Boy Scouts' bankruptcy creates rift with religious partners

[CynicalScouter 1434]

"The United Methodist Church — which says up to 5,000 of its U.S. congregations could be affected by future lawsuits — recently advised those churches not to extend their charters with the BSA beyond the end of this year. The UMC said these congregations were "disappointed and very concerned" that they weren't included in the July deal.

Everett Cygal, a lawyer for Catholic churches monitoring the case, said it is unfair that parishes now face liability "solely as a result of misconduct by Boy Scout troop leaders who frequently had no connection to the parish."

"Scouting can only be delivered with help of their chartered organizations," Cygal told The Associated Press. "It's shortsighted not to be protecting the people they absolutely need to ensure that scouting is viable in the future."

Officials of several other denominations — including the Southern Baptist Convention, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) — have advised their churches to hire their own legal counsel if they fear possible sex-abuse litigation.

The Presbyterian Church said its national leadership can't act on behalf of member churches because they are separate corporations. The leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran church also said its congregations were on their own, legally speaking, and must decide for themselves whether to continue any relationship with the BSA.

"As a result of the bankruptcy, the congregation cannot confidently rely on the BSA, the local council, or their insurers to defend it," the Lutheran church warned. "The congregation needs to make sure that it has sufficient insurance and that its own insurance will cover them.""

Edited September 23, 2021 by CynicalScouter

[SiouxRanger 491]

The clouds are darkening. As we all likely suspected.

[scoutldr 732]

And we thought things were bad when the LDS church jumped ship...

[SiouxRanger 491]

On 9/23/2021 at 3:10 PM, CynicalScouter said:

"The United Methodist Church — which says up to 5,000 of its U.S. congregations could be affected by future lawsuits — recently advised those churches not to extend their charters with the BSA beyond the end of this year. The UMC said these congregations were "disappointed and very concerned" that they weren't included in the July deal.

Everett Cygal, a lawyer for Catholic churches monitoring the case, said it is unfair that parishes now face liability "solely as a result of misconduct by Boy Scout troop leaders who frequently had no connection to the parish."

"Scouting can only be delivered with help of their chartered organizations," Cygal told The Associated Press. "It's shortsighted not to be protecting the people they absolutely need to ensure that scouting is viable in the future."

Officials of several other denominations — including the Southern Baptist Convention, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) — have advised their churches to hire their own legal counsel if they fear possible sex-abuse litigation.

The Presbyterian Church said its national leadership can't act on behalf of member churches because they are separate corporations. The leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran church also said its congregations were on their own, legally speaking, and must decide for themselves whether to continue any relationship with the BSA.

"As a result of the bankruptcy, the congregation cannot confidently rely on the BSA, the local council, or their insurers to defend it," the Lutheran church warned. "The congregation needs to make sure that it has sufficient insurance and that its own insurance will cover them.""

Whole categories of CO's thrown to the wolves.

How many CO's is that?

And congregations are left to obtain their own legal counsel, and claw their way to some measure of legal security.

(And still I get cards from NESA-every few days-asking me to update my data (and that of my 3 Eagle Scout sons, so there are LOTS of cards), so some book can be sold "to support programming.")

No CO should trust National.  It is reneging on its promises, and then leveraging its breach of trust to manipulate CO's to a Plan that favors National.

"Hey, but what are friends for?"