Stosh

My kids are Sarah and Joshua, both good Jewish names. My third child Katherine... well the best I could come up with was Martin Luther's wife was Katherine, I like the name, sue me.

As one who relies entirely on what is written in Scripture and not on the traditions created by humanity, I believe it boils down to how people view Scripture. There are those who take it at face value, those who interpret it towards an agenda, and those who simply use it as some sort of guideline or strong suggestions, but not really totally mandatory. Yes, there are a number of OT dietary laws that have been laid out as critical to the welfare of the individuals. Let's go with pork. It is known that pork harbors far more diseases than other grain fed animals. So Instead of stating the meat should be cooked to 165 degrees, the scripture just says don't eat it at all. Same for the meat/dietary cross contamination problems. If one were to actually stop and review them, they aren't such bad suggestions for a less health aware people. The world isn't all that good of a place to be and not everyone is on the same page, therefore there are going to be such things as slavery, homosexuality, etc, and as a result, maybe the Christians/Jews/Muslims don't participate in such activity maybe others do and will have an impact on one's moral convictions. Kinda like "in the world", but not "part of the world" thinking. Granted these influences will be there but we are called to take a more divine way in the world and avoid such activities. Therefore if an organization or mission in the world is promoting homosexuality as "okay" then we are called to walk away and not participate in such activity. It's not that we are going to force anyone to not be homosexual, it's just that one has the choice of participating or not participating in activities of that nature. The homosexual community plays the game differently. They don't just walk away from activities they don't agree with, they attack them. That's where the real rub comes from. Yes, the more extreme Christians do the same thing, but they are not supported by Scripture, it's just an interpreted tradition they have come up with on their own. It is not my mission in life to convert anyone. I can only preach the Good News so that the Spirit can do His work. If I am unwelcomed anywhere, I merely knock the dust from my sandals and move on down the road. If that ever becomes necessary with the BSA, I have already decided what I must do. It's not a judgement I am passing on, No body has to do it my way, or else, It's not an issue that I'm going to lose any sleep over. It's just the way life is. I used to be an ASM in a adult-led, troop-method troop. I used to be a SM in a boy-led, patrol-method troop that preferred the adult-led, troop-method approach. I used to be a CA in a crew that had other adults that preferred to do it their way. I used to be a minister in organized religion. I used to be a lot of things, but there comes a time to clean up one's sandals......and move on down the road.

99.99999999999% of the problem is not lack of volunteers. (I'm assuming you are referring to adults here.) 99.99999999999% of the problem is the lack of youth leadership. We aren't teaching our boys to be boy-led, nor patrol-method. And so what we end up with is a bunch of out-of-touch adults trying to run a program that they think the boys need rather than simply asking them what they want. I always get raised eyebrows when I bring my SPL to Roundtable and then he does not go off with the Venturing or OA breakout groups, but stays with the SM's in their discussion. It kinda begs the question of who we do expect to REALLY run the show here........ So let's have an SPL roundtable.... What no SPL"s will show up? Of course not, they have to be leading before that process would ever be effective. So I go back to my original post, "Hey District, are you listening?" Maybe it's time to let the boys lead and the adults do what they need to do to suport what the boys want. If the boys don't want camporees, why are we wasting everyone's time?

I think it would be the honorable thing just to roll over and take the 30 pieces of silver. At least you will get something out of the deal even if one has to take a moral hit in the process. It's only a matter of time before someone plays the hate crime card and then one's going to lose it all and end up with nothing. Remember, we are no longer living in a tolerant, live and let live society. Today it's PC-toe-the-line or else. The Bill of Rights is no longer accepted as the basis of our culture. The Constitution went by the wayside, now it's the Amendment's turn. I have seen a staggering amount of freedom lost even in my lifetime, the pace of the loss has accelerated and shows no sign of slowing down or reversing any time soon. The era of the American Dream has passed.

Sounds like the standard pat answer is to cop out on doing camporees is to hand off the responsibility rather than improve. I hope we're in the minority on this.

I'm not worried, the more they persecute the Church, the stronger it gets. Well, that's been the pattern over the past 2,000 years, I don't think people today are going to be able to change that.

Okay, that's better, I can sleep easier tonight.

Bummer, I was hoping for a neat background check report. This turned out rather anti-climatic.

Had our camporee this past weekend and my boys decided they would try it at our local district. Last fall they went out of district to a camporee and last year at this time, they did a camping weekend because it was their first camping activity as a new troop. Well out of the 20 or so units, 4 showed up for the camporee. The boys found out that the other district where they went last fall out of 20 or so units only 3 that did NOT show up. Obviously the difference in programming left a lot to be desired. The first thing the organizers did was break up the patrol/troop into two to be more convenient to their program numbers. My only patrol won first and third place in the competition. That was a tremendous boost of morale for my boys to ponder this coming year. Half won and half didn't My PL asked me to relay their concerns because the adults weren't listening. So I met with the organizers on Saturday after the campfire and found that my PL was right, they weren't listening. I was told that if I had a problem with the way the camporee was run, the simple solution would be to have my troop do the planning for the next camporee. I corrected him by saying, no, 4 - 12 year old boys probably couldn't pull off a district wide event, but the really, really simple solution would be to have the troop just attend a different district's camporee. It is unfortunate that the good-old boys of the political BSA just don't want to listen to what it's going to take to make things better. This was the first time our troop has participated in an event at our local council's camp, too. There was no running water in any of the campsites for the camporee weekend. They didn't formulate a very good first impression, and are once again excited about going outside of council for summer camp. As a matter of fact one of the other 3 troops that were camped near us had their SM come over and get information on this other camp that my boys were going to be attending. I'm assuming my boys were out visiting other units in their spare time. It was interesting that on the ride home the PL was with me and asked if they could just do their own camporee. I said, as boy-led they could do anything they wanted to do when it came to camping. They did hear about another troop that was trying to do boy-led, patrol-method and thought that maybe they could team up with them for an outing. It's interesting how the little cogs in wheels get to turning when they are left to ponder the best course of action for themselves.

..... and this is what is known as Leadership. Management would never have been as effective. Now the trick is to teach these dynamics without the need of the storm. Well done, MattR! You've got some potential Real Eagles in your troop.

Local option? That process of breaking everything down into separate targets only enables the massive lobbies to overwhelm them one at a time, like they are doing with businesses and individuals as recorded in the papers on a regular basis. Either we all hang together, or we all hang separately. - B. Franklin

We had a OA tap-out over the weekend at our district camporee. 3 youth and 4 adults made up the team. Of the three boys, only 2 were in native dress, the other in blue jeans and modern shirt (not uniform). He did take his shoes off for some reason. Maybe to be more Indian-like or maybe to just look ridiculous. The two youth that had reading parts read rather well off their paper lined "buffalo-skinned" scrolls. Needless to say it was rather pathetic. It wasn't just me either, One of my boys who attended summer camp out-of-council, asked if this was supposed to be the same ceremony that had the lanterns, tap-out and fanfare of the other camp. I just said every council does it differently.

I'm not much for conspiracy theories, but I am also a realist that believes humans are capable of some pretty big atrocities. At least that's what their record shows. I don't believe that with the current situation we now face, everything is still on the table. If North Korea were to hold military exercises near the boarder of South Korea or in the international waters just off the coast of Japan, the US would probably react the same was as Governor Abbott. The US has thousands of acres of land they could be holding this "training" on. Why not use that instead? Better yet do it in Nkorth Korea's back yard and see what reaction they get from those people.

I'm not much for PCism, but if one is worried about the stereotype of the historical people of America, why not ask them. If they give some guidance and advice on how to do it proper then follow that to the letter. If they say they would prefer that the interpretation be dropped because it is demeaning, then drop it and find someone else's sandbox to play in. America has plenty of other cultural resources other than than the aboriginal culture to focus on.

EagleScout441, Don't worry, they're just doing a background check on you. If they find something it could take months, even years to get this cleared up. Haven't any outstanding parking tickets? Jay-walked lately? Still taking your son's paper route money? Been driving over the speed limit? Tried to slip an expired coupon through at the Walmart checkout?

I didn't know it was the job of those placed in the position of moderation to try and piss off the members of the forum. So I'll set the record straight. 30 pieces of Silver has become the standard expression for what it takes to sell out one's soul. If that trivializes that process for your faith, I apologize, but for me it is the price one gets for the ultimate treason to one's cause. Just because one uses an expression out of one's book of faith does not mean they are trivializing it, it just shows that one is knowledgeable in what is written there and can use the stores to clarify one's point. Of course, one can use any familiar piece of literature to do the same thing. "The lady doth protest too much, methinks." Hamlet Act 3, Scene 2.

http://inthesetimes.com/article/4124/jim_crow_in_the_north

Is $50,000 the going rate for 30 pieces of silver nowadays? What makes these people think that a program as honorable as the BSA can be bought? Oh, yeah, never mind.

And the scary part of it all is, that if we are all over the map on this what's the rest of scouting going to be doing? While Pandora may be some magical/mythical being/reality/fairy/god of Greek Pantheism/mythology, etc. I think when National get's done with this the reality of Pandora's Box is going to a very real situation.

It has it's reasons within the Scouting Requirements, Oath and Law of 1910 and The Scouting Requirements, Oath and Law of 2015. There are those that say Scouting was created to develop honorable young men of character and others that think it should evolve/morph/mutate/whatever into something else. I can't, for the life of me, see why that isn't obvious.

Everyone who finds it necessary to distinguish between races is a racist. Some take it to the extreme, others, not so much. It's not something one uses to judge, necessarily, but here again, some do. The original point I made was that slavery and racial prejudice of the time were not necessarily as connected as we would like to think they were. There were plenty of free negroes walking around society at that time that had no problem. Some even owned slaves. In the south there were fewer "racists" because they were used to having and associating with negroes. In the north, this was not as common and depending on the area of the country did make a difference. There two issues involved and they are not as related as we today seem to think they are. Just because you were an abolitionist did not mean you wanted the negro living in your neighborhood. I have no idea what Darwin's inner thoughts were on the subject, but I do know that his writings, no matter how well intended did validate what we today view as racist. If human intellect and environment can have an impact on "evolution" it isn't a major jump to conclude that that would apply to social structures as well. Whereas slavery was abolished by law back in 1865, racial segregation continued well into the mid 20th century. Any explanation for that other than we're dealing with two different issues here?

According to scientists they tend to agree that the universe of the natural started. It has a beginning. It is also limited by time and space. Whatever it was that started it is not part, nor ever was part of this universe. While religious people say it was this great unknown we refer to as God that started it, Atheists say, "No, there is no God and I don't know what it was that started it, but it wasn't God." Isn't that like saying, "You're wrong, but I don't know what right is."?

I'm with you on this. I am in scouting for the boys, not for any other reason. I'm thinking that a lot of young people are looking for opportunities to spread their wings, so to speak, and test the waters a bit. But when adults dump on them with such things as push-ups, pranks and songs, it kinda sets them back. After such actions, it is VERY difficult for that young person to trust that particular adult again. They aren't going to put themselves out there just to get shut down again. They might feel a bit on par with a peer, but they are out of their league if an adult instigates such activities. It does make very subtle progress for maintaining adult control over the situation. Sure, I make sarcastic remarks, usually so grandiose that no one listening knows I'm being serious. However, if I am being serious it is always within the privacy of a SMC. That's for the good stuff as well as the bad. The boy that gets his rank advancement and applause from the audience is one thing. The SM saying, "Well done, Scout." is often times more powerful. The negative works the same way. Screaming and yelling when they screw up is one thing, but taking them aside and with a smile say, "I bet you never do that again." is a recognition of the situation that the boy is fully aware of as having fallen flat.