Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth invited Pastor Doug Wilson, a 72-year-old Idaho preacher who has called for repealing the 19th Amendment and described women as "the kind of people that people come out of", to deliver a 15-minute sermon at the Pentagon on February 17, broadcast live on the department's internal television network.

The sermon was part of a voluntary monthly Christian worship service Hegseth started at the Pentagon. The Department of Defense's rapid response account posted a photo on X showing Hegseth with his hand on Wilson's shoulder, captioned: "We have gathered at the Pentagon for our monthly worship service. We are One Nation Under God."

The invitation drew complaints from active-duty service members, veterans, and defense contractors, Newsmax reported, citing Military.com's account that the invitation was sent with a cross symbol from "SECWAR." Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson defended the event, saying Hegseth "along with millions of Americans, is a proud Christian and was glad to welcome Pastor Wilson to the Pentagon today."

For critics on the left, the episode is a ready-made outrage. For those who believe the nation's military leaders are entitled to their faith, and that voluntary worship services violate no one's rights, the controversy looks like something else entirely: another round of elite discomfort with open Christianity in public life.

Who is Doug Wilson?

Wilson is the founder of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, a small but outspoken denomination rooted in Moscow, Idaho. He first drew broad national attention during a CNN interview in August 2025, where he made the remark about women that set off a media firestorm.

His theology is unapologetically patriarchal. In that CNN appearance, Wilson said: "The wife and mother, who is the chief executive of the home, is entrusted with three or four or five eternal souls." He has supported repealing the 19th Amendment and has said that "ordinarily, the vote is cast by the head of the household, the husband and father, because we're patriarchal and not egalitarian," AP News reported.

Those views are polarizing. They are also, in Wilson's telling, pastoral rather than political. He told reporters he avoids policy discussions with Hegseth: "Nobody voted for me, so if I have communication with him, I want it to be pastoral."

Wilson described Hegseth's personal transformation in blunt terms. "I would say his prior life was pretty raggedy," Wilson said. "God can do what he likes and as we should know by now, what he likes to do is to take the most unlikely materials and do something glorious with it."

Hegseth's connection to Wilson's church network

The relationship between Hegseth and Wilson's movement is not new. It traces back to a 2022 documentary project, after which Hegseth moved his family to Tennessee so his children could attend a CREC-affiliated school. He now attends Pilgrim Hill Reformed Fellowship near Nashville, whose pastor, Brooks Potteiger, prayed at a Pentagon service Hegseth hosted.

When Hegseth shared a CNN video about the CREC on social media, Wilson interpreted the gesture as an endorsement. "He was, in effect, reposting it and saying, 'Amen,' at some level," Wilson said.

Hegseth has been open about his faith in his public role. He has declared America's founding rooted in Christian principles at public events and drawn both praise and criticism for asking Americans to pray for the troops.

At the Pentagon worship service, Hegseth praised Wilson directly from the stage: "Thank you for your leadership, your mentorship for the things you've started, the truth you've told, the willingness to be bold. It's the type of thing we are trying to exercise here."

The backlash, and who's driving it

Senator Tammy Duckworth, an Iraq War veteran and Democrat, condemned Wilson's views in sharp terms:

"These views are antiquated, flat out wrong and, more dangerously, designed to justify discrimination and mistreatment of women, including those who sacrifice in uniform to defend Americans."

Kris Fuhr, co-founder of the Women in the Service Coalition, called the invitation "beyond inappropriate" given Wilson's views on women. One unnamed contractor described the event as "stark, depressing, almost threatening."

Calvin University history professor Kristin du Mez framed it in broader cultural terms. Breitbart, citing the Associated Press, reported du Mez's assessment: "Pete Hegseth is kind of the poster boy for this militant Christianity and militant patriarchy."

Wilson's church network has not been shy about its ambitions in Washington. CREC pastor Joe Rigney told reporters: "Our effort is to go to DC and to remind anybody who will listen from top to bottom, from cabinet secretaries and senators down to baristas and housewives, that Jesus is Lord." Hegseth attended the first service of Christ Church Washington, a new D.C. congregation created by Wilson's Idaho-based denomination.

The backlash is real, but it follows a familiar pattern. National Review's Michael Brendan Dougherty noted that "a controversy over a pastor's comments about the Muslim call to prayer is a familiar one," drawing a historical analogy to public religious disputes involving English Catholics in the early 20th century. The implication: the outrage cycle over religious figures in public life is not new, and the intensity often says more about the critics than the clergyman.

Wilson on Iran and the language of war

The controversy extends beyond gender roles. Wilson spoke to The Times about the U.S. conflict with Iran, using language that will alarm secularists and comfort those who see the regime in Tehran as a genuine threat to civilization.

"Iran really is a wicked, wicked place," Wilson said. "The leadership there is terrible. I think the language is appropriate if we're in a war with them. It is appropriate to fight aggressively and speak of it in that way." He described Iran as an "evil entity" and referred to the Middle East as the "Bible part of the world."

Wilson compared the conflict to the Crusades, but stopped just short of embracing the term. "I wouldn't call it the Fifth Crusade, because we are not explicitly Christian enough," he said. "But the Muslims think of it as a Crusade."

Hegseth himself has used religious language in military contexts. At a Pentagon prayer session, he asked "the Almighty" to "grant this task force clear and righteous targets for violence" and to "let every round find its mark." He concluded: "Break the teeth of the ungodly." Those words, drawn from Psalm 3, are the kind of martial prayer that has accompanied Western armies for centuries. Whether they belong in a modern Pentagon briefing room is a question the critics and the faithful will answer differently.

Hegseth has faced impeachment articles from an Arizona Democrat amid the Iran conflict, and his willingness to pray publicly has drawn sharp media criticism, criticism the White House has pushed back against forcefully.

The real question underneath the noise

Wilson's views on women and voting are, by any modern standard, far outside the mainstream. His critics have every right to say so. But a voluntary worship service, attended by choice, not by order, is not a policy directive. It is not a change to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. It is not a memo restricting women's roles.

The complaints from some service members and contractors deserve to be heard. So does the fact that millions of Americans hold traditional religious views and do not expect their leaders to hide them. The First Amendment protects the free exercise of religion. It does not guarantee that no one in government will ever say something a senator finds "antiquated."

Wilson himself seems to understand the distinction. He said he prayed for "a black swan revival", not a policy change, not a legislative agenda, but a spiritual awakening. "Take a prayer meeting at the Pentagon for a possible example," he added.

Wilson's past comments have drawn scrutiny before. His pastor has come under fire for podcast remarks about a Texas Democrat, and the CREC's expanding footprint in Washington ensures that scrutiny will continue.

The left's objection is not really that a pastor preached at the Pentagon. Chaplains have done that since the founding. The objection is that this particular pastor holds views progressives find intolerable, and that the Defense Secretary agrees with enough of them to call the man a mentor. That is a policy argument dressed up as a church-state crisis.

When the government compels worship, Americans should resist. When a cabinet secretary invites a pastor to a voluntary prayer service and thanks him publicly, that is something else. It is called freedom, and the people most offended by it tend to be the ones least interested in protecting it for anyone but themselves.