Pentagon removes 180 faiths from US military recognised religions list

The Pentagon has officially removed 180 faiths from the US military’s recognised religions list, dramatically reducing the number of approved religious affiliations for service members.

According to Military.com, the Department of War now recognises just 31 faith codes, down from more than 200 previously used by the US Military Chaplain Corps.

The change was confirmed in a memo issued on Thursday by Undersecretary of Defense Anthony Tata.

The memo stated that the revised list would “streamline the DoW collection of religious preferences for service members to enhance the delivery of targeted religious support from the Chaplaincy.”

“The new list will provide chaplains with clear, readily available information that will better enable them to anticipate the religious support needs of service members and to provide religious support activities that align with service members’ personal faith and practices,” Tata added.

The updated list still includes Agnostics, Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Jews and Sikhs, alongside several Christian denominations including Baptists, Catholics, Lutherans and Methodists.

War Secretary Pete Hegseth defended the decision earlier this year, saying: “The previous system had ballooned to well over 200 faith codes.… It was impractical and unusable, and many codes were never used at all.”

The Pentagon has also instructed military chaplains to replace rank insignia with religious insignia as part of the broader reforms.