Washington DC - Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is scrambling to fix a bizarre gaffe the Department of Defense made when it redefined the religions that service members can register as being on their personnel records.

The DOD's decision to slash the number of religious identities that service members can register as – down from 200 to 31 – has sparked anger and condemnation across the political divide.

"The goal of this effort is to simplify a previously out-of-control 'belief' coding system that had ballooned to over 200 codes," the DOD explained in a Monday post to X.

"In order to clarify the work of chaplains, and simplify the work of commanders, the Pentagon has consolidated and simplified the list to roughly thirty codes – using the previously used labels for faiths," it wrote.

Donald Trump Cost of Trump's ballroom jumps again as report exposes taxpayer funding

The list – which was first released to the media last week – contains 22 variations on Christianity and few alternative options, with most other religions boiled down to singular options on the list.

It was Mormon Republican Senator Mike Lee, however, who went into a complete meltdown about having no specific option for his religious sect.

"It's just repugnant to any sense of decency, any sense of our common heritage and our common belief that the government needs to not weigh in on doctrinal disputes between various religious denominations," Lee raged.

In a follow-up, he revealed that he'd phoned President Donald Trump to speak with him about the matter.

The DOD scrambled to respond, adding an updated version of the list, which includes the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the statement it released on Monday.

"I agree with this statement, and am grateful to [DOD Secretary] Hegseth for correcting the error," Lee wrote in response.