Airmen, guardians must update their religious affiliation under narrowed list

Airmen and guardians must choose from a new, sharply condensed list of religious affiliations this fall after the Pentagon reduced roughly 180 faith and belief codes to 31.

The Department of the Air Force announced last month that it is replacing its “Faith and Belief Codes” with standardized “Religious Affiliation Codes” established across the Defense Department.

Active-duty airmen and guardians have until Oct. 16 to review and update their religious affiliation in the Virtual Military Personnel Flight, or vMPF, said a Sept. 25 statement from the Air Force Personnel Center.

Security Forces airmen bow their heads in prayer during a National Police Week event at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., May 13, 2024. (Alyssa Bankston/U.S. Air Force)

Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard members have until Nov. 9.

Those who do not make a selection by the deadline will have their existing designation automatically converted under an approved transition system, according to the Air Force.

The change follows an Aug. 27 memo from the undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, Anthony Tata, that consolidated about 180 existing religious designations into 31 categories.

Twenty-one of those are Christian affiliations. The remaining options include Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, no religion, other religions and not provided.

Under the Pentagon’s conversion list, affiliations including Native American, Heathen, Deist and Wiccan are grouped under other religions.

“As a result of this change, some previously authorized faith and belief designations are no longer individually represented and have been consolidated into broader religious affiliation categories,” said an Aug. 26 administrative message announcing the same change for Marines.

The Marine Corps gave its service members until Sept. 30 to update their records. The Army, Navy and Coast Guard have yet to publish a deadline.

The standardized codes will provide the Chaplain Corps with more accurate demographic information for allocating resources and support, said Richard Anderson, assistant secretary of the Air Force for manpower and reserve affairs.

“Our commitment to the spiritual readiness and religious freedom of every Airman and Guardian remains steadfast,” he said in the Air Force release.

Religious affiliations engraved on identification tags — commonly called dog tags — are not limited to the standardized list, according to the Air Force guidance.

Stars and Stripes has reached out to the Air Force and Pentagon by email seeking additional information about the changes.

The consolidation comes as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is making religion a more prominent issue within the department. On Wednesday, he announced the creation of an Office of Religious Affairs that will report directly to him.

“This is not going to be a paper-pushing shop. It’s going to have real teeth,” Hegseth said during his State of the Force address at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va. “The experts, our chaplains, will finally have an advocate at the highest levels.”