This just in....
Alan Houser (troop24@EMF.NET)
Thu, 5 Aug 1999 09:44:26 -0700
Darrell Clakley <Clakley@AOL.COM> wrote (in part):
>You may accept a homosexual as a leader for your son, but I, for one, do not
>want my sons to have a homosexual leader. My Bible tells me clearly to avoid
>the very appearance of evil, and I view the homosexual lifestyle to be
>deviant and immoral--clearly against the values that the Boy Scouts and its
>members embrace.
>This could open the doors to making churches "ordain" homosexuals as
>preachers. Heaven forbid!!! I do not force my beliefs on homosexuals and I
>sure do not want this group of people to tell me I have to accept them as
>leaders in an organization to which I am part.
I was going to stay out of this, but I can't let this go by. There
are a number of denominations of Christian churches as well as other
religious faiths that do indeed ordain gays and lesbians as clergy
and who do not demonize them.
According to my Bible, eating pork and shellfish is an abomination
before the Lord. Should BSA enforce that commandment on all its
members? If it is acceptable to use your religious beliefs to
define my membership in BSA, why shouldn't BSA use mine to define
yours?
BSA is not the only organization struggling to deal with internal
conflicts over this issue, it just happens to be a very public one
that professes to have a unified membership on the issue when it
does not.
YiS,
Alan R. Houser ** troop24@emf.net
** Scoutmaster, Troop 24, Berkeley, California **
** Committee Member, Crew 24, Berkeley, California **
** Boy Scout Roundtable Commissioner, Herms District **
** WWW page ** http://www.emf.net/~troop24/t24.html **
