Rick_in_CA

Two things: 1) The Totin' Chip is about learning the safe handling of blades, whether in a scouting event or not. So yes, you can loose the corners even at non scouting events. 2) He is your father - that means he has the authority to take away your knife, your favorite t-shirt or your Totin' Chip card. He also has the authority to ground you, take your TV privileges away, praise you, reward you, feed you cake, buy you shoes, love you, worry about you; and yes, even cut a few corners off the Totin' Chip card when you make a mistake. Be very glad you have a father that cares enough to do so. You are actually a lucky kid. Even if it doesn't feel like it.

See the lovely circular logic? All that is required is a belief in God - the BSA refuses to define what constitutes belief in God. That is for the scout and his family to decide. As for A Scout is Reverent, I believe this is the current wording: This doesn't define what God is either. So if someone belongs to a religious faith that doesn't have a god (like many forms of Buddhism) or require a belief in a god (like Unitarianism), who believe they can do their "Duty to God" as their faith defines it, the BSA appears to say they can be members. Which is the situation the OP was in. So to tell the OP: "stop whining, it's all their in black and white" is incorrect.

Trevorum, that's interesting. Does that mean the UUA religious awards might be reinstated? Or is there just too much animosity toward the UUA still in the BSA? Or would that require them to admit they were wrong, which can't happen?

Scouts Canada allows atheists, provided they have a "basic spiritual belief" (which isn't really defined - do you have to believe in ghosts?). What is interesting is the WOSM link you provided specifically says no belief in God is required, then dodges the whole "Atheist" question by ignoring what the word means (a non-theist). Basically they appear to be saying something of the form: "Atheist is a bad word, so we don't want to apply it to those good atheists over there. So we are going to make up a new definition for the word so we can pretend it doesn't." This is a common way of treating the word by people that haven't really thought it through, or don't understand what the word really means. "Those bad people are Atheists, so those good people can't be Atheists!". The same thing applies to the word: "agnostic".

Trevorum, the UUSO (Unitarian Universalist Scouters Organization) group that produces those awards have nothing to do with the UUA (Unitarian Universalist Association). The UUA still runs it's emblem program and offers them to scouts. They are just not "approved by the BSA". The UUSO is a group of scouters not associated with the UUA that decided to put together a emblem program that would make the BSA happy. Their awards are not recognized by the UUA. The UUA emblem program: http://www.uua.org/re/children/scouting/169557.shtml

Part of the problem is that the BSA is inconsistent in how they interpret their own policies. For example, the BSA has said the following is incompatible with BSA values (and one of the given reasons for disallowing the Unitarian religion awards): http://www.uua.org/re/children/scouting/169563.shtml But I think it is an excellent way of looking at Duty to God. Of course I am Unitarian, so I am biased. However, I cannot see anything in there that is "inconsistent with boy scout values".

So I now the latest change info is out of date. I was able to post to the Issues and Politics forum, but it shows the most recent post as 5-31-2013, not today (like it should).

Now I can't post at all. I tried to apologize to BadenP and all I get is errors. Maybe I can post here? OK. I can post here. Why not anywhere else?

I'm having trouble posting things as it keeps giving me "Empty Response" errors.

KDD - I don't know anything about Khaliela's specific beliefs, but a good general start is probably: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-Druidism

Can I name the district? Unfortunately no. The Muslim scouter that told me about his old council did tell it's name, and where it was. But that was at a district bbq three years ago, and I don't remember (I just remember it wasn't in a western state - yah, big help there). What I can tell you is basically the story he told me: He had been attending his district round table, and noticed that they were always opened with an overtly Christian prayer. This didn't bother him much, he just assumed that was because only Christians were volunteering to lead the prayer. So he offered to lead the opening prayer at the next round table. He was told that non-Christian prayers were not allowed, and to justify that he was told a story about the last time it was tried (basically the result was threats and violence - he told me the story as he remembered it, we both felt it was so over the top - it had to be grossly exaggerated). He then felt that several scouters went out of their way to make him feel uncomfortable at district and council events (such as the person leading the prayer instead of standing in front of the room, that person would come over and stand in front of him or another Muslim scouter when leading the prayer - or including phrases like "bring Jesus to the non-believers" in the prayers). He told me he reached out to other scouters for support, and didn't get any. So he stopped going to round table and other council events. Of course this is one persons point of view, is he exaggerating or misinterpreting? Maybe. I assume he was basically honest about his experiences. My personal guess is that what he encountered was not an official policy of the district or council, it was the result of a group of scouter volunteers taking it upon themselves to "Christianize" things, and no one was willing or interested in challenging them (or perhaps it was an anti-Muslim thing). Of course, maybe he made up the whole thing, and it's all in his head. I don't really know.

An all out crusade? No, though there is a small minority (as you pointed out) that would like that. What I have seen, is that there is a large group of people that would like to see the BSA become (or in their opinion, remain) a de facto Christian organization that allows others, but follows Christian beliefs (sort of like the AHG). In discussions of the membership question, when people are asked about "what about other faiths?" I heard a lot of "I don't care about the others, they have to conform to Christian beliefs if they want to be here." (or something to that effect). And of course, just about all these people define "Christian" as "conservative Christian". Basically I saw that a lot of the people (though not all) in the anti-membership change camp were very dismissive of different beliefs ("Don't talk to me about nonsectarian! That's just PC b# s# they had to put in to keep funding from the United Way!"). Yes, they are a minority (at least I hope they are - they are in my council), but there are a lot of them. My fear is that if they win the vote, it will empower them to push their point-of-view in more areas. I have already met one scouter that said he was effectively made unwelcome (at council and district events) in his old council simply because he was a Muslim and offered to lead an opening prayer at a round table. Think about it, arguing against inclusion of gays based on religious belief is incompatible with nonsectarian. How many of the people making that argument know that but just don't care? For many scouters, nonsectarian is something to be ignored. For some, it's something to be gotten rid of. Already there are districts where if you are a non-Christian scout or scouter, you will have your face rubbed in that fact at every event. And for some scouters, that is the point. Maybe I'm overreacting to things said in heat. But I was surprised how little respect some people have for faiths other than their own.

My post vote plans will be based on how it all falls out. If the vote is a no, it will depend on how it happens. Basically, if it all turns out that the BSA takes a turn for the right, and it becomes clear that people that are not social conservatives are not welcome, I will leave. I had a conversation with a scouter that basically went "once we get rid of the fags, next we get rid of the #%$# Hindus, Muslims and women!". If people like that win, the BSA is dead, and I'm gone. If on the other hand, people like me are still welcome (or at least tolerated), I'm going to continue to write letters, and advocate for change from within. A no vote isn't an automatic "I'm leaving". But given some of the things I have heard from some scouters, if they get their way, I won't have to leave on my own. I will be "unacceptable" just for being Unitarian (or as one scouter put it: "#$ Unitarianism isn't a real religion, and they shouldn't be allowed!"). Way to live "A Scout if Reverent".

Are non-Christian prayers acceptable at council or district events? At my local council and district events, the opening prayer or invocation usually takes one of two forms: overtly Christian (“In Jesus’ name, amenâ€Â) or generic (“May the great Scout Master...â€Â). Almost never overtly Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, etc. Now I live in a diverse region, we have many churches and temples of different faiths in the area (there is even a Zoroastrian temple in town - I’ve been told one of the local troops has a pair of Zoroastrian scouts). In my own pack, most of the families are various flavors of Christian (mostly Catholic), but we have, or have had, Muslims, Jewish and Hindu families. So this topic came up for discussion with some scouters at a round table BBQ a while back. One of the scouters said that his previous council (he has recently moved to our area) all the prayers were overtly Christian, and he had offered to give a Muslim prayer to open a round table (he is Muslim). He was told no because too many scouters would be offended so it wasn’t allowed (there is a story he was told to go along with that - I don’t want to derail the discussion, so I won’t repeat it here). I found this to be very surprising (and hope what he was told was incorrect). I have no reason to believe a similar rule exists in my local council or district. So the question: would you be offended if an overtly Muslim, Hindu, Zoroastrian, or other non-Christian prayer was used to open a district or council event (unit events are a different issue)? If yes, why? And if yes, are you also offended by overtly Christian prayers (and if no to that, why not)? Does your local district or council have a rule against non-Christian prayers at district or council events?

Our council has told us that they were allocating their five votes in proportion to how the council board voted: 4 in favor, 1 against.

Really? How about some examples?

One thing to remember about venture groups. It is optional for them if they accept girls. Not all venture groups do. I imagine if the BSA became open to girls at all levels, it will be optional. If a unit doesn't want to deal with it, they can say no.

I brought this up in a previous thread, but it didn’t belong there, it belongs in it’s own thread. The BSA’s bylaws state that the BSA is “completely nonsectarianâ€Â. The question is: “What does nonsectarian mean to you in a BSA contextâ€Â? The reason I am asking, is that over the last several years, I have had discussions with fellow scouters about the nonsectarianism of the BSA, and have heard many different interpretations: from very broad to dismissive. I have heard scouters say things like: “The BSA is a christian organization, and nonsectarian means the same thing as nondenominational†too “to be properly nonsectarian means you shouldn’t open a district or council event with a prayer since no prayer can satisfy all religionsâ€Â. Obviously not all scouters agree on what it means. If I remember correctly, even the BSA’s Religious Relationships Committee referred to the BSA as a Christian ecumenical organization (in a letter to the UUA back in the late 90s). So, what does our community think?