Boys' Life Bible Stories?

[FScouter]

"How would you feel about a story of a whole kingdom of people who became so enlightened that they dematerialized and are now in a celestial plane, without the aid of a supernatural being?"

 

I'd think, "Hmmm, that's very interesting." It would not cause me problems, nor would I feel offended.

[captainron14]

Get over it! There are far too many "thin skinned" victims in our country.

Example,

There was a protest at my daughter's school over a Veterans Day Assembly by students against the war who were "offended", they were themselves protested against by Atheist students who were "offended" by their signs saying "Pray for Peace".

 

By the way the original assembly was focused on WW2, NOTHING on wars after Korea.

 

Get over it.

 

Sorry for leaving the topic.

[Trevorum]

"Get over it?"

That rather effectively trivializes the other position, don't you think?

 

I'm very glad you won't be taking offense at this. Your post reminds me of a bumper sticker I saw yesterday. It simply said "He died in A.D. 33. Get over it!" Somehow, I think both that driver and yourself are missing the whole point(s). And from completely opposite ends of the field.

[Kahuna]

"Get over it?"

 

Apparently, there are some rather "thin skinned" people right around here.

 

I fail to see the connection between what happened at your daughter's school and this discussion, except that some people don't get the point of certain issues.

 

Sorry for leaving the topic is right.

[evmori]

Actually, I see the connection. A couple people are offended by something & decide to complain about it! That's the connection. And the result is usually we have to change things to accommodate the minority who is offended. And that, excuse my language, sucks! Just because a couple people are offended by stories in a publication they opt to read these few think these stories should be removed because they are offended! Too bad! Don't read it! You don't have the right to not be offended!

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10

[Trevorum]

But a Scout has an obligation to be courteous. Courtesy is going out of your way to avoid offending others and to make others comfortable.

 

I agree with Kahuna. The BL feature, while perhaps not intending to be offensive to anyone, is nonetheless thoughtless. I personally am not offended by the obvious Judeo-Christian-Islamic bias, but I completely understand how another person of a minority faith might be.

 

I further feel that they are good stories and should not be eliminated from BL, but just supplemented with comparable stories from other faith traditions. I think scouts of all faiths would enjoy reading stories about Shambala, Corn-Woman, or Akupara just as they like the stories of Noah and Jonah.

 

This solution would be a "win-win".

[SemperParatus]

Trev,

 

You've got to tell the Corn-Woman story. I am all ears!

[evmori]

Everyone is offended by something or someone. There is no way to completely avoid it. Being courteous is no deliberately offending someone and I seriously doubt if the Boys Life is trying to deliberately offend someone.

 

CORN-WOMAN: It was all too good to be true. Suddenly in the middle of the tribe appears this strange woman operating a snack shack - and she cooks an utterly delicious dish she calls 'corn'.

 

Hmmm, no bones, no fat, no blood. What can it be? Time to spy on her through a crack in the shack. What's that she's scraping into the pot? Ewww! Boils! Sores! Corns! It's not corn on the cob, it's scorn on the scab.

 

Her disgusted customers don't know quite what to do - the whole tribe have been consuming vast portions with great relish. When confronted, the unperturbed CORN-WOMAN says: "Bury the scrapings in the ground and edible plants will grow. I'll can teach you how to grow crops and you won't have to chase animals every time you get hungry."

 

This might sound a little corny, but the CORN-WOMAN is so persuasive that husky braves are soon growing things in husks and eating out of her hand. But only after the medicine man has cured her warts.

 

Ed Mori

Troop 1

1 Peter 4:10(This message has been edited by evmori)

[Kahuna]

Ed, while I understand your point about a minority wanting to screw up everything for the majority. I have made the same point about Christmas celebrations. A distinct minority wants to eliminate Christmas for those who wish to celebrate it and have gone to great extremes to get rid of it. I am not one of those people. And "get over it" is a cop out to this discussion. It is not an answer to the issue.

 

If we were talking about Esquire Magazine, the Honolulu Advertiser or certainly the Christian Science Monitor (to which I am a long time subscriber), or even Scouting Magazine, I would have no problem with that segment. But those are publication for adults.

 

Boys' Life Magazine is not like those magazines. It is a publication for boys, ages 8-15 or so, and it is published by the BSA, an organization which stresses religion but supposedly does not discriminate among the various religions. It is sent to boys who are Christians, Jews, Mormons, Buddhists, Hindu or Unitarian. It does not seem to me appropriate to stress stories only about one segment of those religious groupings.

 

It's interesting that in this discussion that no one to date has attempted to answer my continuing question: What is the purpose of including those stories in Boys' Life magazine? Why are there no stories from other religious heritages? I understand why Peewee Harris is there. I understand why stories heroism by Scouts are in there. But I'm not sure I can see a reason for Bible Stories. And I can certainly imagine the reaction of many Christians to seeing their children exposed to religions who worship what they consider false gods.

 

BTW, it isn't a question of MY being offended. You can obviously take it or leave it. But what about the ten year old Buddhist boy I mentioned and his parents. What about their offense? Isn't this program about boys? Are we as adults here to promote our particular religious point of view? Does some editor at BL have the right and qualifications to decide which religious viewpoints will be presented?

[Trevorum]

Semper and Ed,

 

There are many Corn-Woman stories, just as there are many "Great Flood" stories (Noah is one of many such). Ed's sounds to be perhaps Hopi. The Cherokee have one that goes like this ...

 

Corn Woman is a spirit that is sent down from heaven every year to come and walk in the fields of the Cherokee. And when she walked in the fields the corn began to grow, and it grew tall and beautiful.

And the Cherokee corn is a corn that is very, very special, because it is a corn that has ten rows of kernels on it. Most other ears have thirteen, that we are familiar with today.

 

So the Cherokee corn will grow ten, almost ten feet tall, and on those stalks it will have three or four ears of corn, where most other kinds of stalks have one or two, and it's beautiful in color. It's all the colors of the rainbow. And many people ask, "How did you paint that?"

 

And the Cherokees ate it. It's a very good corn.

 

Anyway, this Corn Woman would walk in the fields, and the corn would grow beautifully. One year they planted their corn and had gone out to watch it come up, and it didn't come up.

 

And they waited a week, and then two weeks, and it still hadn't come up.

 

So they prayed to the Great Spirit and asked where the Corn Woman Spirit was. And he said that he had sent her down two weeks before, and she was missing, evidently.

 

And so the people began to look. And they looked all over the earth known to them at that time, and they couldn't find her.

 

So they began to ask the animal kingdom if they would help search for her. So all the animals were searching for this beautiful Corn Woman Spirit when all of a sudden the raven dived down into a dark cave and was looking for her. And he found her in the bottom of the cave, all tied up. She was captured and prisoner of the evil spirit Hunger.

 

And he was dancing around her and laughing, knowing very well that if she didn't get out, that the Cherokee people would starve the coming winter.

 

So raven went back and reported to the people that he had found the Corn Woman Spirit. And they told the raven that only he and his family could get her free. So they told him to go down into the cave and perch on the ledges and hide from the evil spirit, and he did.

 

He took all of his brothers and sisters into the cave, and they were so black they couldn't be seen by the evil spirits, and they perched on the ledges and the rocks.

 

When the signal was given they all leaped down and pecked the evil spirit and made such terrible noises that they frightened him out into the sunlight. And like most evil, when he hit the sunlight he just melted away and disappeared.

 

They freed the Corn Woman Spirit with their big strong beaks, and when she walked out into the sunlight the corn of the Cherokees began to grow.

 

From that day forward, the Great Spirit in the heavens would not let her come down in person. And so it is today.

 

So when you look out at the cornfields and see the stalks of corn and their leaves saving in the wind, you'll know that the Corn Woman Spirit is walking through the fields of today.

 

And the Cherokees give the raven a very special place: that he was the one that saved the fields of the Cherokee. So therefore they feel that if he takes a few kernels of corn, that's ok. But if the raven is in the fields, and an animal comes into the field, the crows and the ravens will pitch such a fit that the people will know that someone is stealing their corn, so they can go down and chase them away.

 

So I imagine it's all in the way you look at animals and the circle of life as to whether they're necessary or need to be destroyed.

 

[Merlyn_LeRoy]

Kahuna writes:

 

A distinct minority wants to eliminate Christmas for those who wish to celebrate it and have gone to great extremes to get rid of it.

 

I've never heard of this (in modern times, at least; some puritan areas outlawed christmas centuries ago). Do you have any examples?

 

Please keep in mind that not having the government promote a religious holiday does not constitute "eliminating" or "getting rid of" that holiday, unless you also subscribe to the view that practically every other holiday has already been "eliminated" and "gotten rid of" by virtue of even less government promotion of pretty much any other religious holiday you can name.

[BrentAllen]

Kahuna,

That section of Boys Life is Bible Heroes, not Bible Stories. Maybe just a small difference, but still a difference.

Boys Life is not just marketed to Scouts. In fact, every now and then you will see a letter to Pedro complaining about all the Scouting stuff included. My guess is the editor sees those half-page cartoons as a positive in increasing readership - just a business decision. If 90% + of the crowd they are marketing to practices a religion that recognizes the Old Testament, then why not include it? It's kind of like this Issues and Politics forum - those who don't want to read it just ignore it.

Teaching boys about heros has always been pretty popular.

 

[Kahuna]

BrentAllen: I can't put my hands on the copy of the magazine at the moment to see what the title is. However, I don't see any difference if it is called heroes or stories. They are Bible stories. This particular hero (Elijah) called down punishment on a whole nation because of the actions of its' king. It's a religious story from the Old Testament of the Bible.

 

Boys' Life could probably increase its' readership by putting in a centerfold section of female cuties, too, but would that be what you would want to see them do? Yeah, a handful of non-scouts probably read it, but it is the house organ of the BSA.

 

Teaching boys about heroes is fine, but there are mythological heroes and there are actual heroes. Elijah was one of the former. Baden-Powell was one of the latter. I would submit there are lots of American heroes that could be written about that boys would find interesting.

 

 

[Trevorum]

OK, here's where I part company with ya, Kahuna ol' buddy.

 

Myth heroes are a VERY important element in the cultures of every society. They are literally larger than life and always carry an important moral message. Wheaties boxes with sports 'heroes are all well and good, and yes, we have lots of real life heroes to look up to. But, man, none of 'em can compare to John Henry, to Pecos Bill, to Paul Bunyan, to Robin Hood, to King Arthur, to Roland, to Pheidippides, to Achilles! And that's just one very narrow slice of culture-history!

[Kahuna]

Trevorum: Sorry to lose you, but there are mythologies and mythologies. All boys realize at some point that Greek mythologies, Pecos Bill, etc, are myths. Bible mythologies are different. How would you title the story of Pecos Bill? Western History Hero Stories? Bible Stories or Bible Heroes, whichever it may be, has an entirely different conotation.

 

Religious stories or Bible stories are taught to children as fact. If a boy asks his dad about King Arthur, dad will say it's myth or legend. Bible stories come from a book with "Holy" on the cover.

 

Not the same thing.(This message has been edited by Kahuna)