Hiromi

RangerT wrote:

"It sounds like Pappy has created a pre Vatican II Catholic Ranger troop using only what he wants to from the methods of the BSA"

What is this pre-Vatican II Ranger Troop you write of? I never heard of it.

Pappy

Gold Winger,

Thanks for the correction. Duly Noted. I like Boss of the Plains!Our town's founders are refered to as those that "Broke the Priaire", so it fits. We'll go with that.

Pappy

Young Knights of the Empire

by Sir Robert Baden-Powell

http://meritbadge.net/books/YoungKnightsOfTheEmpire/part14.htm

Interesting thread.

"..I had the pleasure, too, of meeting the Chief Scout of Belgium, Dr. de Page, the director of a splendid hospital for Belgian soldiers given by the people of Great Britain. His three sons are Scouts, two of them serving in the Army, and the youngest doing his bit in the workshop attached to the hospital--where they make their own instruments, such as scalpels, scissors, etc.

Finally, I had an interview with King Albert of Belgium. He told me that "he considered the Movement one of the best steps of modern times for the education of the boy. His own son is an enthusiastic Scout, and the Belgian boys who had taken it up were quite changed for the better, and had done valuable service in the war. The war had been a high test for it, but had proved that our training gave the very best foundation for making good soldiers--by developing the right spirit and intelligence as well as physical strength and activity."

I have a100 percent uniformed organization.

The Boy Scouts just formed their own patrol last night (six Boy Scouts).

The Cub Scouts have been put into two dens of 7 each. The only deviation from BSA proper uniforms is that everyone at my CO's scouting organization wears the Khaki Tan and either Campaign cover or green baseball cap ( depending on the activity).

Yesterday the newly formed Dens and Patrol voted on individualized neckerchiefs, designed there own Den and Patrol flags, mottos, and yells. (Allowing a lot of patrol culture into the den experience).

My female ASM has volunteered to help me sew the new 32 inch traditional neckers. The boy scouts voted on pitch black necker. There patrol name in Anonymous. Their patrol motto is Qui sono noi? (Italian boy in the troop told them it is Italian for Who are we?. Their flag will have a big question mark as its symbol.

The Cub Scout dens chose Forest Green and Navy Blue. They are the Cobras and the Anacondas. Their mottos are "Do or Die!" (From the George M. Cohan song I suppose!) and "Good scouts make good leaders."

Each Den has two Denners. The Scout patrol are all Den chiefs (red, blue, and gold double chord) with one boy voted as Den Chief in charge of Denners.

We now hold both joint and separate meetings.

This change was made in large part by the input I have received from the contributors on this site. Thanks fellas and ladies, especially Beava, Old GRey Eagle, Lisabob, Nessmuk, and (I grudgingly admit) Bob White .

The boys were ecstatic about the changes and glad to see my role in the unit diminished as theirs has increased (Isn't that what John the Baptist said about JC??)

Anyways- the boys love their uniforms- they really love their new patrol leader patches and shoulder chords - we call them foogareys from the French. (I cant find the right spelling on that!)

I really do not like scouting without uniforms. It feels wrong and way too casual. The CO school is uniformed- so the boys and their families are already acclimatized to uniform culture.

The public seems pretty enamored of my boys and their khaki tans and campaign covers (Smokey bear hats). I suppose it is because it is reminiscent of something older in American culture. It is also a very clean and handsome ensemble, and the boys wear it with pride.

Also- I think it imporatant that adult leadership have a full uniform as well, as we do.

Pappy

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Yeh Dan,

You guys all sound pretty gay to me, but I won't assume you are homos. And if you were, I wouldnt think any less of you. But I just think that there is little practical difference between gay boys camping together and hetero boys and girls camping together.

I wouldn't let my sons go camping with girls- because I have sense enough to understand that this is an opportunity for sex. Sam goes with a unit that openly welcomes gay scouting.

It is just common sense. If you want to keep the sex act away from scouting (And I think we should)- do your best to curb the opportunity and the temptation.

I am opposed to coed as much as I am opposed to homosexual scouting because kids shouldnt be having sex and shouldnt be put in situations that make it too easy to do it.

I am not afraid of gays. But I think it is the Gay argument that is insinuating itself into scouting- not scouting insinuating itself into gay-culture.

Pappy

I found the ceremony when I first witnessed it t be pretty ridiculous. Especially since as Christians of European ancestry we have rituals and symbols that actually hold actual meaning and relevance to our scouts.

The romance of Indjuns and Cowboys and Knights and Soldiers is all real for boys, as Bob White alluded to. But I for one do not appreciate the Disney aspect to Cub Scouting. And as many of you know- I have edited our Cub Scouting experience to fit what I believe our COs mission is- The Formation of Christian Men.

We replace the imagery of current Cub Scouting with the illustrations from early scouting. We replace the blue and gold uniforms with the Khaki Tans and campaign hats of yester-year.

Our ceremonies have a very military and or Roman Catholic bent- all heavy on Chivalry and Service for God. I have had the boys hold vigil in the Chapel and before the Holy presence and pray to be better scouts. We light candles, have our parish priest bless us, have our boats launched with formal blessings, etcetera.

When we pray it is always hats off and bent knees.

Our meetings often end with lowering the flag slowly while the bugler plays taps.

This is all in an attempt to connect the community's culture, faith, and scouting into a single fabric.

Boys are capable of a high degree of spiritual intelligence- and sacred symbols, rituals, and actions can be both appreciated by boys and embraced as part of their identity. We dont have to introduce shallow symbols like fake arrows and Halloween-costumed phony Indians when we have available to us Sacred Scripture- and a real historical tradition of Saints, Martyrs, Patriots, and Heroes.

Instead of fake Indjun Chief, how about Charles the Hammer- who fended of the Islamic Horde from its attempt at invading Europe through Spain. Instead of Baloo the Bear, how about American Patriots like Patrick Henry or Paul Revere (who was the model of preparedness) or Colonel Henry Knox, the young Boston bookseller who had led a small group of men on a 300-mile journey from Boston to Fort Ticonderoga in New York State. Once there, the party disassembled cannon taken when the British surrendered the fort and retreated to Canada in May 1775. In less than two months time, Knox and his men moved 60 tons of artillery across lakes and rivers, through ice and snow to Boston. On March 7th, 2,000 Continental soldiers maneuvered the guns to a hill overlooking the city. The British had no choice but to evacuate Boston. Colonel Knox is the model of resourcefulness and American know-how).

We Americans all have various treasures of Tradition and History and truth- why the phony non-sense?

Pappy

LisaBob,

I never argued that BSA is monolithic. Who has? Bob White? Old Grey Eagle? Beava?

No- I can't think of anybody I have read on this forum.

I think the myth of the monolith is problematic if it is actually believed in. I think we all pretend that we are part of the same movement because there is a fear of the reality that we are all actually just faking something that shouldn't be faked.

We shouldn't be afraid. We should just all be more creative and more assertive and more loyal to our core values. And if that loyalty leads us down different paths- so be it. I think America can handle a plurality of different scouting movements. I think the problem is that BSA is too darned monopolistic. That is kind of un-American in and of itself. (And dont start descending on this post with all the Venture/Crew and CO stuff making BSA as diverse as the wind driven snow thats bull). . America can handle many scouting movements, just like America can handle a great deal of balkanization. But we should drop the pretenses and build scouting corps that get people excited about scouting again be they gay, communists, godless, or whatever. Let them just do it the way they want to do it and stop pretending that we can all do scouting together.

Pappy

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LisaBob,

My faith guides me that I fear no man. And I can assure you that I dont fear Homosexuals.

But I do fear that we are letting go of our God-given duty to parent our children. I think that the concerns I had about scouting and sexuality are not the same as fears.

I do fear that radical liberals are having a deleterious effect on generations of Americans.

I do fear that while most of America slumbers a radicalized and organized and educated element are doing their darndest to overcome the best values in America and on Earth.

I do fear that Godlessness leaves openings for the worst forms of evil conduct.

But my fears are all allayed by Gods grace- which helps me to be calm amidst a raging sea.

The canard you raise of calling me Homophobic is no less a cheap epitaph than calling someone a Nazi. I do not fear Homosexuals- , as I said; I am mandated to actually love them as Gods children. But the inclination to want to give other men oral pleasure, or to partake in sodomy, are issues that will arise in scouting- no matter how asexual you want to pretend the boys are.

To my thinking Coed heterosexual scouting is as dumb as single sex Homosexual scouting. (Unless you drop the law on sexual conduct during camping- and dont make judgments about fornication amongst teens and preteens).

On moral grounds- what are the grounds for BSAs prohibition on sexual activity during camp outs? By whose moral code? Is it secular? What is the logic? Why not let the boys have their fun- whos getting hurt? You think two gay boyfriends who join a troop and bunk together arent going to get it on? Are you so nave? We already know that boys often join scouting to be with their friends. And we know how sexually aggressive teenage boys can be. So why do we keep pretending that homosexual youth are somehow more discretionary in their sexual conduct? Why two standards?

I have explained my views on what Manliness is or at least should aspire to more than most on this site. And I never said it had anything to do with sexual appetite or proclivity. I wasnt the one who kept on bringing up Monty Python and SNL gags snickering about manliness as latent homosexuality.

I think you, and the rest, who are in agreement, ought to bring this up at the next jamboree maybe after President Obama gives a rousing speech to the scouts on hope and BSAs timeless values. In the spirit of a big fat inclusive tent you can make the proclamation that Boy Scouting is now open to everyone, whether they are gay or straight, believers or atheist, republicans or communists.

Im sure the scouts and their leaders attending the Jamboree will come out in your defense- (seeing that you believe that it is you and your ilk that are in the vast majority).

Yeh, have fun with that. But I advise you to wear your best running shoes as you make a bee line for the hills they'll have you heading for.

Pappy

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Lisabob,

You seem to always be extolling the virtues of a properly followed BSA organization you really want me to believe that you represent the majority of good-scouting practices that exists out there in the ether and yet you seem to hold its policy on homosexuality in contempt. Wow. You want to have your cake and eat it too.

Why doesn't BSA just come out and open up to Atheists and Homosexuals LisaBob if it isnt a morality issue? What's the harm?

And Lisa bob, do you honestly believe that homosexual scouts would be any less inclined to break the ban on sexual activity during campouts than would boys and girls sharing tents in a coed camping situation?

It is you and your scouter-ati that are being unreal and unreasonable.

Keeping it hetero- and keeping it same sex- is just plain good horse sense.

Or just maybe, deep down, you also believe this to be true, and you are too petrified of your fellow lefty professors learning that you might hold a belief out of lock-step with theirs. That is a sure fire way of getting yourself UN_invited to the next faculty pot-luck and maybe tenure as well, isn't it?

Pappy

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Packsaddle,

I think what the world statistically thinks is normal- and what is good, beautiful, and true- will always be about 180 degrees out of phase.

I think opening up scouting to all is probably inevitable. But so is opening up pornography to all as well.

The local option for morality and conforming to the word of God will continue as well. And that is why the schism is an inevitable.

And it will probably fall along similar fault lines of the ever widening red state blue state cultural chasm.

Pappy

Yes DanKroh, that would be, let me see- oh yeah - Blue State.

Why should BSA ban sexual conduct during camping?- especially since it would be pretty hard to enforce with the buddy system and scoutmasters not allowed in boys's tents. Oh yeh, I forgot- "Scouts Honor, Scoutmaster Ken, Bruce and I didn't share sleeping bags last night." That works so well with kids in general- why wouldn't it work with BSA?

Pappy's solution -- Salt Peter for all!

It worked for my Dad's expeditionary force in the Philippines.

Pappy

Pappy

So Merlyn,

That being said, are you for pro-orgy scouting as well? And if you are not- by what moral standard do you have the right to ban this type of behavior- since nothing is normal or abnormal in yours and Packsaddles alternate universe?

The idea of with-holding self-gratification is at the core of scouting and nobility (Being helpful to OTHERS at all times).

IF we embrace all gratification as being acceptable then what a group of scouters or scouts do in the privacy of their own tent or behind that yonder ridge, should be nobodies business. If that is the case- then we might as well have scouting be coed so we can maximize the opportunity for fun and self-expression.

The reality is- kids should not be having sex. If you disagree with this moral stand, then where do you begin to add caveats?

And if straight scouts and their families and COs realize that scouting has gone the way of rest stops then what will that do to enrollment and FOS support?

Pappy

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DanKroh,

I am not an expert on this issue of transgender. And I found the Wikipedia article very educational.

But I do have a problem with identity politics. It lends itself to balkanization. And I have noticed that many groups make their particular sexual orientation the focus of their identity. I think this is troublesome.

You also mentioned that heterosexuals can exhibit sexual deviance. I agree- sexual deviance is pretty universal. But an open adulterer is as much of a problem to a community of scouters as would be a Homosexual player. They are a destabilizing influences on the formation of normative values a community comes around such as marriage an sexual abstinence.. An open adulterer- or a closeted adulterer- whether Homo or Hetero is a pariah and should be unwelcome to an organization promoting contrary values.

I know that you have written about all the seemingly normal everyday varieties of homosexuals who lead lives like most normal heterosexuals but the exponents of the hedonism found in many clubs would probably not put themselves in this category.

Come out and say it --DO you want scouting to be open and admitting of gays or not? But the idea of norming this behavior is ridiculous: IT IS abnormal by its very definition.

So what we are really advocating is a boy scouting that would have no moral ground to say that boys who buddy up shouldnt participate in friendly behavior such as mutual masturbation- oral and anal relations, and group antics. After all- there is no harm done if it is consensual, right?

This is what this is all leading to. Why shouldnt a boy want to satisfy himself with another boy especially if the other boys are willing to reciprocate the actions?

And what of the boy or boys who are left out of all the fun?

This is itself a huge Pandoras box. (No pun intended to Pandora).

Pappy

I think this wikipedia article does a pretty good job of explaining the defition and history and issues of normalizing trangenderism and identity around sexual orientation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender

But the issue, ladies and gents, is in the "normalizing" of things. If we make everything ok, then what does not become "OK" are the faith traditions that do in fact discriminate about appropriatness.

A value-judgement-free world with its laws that mandates to protect it becomes a world at odds with a "timeless values" world view - i.e. scouting and many faith traditions and one could argue The United States and its founding principles which invoke authority from God.

So it is the radical left that is playing games and trying to change the rules and the realities- not the conservatives.

Red State/ Blue State Scouting seems to be manifesting itself pretty clearly on this and a few other threads of late!

I say we encourage this discussion among the District Round tables and Committee meetings of PAcks and Troops and Crews across the nation. Hold on to your packsaddle- it's going to be a bumpy ride!

Pappy

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I fully understand Packsaddle, that when you say that life-style is not a part of your BSA program. But we are dealing with boys - who are often pretty obsessed with all things sexual. They are looking for answers and models of conduct.

I don't hate people - and my Church mandates that I love all God's children. But if someone's lifestyle is at odds with the beliefs of a community, and that community has a values organization in place to promote and nurture those values, don't you think a problem might arise?

Also- if a scoutmaster was openly an apostate - he probably would have no chance being a scout leader in many units whose CO was a church group. So I guess don't ask don't tell applies to Atheists as well. How about members of organizations promoting the relations of men and male youth? How about a don't ask don't tell about members of the Communist party or KKK? How about openly pro-abortionist scout leaders?

I was pretty excoriated a month ago by a forum moderator for not upholding the scout oath by not adhering to the letter of the scout oath and following the guidelines for scouting. How is hiding one's life-style scout-like?

When Scoutmaster Ken invites his friend Steve along on a campout and the discussion gets going along the lines of faith, or sexuality, or politics, or you name it - can't you imagine an interesting situation developing? So the boys are all in their tents thinking to themselves- I wonder what act Scoutmaster Ken and his buddy Steve are performing this instant? It kind of wreaks havoc on the term buddy system.

I think that your assertion that BSA has already become Canadian under the radar and just pretending to be towing a Texan party line is troubling. I say once again- let everyone come out of the closet and choose sides and make their own scouting organizations and stop all the sneaking around and pretending to be a movement in name only.

The radical liberals can gleefully pronounce the inevitability of so called progress and that the new normal will include transgender relations, trans-age relations, trans-species relations, and a socialized egalitarian neutered utopia like Denmark.

But you wont see it in promotional materials why not?: Because of the fear of losing Neanderthals like Nessmuk and Pappy??

Pappy

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Bob,

Yes, both, precisely.

Hi Bob,

I said that I don't blame the culture war or any one else for my failures at retention and recruitment. I blame myself. In fact- you might be glad to hear that I have been moviing my two units which have been unconventional and consolidated into a more conventional bifuracted BSA state. I will manitain an advanced Denner leadership experience because I believe this has been a very good experience for the boys.

I fully plan on recieveing my woodbadge and cope training. I have not rejected BSA. I have merely allowed my own judgement and taste to guide me in my efforts of forming a unit for my CO. (One of the pitfalls of being a visual artist is that your romance and superfiscialty sometimes gets the best of you!I was very enamored of the paintings of Norman Rockwell and many of my early efforts was to get my unit looking and acting like those pictures.)

I readily admit that I have never been a very good team player. I have a lot of my own ideas about things, and this may or may not be a good skill set for the ideal scout leader. But as I have grown in this roile, I have come to see the logic and beauty of much of what BSA does.

And I am not trying to create a movement or sell anyone on what I have been doing with my unit.

And the school that is my CO has 8 grades to pull from (we have tigers), and from those 8 grades of 200 children there are about 100 boys. So when in my hay day we had 42 scouts we had a significat portion of the male student body. With that number came excrutiating difficulty for me in many respects. I wasn't prepared for that kind of growth. Not keeping that number and losing one clique of 5th grade boys in particular was one of the most difficult experinces I had as a scouter. It was very hard.

But we built up a new corps group from the ashes, with parents who "got" what we were tring to do- as imperfect as it was. ANd now I have parents and kids who seem more solid and our unit is friendlier and more communicative. I don't know if this makes sense.

ANyways- We are in the process of bifurcating and allowing the Boy Scouts to form a boy run patrol and have separated meetings, elections, and everything else entailed in a traditional Scout unit. But in addition to being Boy Scouts proper, they will be Denners.

Pappy(This message has been edited by Pappy)

HI Bob,

I have a pretty moderately successful unit for my area. I have seen two packs dissolve over the same period of time in my town. Some long established by the book troops have had plummeting numbers.

I only blame myself for my numbers (Average of 20- currently 20)- not the culture war. Before I took over the Pack and formed a Troop where none had ever existed scouting was pretty much non existent at my CO. Now we have a highly visible after-school scouting program. While our older boy retention is not high, we are pulling more and more tigers and cubs into our unit then ever before and this year we are bifurcating the unit so the boy scouts have a more independent Patrol group and only a partial Denner function.

But like I told you- I only recruit from my CO population and the home school community through word of mouth. In that regards, I have 1/8th the male population of grades 1 through 8. I don't know how that compares to national statistics for a grade school. But like I said, around here it is like a scouting dessert.

But if you noticed Bob, I never ask you about how you run a troop. I take whatever ideas you have to share based on their merits, not on what kind of a Scoutmaster I think you might be.

And if your answer to the culture war is to run a Boy Scout Troop by adhering to the Aims and Methods of Scouting manual, then thanks for your contribution to this thread. That is certainly doing your part in forming boys into men.

Pappy

You are right, Old Grey Eagle, that the Battle of Pork Chop Hill refers to a pair of related Korean War engagements during the spring and summer of 1953. These actions, occurring as the conflict was drawing towards a negotiated armistice, were controversial in the United States because of heavy loss of life in battles for terrain of no apparent strategic or tactical value. (One could say that the energy fighting the Boy Scouts can be seen as such a fight).

The first battle was described in a book of the same name by S.L.A. Marshall, from which was made the film Pork Chop Hill.

The first battle ended with a United Nations victory as the Chinese broke contact after two days of battle and withdrew. The second battle involved significantly more troops on both sides and was hotly contested for five days before United Nations Command conceded the battle to the Chinese forces and withdrew behind the main battle line.

So yes, battles can be won and they can be refought and lost. That is why vigilance is so important. Pork Chop Hill had no real military or strategic value- but it was the site of a conflagration between to beligerent forces. It had symbolic importance. It was a place where a line in the sand was drawn.

I thought it was an apt metaphor.

Pappy

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Hey Bob,

How do you know how much luck I have been having with my scouting unit? Have you been speaking to your 'Friend' at Illowa Council again? Havent you already learned that you cant always believe what you here from that guy?

The relative success or failure of my little Scouting unit has really nothing to do with any arguments I have presented on this thread. Youre the one who has argued for a credibility litmus test for posters in this forum.

What should the minimum retention and recruitment requirement of a Scouters unit be for them to be eligible to contribute Bob? (Assuming the forum member is a scouter with a unit).

I run my unit mostly along BSA lines. I have a substantially larger denner program for my Boy Scouts than most units- but this is hardly radical or conservative. The military elements I introduced are there to keep the boys motivated and organized. And we have argued on other threads the relative merit of this approach.

So I would appreciate sticking to the thread at hand- and not making it about me or my Cub or Boy Scout unit and the way it is or is not run.

Pappy

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Old Grey Eagle,

I don't think being a liberal or a conservative should have anything to do with scouting. But the scouts, along with many of our institutions, are under (cultural) fire by an organized and highly motivated movement with a programme of deconstructing the republic along "identity political lines."

I personally would love to see BSA successful amongst all American so-called groups. I think it is an incorrect point of view to put BSA in this fight. But their is a programme to balkanize America along identity lines, and this bodes poorly for BSA.

The conservatives didn't preemtively put their faith or their love of country or scouting into a culture war. The shifting sands of the political landscape turned something as apparently wholesome and uncontroversial as boy scouting into something seen as seedy, fascistic, and highly controversial. It was the left that made scouting into a lightening rod, not the right. (Not historical revision- Lisabob.)

The right has only recently begun to fight back in the media and on the ground against the lefts' stranglehold on academia with the actions of such men as David Horowitz.

The world changed - not scouting. Its values are timeless, and some of those values are what infuriate the far-left. (Not your FDR/JFK/LBJ/Lieberman types of democrats but the new Lefts brand of Democrats that are fighting a culture war against the perceived hegemonic-bogey man of white male imperialist capitalist environmentally ruinous religiously intolerant culture. The Maxine Waters/ AL Gore/ Michael Moore variety).

I don't see right wing watchdog groups and attorneys trying to squeeze out groups that don't share conservative values. Unless aborting children is a liberal activity.)

I've looked for these groups. I want to sign up.

And Packsaddle. Are you pulling my halter chain? What is Culture?

In the American Northern Midwest at least, culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate,") generally refers to patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance.(Like scouting, rituals and rights of passage, etc.)

Different definitions of "culture" reflect different theoretical bases for understanding, or criteria for evaluating, human activity. (Marxists might see culture as radically different as do most red-blooded bible reading Americans- they do not make many of the same basic suppositions about what constitutes relevant history- values, social institutions, etc.)).

Culture is manifested in music, literature, painting and sculpture, theater and film and other things (Like scouting Although some people identify culture in terms of consumption and consumer goods (as in high culture, low culture, folk culture, or popular culture) anthropologists understand "culture" to refer not only to consumption goods, but to the general processes which produce such goods and give them meaning, and to the social relationships and practices in which such objects and processes become embedded. For them, culture thus includes technology, art, science, as well as moral systems.

Anthropologists most commonly use the term "culture" to refer to the universal human capacity to classify, codify and communicate their experiences symbolically. This capacity has long been taken as a defining feature of the humans. That is why the best place to influence a change in culture and to subvert the norms we take for granted is to employ legions of professors and school teachers to indoctrinate our youth. It is also the reason why forming children is so important - children are formable- and correct schooling- spiritual formation and scouting (Wholesome instructive play) are vital to a strong nations' future.

Pappy- with help from his friend Wikipedia.

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Seven Signs of a Falling Nation

No government, kingdom or society lasts forever. Here are seven factors that contributed to ancient Romes demisewarning signs that exist today within the nations of the American and British peoples.

By Bruce A. Ritter

http://www.realtruth.org/articles/070831-002-ssoafn.html?cid=EMAF001

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Bob,

Why would you assume that culture wars can never end? I agree that they may turn into long and protracted holding actions, but wars often have victors.

"Never in our time?" I dont think the Civil Wars toll on this nation could have been foreseen by the culture warriors of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

American Leftists were blind to Stalins barbaric evil even when they saw it with their own eyes.

Rwandans were dealing with a culture war until it started using machetes.

There is real power to change our nation in the public schools. If the left continues to train- certify, and promote teachers and write the curriculum, how long will it be until our frog begins to cook?

I would not assume that this culture war is a safe status quos which holds no real consequence and no tangible outcomes.

You can defeat a nation without firing a shot. You can kill its spirit by turning its children against their parents.

I have seen first hand the promotion of hatred and mistrust and condescension towards the family, parents, the military, the boy scouts, Christians, and even God - in reputable colleges and Universities - and all in the name of an enlightened cosmopolitanism.

Sin is pass. So too is patriotism, belief in God, and the American Dream.

They see the enemy in the American middleclass bourgeois consumer who is using up the planet's resources and in doing so warming it and ruining it for everyone else and the polar bears.

This kind of insanity is becoming entrenched as a common intellectual currency in the academies and the high schools and will soon be fully infiltrating the grammar schools.

But working on bettering our own scout units is doing our part as well Bob. With that I fully concur!

As I have mentioned part of the preparedness I teach my scouts is to be ready to wage spiritual battle with a tenacious opponent. We recite the prayer to Saint Michael after every meeting. It is a martial prayer. And these boys get it that evil is real. It is we adults that so often try and tidy things up by pretending not to notice the 700 pound drooling fiend in the corner.

Now lock and load men- Hannibal is at the Gates!!

Pappy

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Excerpted from On My Honor: Boy Scouts and the Making of American Youth by Jay Mechling, published by the University of Chicago Press. 2001

"The religious conservatives who control the national office of the Boy Scouts see themselves as important troops in the culture wars. If religion, masculinity, and citizenship are as tangled as the rhetoric of the Boy Scouts and others seems to make them and if, as so many historians and social critics have suggested, there is evidence everywhere of a "crisis in white masculinity," a status revolution in which white males feel like the beleaguered class, then it makes sense that the men running the Boy Scouts see the atheists and their ACLU lawyers as agents of an assault upon masculinity and whiteness (symbolized by certain European religions and the very American religion of Mormonism). The link between white masculinity and religion at century's end explained why the Boy Scouts would not make this compromise, while the Girl Scouts would; the Girl Scouts, quite simply, have no stake in the masculinity part of the tangle."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-08-10-europe-religion-cover_x.htm

From USA TODAY

Religion takes a back seat in Western Europe

"The separation between church and state in Europe is becoming standard. After vigorous debate, European leaders rejected any mention of the role of Christianity in a new constitution for the 25 European Union countries. Italy's nominee for justice minister of the EU, Rocco Buttiglione, was rejected because he was openly religious and condemned homosexuality.

Asked by USA TODAY about the consequences of the decline of religion, Buttiglione said, "If we ignore our pasts and try to create a Godless society where things like money or ambition or property are worshiped, then the society loses. ... It is a battle we are fighting at the current time.""

"In 1900, almost everyone in Europe was Christian. Now, three out of four people identify themselves as adherents to Christianity. At the same time, the percentage of Europeans who say they are non-religious has soared from less than 1% of the population to 15%. Another 3% say they don't believe in God at all, according to the Center for the Study of Global Christianity.

In 12 major European countries, 38% of people say they never or practically never attend church, according to the World Values Survey in 2000. France's 60% non-attendance rate is the highest in that group. In the USA, only 16% say they rarely go to church."