06/11/2026
What the Department of Defense (aka the Department of War) Did
A memorandum signed by Anthony Tata, Undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness, reduced the military's recognized religious affiliations from more than 200 to just 31. Gone from the list: Atheism, Asatru, Deism, Druidry, Humanism, Paganism, Rosicrucianism, Shamanism, Spiritualism, Unitarianism, Wicca, and over 150 other traditions. What remains is a list dominated by Christian denominations, alongside Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Sikhism.
If your faith does not appear on this list, as far as the military is concerned, it no longer exists:
Agnostic (AN)
Baha'i faith (BH)
Buddhism (BU)
Christian - Assemblies of God (AG)
Christian - Baptist (BA)
Christian - Brethren (BR)
Christian - Catholic (CA)
Christian - Church of Christ (CC)
Christian - Church of God (CG)
Christian - Church of the Nazarene (CN)
Christian - Episcopal/Anglican (EA)
Christian - Evangelical (EV)
Christian - Jehovah's Witnesses (JW)
Christian - Lutheran (LU)
Christian - Methodist (ME)
Christian - Non Denominational (ND)
Christian - Orthodox (OX)
Christian - Other (CO)
Christian - Pentecostal (PE)
Christian - Presbyterian (PR)
Christian - Quaker (QU)
Christian - Reformed (RE)
Christian - Scientist (SC)
Christian - Seventh Day Adventist (SA)
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (CJ)
Hindu (HI)
Islam (Muslim) (IS)
Judaism (Jewish) (JU)
No Religion (NR)
Other Religions (OR)
Sikh (SI)
The official justification, offered by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, is administrative tidiness. The old system had "ballooned to well over 200 faith codes – it was impractical and unusable." He noted that 82% of religiously-identifying service members use only six codes.