Religious Awards

[k0jsy]

I am collecting information to see about starting a new religious award for my faith. One of the requirements is that there must be at least 25 units nation wide whose chartering organization is part of my faith. My question to you is, Do you know of any Scout Troop, Pack, Crew, or Team who is sponsored by a Church of Religious Science or Center for Spiritual Living?

[packsaddle]

Not in our area, sorry.

[Oak Tree]

According to your national web site, there are none of your churches in our council. So I can't help you there.

 

But I'd think this is a pretty hit-and-miss way of identifying units. Can the relationship division of the BSA help out here? I'd start by asking people at the council office how to go about this.

[k0jsy]

I started with BSA HQ and they said I would need to find out how manu units were sponsored by the organization. I realize it's spotty at best to post here, but I figured it was a start.

 

What website did you gather that info from?

[ScoutNut]

You do realize that creating a religious award for your faith has nothing to do with BSA don't you? Religious awards are NOT BSA awards. BSA simply approves some of them to be worn on the BSA uniform.

 

If what you truly want is a religious award program, for your faith, to encourage the youth of that faith to understand and to grow in their faith, then the first thing that you should do is to create that program. At this point it should not matter how many BSA units your faith charters. What matters is to bring a religious program to the youth.

 

If you want that program to, potentially, be approved by the BSA there are certain criteria BSA looks for in a religious program. You, and the national hierarchy of your faith, then need to look at those criteria and see if they are something that your faith agrees with and can include in it's religious program. Once the program is created, if it meets the BSA criteria, THEN you can start worrying about chartering BSA units. The national leaders of your faith might be able to help you with that.

 

If you can get the required number of units chartered, great, than you can get the program's award approved by the BSA for wear on the BSA uniform. If you can't get the required number of units, your youth still have a quality religious program to help them grow in their faith. Any of your youth members who earn this award, and who are also members of BSA, can wear the universal religious square knot for earning the religious emblem award of their faith, they simply would not be able to wear the award itself on the BSA uniform. Still, not a bad deal. Your faith would get a way to reach it's youth and Scouts of your faith would be able to demonstrate their duty to their god.

 

[packsaddle]

Excellent point, ScoutNut. And even if the required 25 units weren't identified, I doubt that anyone in the uniform police would say anything if the boys wore the award on their uniform anyway. I sure wouldn't worry about it.

[FScouter]

That hardly seems ethical. Kinda like advising a boy that its OK to do the wrong thing as long as you don't get caught.

[k0jsy]

ScoutNut makes a good point. I didn't realize they could just wear the knot. Fortunately our movement is developing new youth curriculum so it will give me the opportunity to create that award with the hopes that it will eventually be recognized by BSA. Thank you all for your input on this.

[John-in-KC]

Some resources to help:

 

1) Your National Organization Youth Division, whatever it's actually called, is a key player. They are also a player in that the lay leader or ministry professional in charge will be the proper initial contact with the Relationships Division of the Boy Scouts of America.

 

2) This is a vital step: Your denomination must accept the various BSA positions on issues, including the Declaration of Religious Principle. If this doesn't happen, it's time to cease work, or you will be tilting at windmills. Search through the archives for the Unitarian Universalists and the conundrum surrounding them and religious award recognition.

 

3) Assuming your National Organization and the National Council can "play nice", then we get down to the work of developing a curriculum, awards, getting the stuff MADE, and getting an inventory provider: The expert on all this is Mark Hazelwood of PRAY (Programs for Religious Activities for Youth), www.praypub.org, in St Louis. He not only writes the Protestant curriculum, he is the clearinghouse in support of many denominational activities. He can help develop medals and get them minted.

 

As others have said, chartering 25 units is a threshold, but the other threshold is your denomination buys into the Boy Scouts of America and what they stand for.

[Oak Tree]

I found the list of churches here:

 

http://www.religiousscience.org/

 

You could send a mass email to all of the contacts for the churches listed there and ask them if they happen to sponsor a unit.

 

I'm surprised that HQ didn't offer more help - but I guess it can be difficult to know which national organizations are associated with the local chartering organizations. Still, you'd think they could offer a little more help - it seems like they could at least search their list of chartering organizations for "religious science" - at least after they were convinced you were serious about it. Do you have a mandate from your national organization?

 

And while you could wear the knot without authorization, it does seem like an odd place to be cutting corners. Much nicer for the boys if the award is listed along with all the other awards that the BSA recognizes. It also ensures that you've developed some significant materials that make it seem much more official.

 

Do you think it's likely that there are 25 churches that charter units? A quick google search didn't reveal any.

 

[packsaddle]

FScouter, if the boy wants to wear the award proudly, I'll let you deny him that right. Me, I'll support the boy. Likewise if a scouter wants to wear the rainbow ribbon, I'll let you rip that patch off their uniform. I think I can find more important things to worry about.

 

I think John-in-KC has one detail not quite right with regard to the UUA award. A religious denomination does not have to buy into the BSA position on gays or atheists. But if the UUA episode is a guide to BSA's response, a denomination that disagrees with BSA and states their disagreement explicitly in the literature for their award may face the fate of the UUA. BSA's action was an assault on freedom of speech, not freedom of thought.

 

To extend that idea, if the church cannot agree with BSA's policy on gays and atheists...with respect to membership, then they probably need to reconsider being a CO.

[Kudu]

Given the statements found under "Our Spiritual Philosophy" and "What We Believe" on the religiousscience.org Website, you might want to rethink the wisdom of a Religious Award.

 

Most Religious Awards (including the Unitarian-Universalist medals) are just church school. Scouting was invented by a man named Baden-Powell (B-P), who questioned the effectiveness of church school because it is mere instruction which (like Citizenship Merit Badges) has little to no appeal to boys.

 

B-P conceived of Scouting as providing an alternative to church school "instruction": Namely education which can only be achieved through real-world experience.

 

The Scouting spiritual experience is two-fold: inward and outward.

 

He called the inward spiritual experience gained through Scouting "The Religion of the Deep Woods." This insight is gained through the study of Scoutcraft. Scoutcraft Awards are worn on the right side of the Traditional Scout Uniform.

 

When speaking on religious training in England, he called the outward spiritual experience gained through Scouting "Practical Christianity." This insight common to all religions is gained through Public Service. Public Service Awards are worn on the left side of the Traditional Scout Uniform.

 

We now equate "Duty to God" with Religious Awards (and Citizenship with Citizenship Merit Badges) because deep down in our hearts we don't really believe that we can achieve the Aims of Scouting through Scoutcraft and helping other people at all times.

 

Rather than creating more classroom content (instruction), perhaps your time would be better spent organizing Church of Religious Science or Center for Spiritual Living Scouting Units and getting the boys of your faith out in the woods (education).

 

Kudu

 

The conclusion come to is that the actions of a very large proportion of our men are, at present, very little guided by religion.

 

This may be attributed to a great extent to the fact that again instruction instead of education has been employed in the religious training of the boy, and that in some instances the teaching is undertaken by people who have no real experience or proper training for the work.

 

The consequence has been that the best boys in the Bible-class or Sunday School have grasped the idea, but in many cases they have, by perfection in the letter, missed the spirit of the teaching and have become zealots with a restricted outlook, while the majority have never really been enthused and have, as soon as they have left the class or school, lapsed into indifference and irreligion, and there has been no hand to retain them at the critical and important time of their lives, i.e., sixteen to twenty-four.

 

The disappointing results in religious training have been recognized by the authorities, and the more thorough training now inaugurated for teachers in Sunday Schools and the like promises a very different result for religious education in the future.

 

http://inquiry.net/traditional/b-p/scoutmastership/service.htm

 

[k0jsy]

While many of you have offered advice, and some have provided helpful information, the only one who has actually answered my question was packsaddle. I appreciate the advice, and information on the process, but I'm still looking for information about units.

 

So, I state my question again,(and please only repy in the affirmative, I don't need a bunch of "not that I know of" type responses, those don't help me) Do you know of any UCSL or UCRS chartered BSA units?

[Gold Winger]

" Any of your youth members who earn this award, and who are also members of BSA, can wear the universal religious square knot for earning the religious emblem award of their faith, they simply would not be able to wear the award itself on the BSA uniform."

 

Are you sure? The knot represents the medal/award, if the award is recognized by BSA the knot wouldn't be authorized.

[k0jsy]

Yes, you can wear the knot for a religious award even if it's not officially recognized by BSA. See this link for further: http://www.geocities.com/~Pack215/cubinsignia.html