Do you people still not understand, what with all the information that’s available at your fingertips these days, that anyone interested in children has nothing to do with their orientation, but are instead pedophiles? So, normal straight women or normal gay men are not a threat to these Boy Scouts. It’s only perverts that are the problem. Duh.
This is just about the most sensible post so far made in this thread.
The next 18-24 months will be a scramble. My large Troop (~75 boys, 40-50 active) is in danger of losing our meeting place with a Missouri Synod Lutheran Church. The Pastor has indicated that they might not resign our Charter this Fall. A few parents are also freaking out about it as well, and talking about leaving Scouting.
On the flip side, a few parents in my Cub Scout pack are now talking about allowing their sons to go into Boy Scouting because of the rule change. Prior to this there were going to stop with Cub Scouts.
My personal church is split. We welcome gays and lesbians, ordain them, etc. (Presbyterian Church USA). However, since the Boy Scouts only took half a step - I don’t know if our Elders would vote to take in my Troop. We also don’t have the storage facilities at our location.
I think membership will continue to decline nationally, and a few older Scouters will retire. In 10-15 years we will hopefully recover.
I expect gay adults to be welcomed in less than 10 years, hopefully 5. THAT will trigger a bigger fight potentially, though could be solved by allowing the Charter orgs to choose their leaders.
Atheists is another question. That one will continue to be a wink and a nod depending on where you live. Bluntly, a lot of units allow a “I am still searching for specifics in spirituality” answer and move along. You only hit a wall when you get a hard core religious type in the Board of Review.
I would be perfectly happy to see less church involvement in Scouting.
My local Scout troop met a Catholic Church. And on my first campout, it was made clear that I had to attend Mass if I intended to remain a Scout in “their” troop. It was my last campout as well.
Probably all for the best, as it was one of the child rape parishes.
The Catholics and Mormons are sticking around, so it is just the risk from the Southern Baptists. I expect a lot of local Southern Baptist churches to push back against their national organization.
Here are the top sponsors of Scout units:
http://www.scouting.org/About/FactSheets/operating_orgs.aspx
I think the OP is worried over a non-issue, especially since his group doesn’t even meet in a SB church.
Whole denominations of Christianity fall on different places on the conservative/liberal scale, and Southern Baptists fall pretty heavily on the conservative side of the scale. Just the designation “Church of Christ” covers a number of different denominations, so that alone doesn’t mean that the church is going to kick his troup out.
If a troop does get kicked out of one church, there should be plenty of others that will be happy to take them in. Unitarian Univeralists, for starters.
Yep, a bit. Young boys being attracted to their teachers and other young women is not at all uncommon. Less common but still in the news every few months is another case of a young, or sometimes not so young, teacher having a sexual relationship with a student or students.
I don’t think that your average gay guy who wanted to be a scout leader has any intentions whatsoever about having sex with the boys. However if someone was uncomfortable with that situation I wouldn’t think that they were bat-shit insane. Personally I can think of a bunch of different people I’d not like my kid around. A gay guy wanting to teach kids about scouting probably wouldn’t crack the top ten behind people like WBC members, birthers, really racist people etc.
This reminds me of the furor when Australian Scouts became fully co-ed. There was outcry that this was the end of the world and how are we going to keep all these randy scouts and scout leaders under control. Scouting in Australia is at historical highs and all the doom sayers are quietly passing away as the world moves on.
If there is enough call in a local area why not approach local council to donate some land and build your own hall? Is this even possible in the US?
Well, June 11 is tomorrow. Fingers crossed that common sense will prevail and the Southern Baptists won’t vote to kick out the scout troops.
This is only at the National Level anyway. Every Southern Baptist church can and will make their own decision. But, obviously a vote at the National Level means something.
We should hear something in the next couple days. Certainly by June 14 the decision will have been made.
Southern Baptists have traditionally been very conservative. My mom likes to remind me that her school didn’t have a prom because Baptists frowned on dancing. They had a Senior Buffet dinner instead. The churches I’ve attended aren’t nearly as strict today. But there’s still that old school conservative element in the Baptists. It just doesn’t represent all the churches like it used to.
If you are worried about this sort of thing, you are essentially operating on the level of someone who is terrified to let their children walk 200 yards to the bus stop because “predators are everywhere” and “you can’t be too safe.”
Yes, rarely a teacher will have a sexual relationship with a student. No, this is not a good reason to stop your child from attending extracurricular activities run by teachers. Or Scout leaders. Of either gender.