Jewish activists and advocates for church-state separation reacted angrily yesterday to new religious conduct guidelines issued by the Air Force, but evangelical Christians praised the new guidance as respectful of the rights of the religious.

The one-page document replaces more detailed interim guidelines issued in August, following complaints that some Christian chaplains, officers and cadets at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo., were proselytizing.

“In official circumstances or when superior/subordinate relationships are involved, superiors need to be sensitive to the potential that personal expressions may appear to be official or have undue influence on their subordinates. Subject to these sensitivities, superiors enjoy the same free exercise rights as all other airmen,” the new guidelines state.

The new rules omit language from the interim guidelines that discouraged public prayer at “staff meetings, office meetings, classes, or officially sanctioned activities such as sports events or practice sessions.”

“This is a sad day,” an Air Force academy graduate who is suing over religious practices there, Michael Weinstein, told The New York Sun. “It’s a very happy day for those who want to Christianize America.”

Mr. Weinstein said the Bush administration succumbed to pressure from the religious right to allow evangelical Christians in the military to seek converts. “This would last three seconds in the private sector,” Mr. Weinstein said. He said the new rules might seem inoffensive but contain coded language to bolster religious activists, including chaplains who want to invoke Jesus during public prayers.

In a statement, the Anti-Defamation League called the new rules “a significant step backwards.”

“This is a lost opportunity,” the group’s national director, Abraham Foxman, said.

The executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Reverend Barry Lynn, said the Air Force should have banned public prayers at all official events. “It appears that the Air Force does not understand that all prayer, including so-called ‘inclusive prayer,’ is an inherently religious activity for which not all staff and cadets wish to be subject to,” Rev. Lynn said.

A spokesman for the National Association of Evangelicals, Kyle Fisk, said his group was delighted with the new guidelines. “Overall, we very much approve,” he said.

Mr. Fisk, whose group has moved to intervene on the government’s behalf in Mr. Weinstein’s lawsuit, said there is no reason to protect service members from receiving information about religion. “We believe our men and women in uniform are adults who can think and process information,” Mr. Fisk said.

An official with a conservative Colorado ministry and advocacy group, Thomas Minnery, said the new guidelines should shield the military against a concerted attack by those aimed at driving religion from public life. “We hope these guidelines will bring an end to the frontal assault on the Air Force by secularists who would make the military a wasteland of relativism, where robust discussion of faith is impossible,” Mr. Minnery, the vice president of government and public policy for Focus on the Family, said.

Mr. Weinstein said those who endorse public religious activity in the Air Force fail to acknowledge the inherent pressures in the military hierarchy. “‘Get out of my face, sir or ma’am,’ from the subordinate to the superior is just not something you can say,” he said. He noted that a top Air Force chaplain told the New York Times last year that chaplains have the right to “evangelize the unchurched.”

The Air Force has moved to dismiss Mr. Weinstein’s lawsuit, asserting that he has no standing to sue. Mr. Weinstein is an Albuquerque, N.M. attorney and 1977 graduate of the academy. Two of his sons have also attended the academy and one is still enrolled.

The federal judge handling the lawsuit, James Parker, has yet to issue a decision on the Air Force’s motion.