Catholic Leaders Urge Support for Boy Scouts Under New Policy on Gays

[Davidnic]

Well it is not a religious freedom issue because it has nothing to do with the government. A private organization can do what they want to an extent. Like a Catholic college can enforce rules based on lifestyle...and it is legal. But that is not discrimination. But the government can not do that.

Same here, it has nothing to do with religious liberty because it is not the government.

A judge did not do this. Judges said that the Boy Scouts did not have to admit anyone who did not meet their rules. But they chose, as an organization to do differently and keep only part of their restriction.

So it is not a freedom issue. A private group can do as they please membership wise.

 

[imind]

Besides that redefining traditional marriage is quite harmful to society, especially children.

research doesn't support either of these statements.

 

[Chrystal-J]

Thank God President Obama eliminated abortion coverage in the Affordable Care Act.

That is good news. (Link so I can read it, thanks.) Did he stop the required birth control measures too?

 

[KatherineS]

That is good news. (Link so I can read it, thanks.)

You are welcome. God bless you.

Executive Order 13535-- Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act's Consistency with Longstanding Restrictions on the Use of Federal Funds for Abortion | The White House

 

[Chrystal-J]

You are welcome. God bless you.

Executive Order 13535-- Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act's Consistency with Longstanding Restrictions on the Use of Federal Funds for Abortion | The White House

This is from March 24, 2010. In a lawsuit filed last December by Tom Monaghan (the owner of Dominos Pizza), contraceptive methods that could result in abortion are included under the "Obama care" plan.

LINK: http://www.thomasmore.org/sites/default/files/files/Dominos Farms Complaint filed copy 121412.pdf

From the link: 8. Under the IOM guidelines, the Mandate requires all insurance insurers to provide not only contraception, but also abortion, because certain drugs and devices such as the “morning-after pill,” “Plan B,” and “ella” come within the Mandate’s and Health Resources and Services Administration’s definition of “Food and Drug Administration-approved contraceptive methods” despite their known abortifacient mechanisms of action.
Also: 6. The Mandate requires all insurance issuers (e.g. Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan) to provide contraception, sterilization, abortion, and abortifacients in all of its insurance plans, group and individual.

Even if the plan didn't include abortion-inducing drugs, it includes contraceptives that go against Catholic teachings.

 

[Wolseley]

“Scouting is still the best youth-serving program available to all youth,” Edward P. Martin, chairman of the National Catholic Committee on Scouting, wrote in a May 29 letter addressed to “fellow Catholic Scouters.”

“We should be encouraged that the change in BSA’s youth membership standard is not in conflict with Catholic teaching,” Martin said, asking that “Catholic Scouters and chartered organization heads not rush to judgment.”

Evidently Mssr. Martin is unfamiliar with the "frog in a pot of boiling water" analogy. If he thinks that just letting openly homosexual boys into the organization is where it's going to stop, he's seriously deluded.

You understand we're talking about kids, right? Puberty is a confusing time. Plus, with society pushing gayness like it is, it will make it even more confusing.

All the more reason not to place boys who may be experiencing that confusion into an environment where they may be exposed to sexual deviation as being normal and healthy. We are, after all, enjoined to avoid the near occasions of sin, are we not?

Even if they really do turn out to be gay, what impact does that have on scouting? Do you think they're going to be having gay orgies or something?

Would you be comfortable allowing your 13 year old daughter to go on a three-day camping trip in a wilderness area where she'd be sharing a tent with a 17 year old boy? Are you telling me that you really believe there will be no instances of intimidation, coercement, or even rape, by an older, bigger homosexual boy against a younger, smaller heterosexual one?

If you are, then you have a lot more trusting nature than I do.

Personally for me, I want to see how they implement it. If they do so in a way that says an eventual active homosexual lifestyle is as valid as a heterosexual one...then that's a problem.

Again, the frog in the pot of boiling water; give it time, give it time.

Are Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or Pagan boys allowed to join? I didn't realize agnostics and atheists weren't welcome.

Back in the day, Scouts were required to have, at the very least, a belief in God. In actual practice, this was probably pretty loose, at least it was in the troops I was a part of when I was a Scout.

I can see the day when the first gay Scout is dismissed for having a boyfriend. The gay hate groups, like GLAAD, are going to be all over it screaming sex discrimination! Homophobia! Etc...

If gay boys can be welcomed in our congregations they can be welcomed in the scout troops. The key is going to be does this change anything about how the Scouts allow troops to express their own faiths and complications at activities. Are they going to go the route of the Girl Scouts, who support planned parenthood and other things that establish a culture in the troops at times where expression of the Catholic faith is at odds with the organization?

Time will tell.

As I said: if anyone thinks for one moment that simply allowing them in is where this is all going to stop, they're seriously mistaken. "Tolerance" always leads to "Acceptance", which inevitably leads to "Proselytization", and ultimately results in "Adoption of Practice".

Aztec sun worshipers can't perform human sacrifices, even though it's one of the most important parts of their faith.

And yet human sacrifice is a common occurance here in America; we have allowed millions of children to be sacrificed to the god of sexual pleasure through abortion. Go figure.

Besides that redefining traditional marriage is quite harmful to society, especially children.

research doesn't support either of these statements.

Some research does, some doesn't. Depends on which research you want to cherry-pick out of the total pool of evidence. It also has to be borne in mind that not all research procedures are of the same level of competance, and what agendas or biases the original researchers were laboring under.

 

[Chrystal-J]

Would you be comfortable allowing your 13 year old daughter to go on a three-day camping trip in a wilderness area where she'd be sharing a tent with a 17 year old boy? Are you telling me that you really believe there will be no instances of intimidation, coercement, or even rape, by an older, bigger homosexual boy against a younger, smaller heterosexual one?

Good point. Plus if it's going to be promoted as an "alternative" lifestyle rather than a disordered one, how will you explain that a person should not engage in that activity as a Christian?

 

[Davidnic]

I happen to agree this is only the start and fully expect that by the time my son is ready for Scouts it will be something I can not in good conscience allow him to join. It has not happened and on the surface this does not oppose Catholic teaching. But I am sure it is only a matter of time. That is, however, a personal opinion.

 

[Davidnic]

Now, I hope it does not happen. I hope the Scouts can just not make sexuality or sexual activity or any further issue with the agenda part of what they do.

But I worry that will not be possible.

 

[Wolseley]

My wife and I considered letting out son join Cub Scouts when he was smaller; but after one visit to one of their meetings, we kiboshed the idea. The scoutmaster was an incompetant boob who had absolutely no control over his charges, and the boys were a bunch of uncontrollable little monsters creating mayhem and havoc and destruction of all that was around them.

I thought, "WHY, in the name of all that's holy, would I want to place my sweet-natured, well-behaved, polite, and respectful little boy in with these little hellions so he can learn to imitate their behavior?" He was appalled, and we were disgusted. When we got back to the car, he asked me, "Dad, why were they acting that way?", and I replied, "They've never been taught the proper way to behave, son. Simply take it as a lesson on how not to act."

 

[AMDG]

research doesn't support either of these statements.

Depends on the research. Did they take into consideration the fact that children model themselves after their parents--girls their mothers and boys their fathers? That's how children learn. The teachings are more "caught" than "taught". (That's according to the child development course that was taken at the military chapel that was necessary to even work with children.) How do they treat the opposite sex as well as others. And I find it real hard to imagine someone who actually hates the other sex will be able to show that it is normal to cling to the opposite sex in marriage and not insert little digs--"men are no good anyway, you don't need a man" the lesbian might say while the homosexual man might have a slightly "tainted" idea of women. And I wonder about the religious aspect to it--when the child is exposed to folks having to exclude him to save his feelings to know what God thinks of the act his parents participate in. Guess religion isn't even expected in those tests. IOW, sounds like the tests you speak of are not based in reality, but are stacked in favor of the homosexual lifestyle.

 

[AMDG]

This is from March 24, 2010. In a lawsuit filed last December by Tom Monaghan (the owner of Dominos Pizza), contraceptive methods that could result in abortion are included under the "Obama care" plan.

LINK: http://www.thomasmore.org/sites/default/files/files/Dominos Farms Complaint filed copy 121412.pdf

From the link: 8. Under the IOM guidelines, the Mandate requires all insurance insurers to provide not only contraception, but also abortion, because certain drugs and devices such as the “morning-after pill,” “Plan B,” and “ella” come within the Mandate’s and Health Resources and Services Administration’s definition of “Food and Drug Administration-approved contraceptive methods” despite their known abortifacient mechanisms of action.
Also: 6. The Mandate requires all insurance issuers (e.g. Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Michigan) to provide contraception, sterilization, abortion, and abortifacients in all of its insurance plans, group and individual.

Even if the plan didn't include abortion-inducing drugs, it includes contraceptives that go against Catholic teachings.

Chrystal-J, an executive order is only good for the particular president (and as we have seen, Obama even ignores laws at will.) The Bishops were not impressed by the executive order that Obama gave. They knew that it was meaningless particularly after wording actually forbidding taxpayer abortion was rejected several times in the bill itself! And after Obama stabbed Cardinal Dolan in the back by insisting that Catholics and others whose religious tenets forbid abortion pay for others abortifacients, sterilizations, and birth control we found out that the executive order was meaningless. (The Bishops were right not to trust it afterall.) Stupak (who originally held out for that executive order) said that he now realizes that he had been "had".

Sad. Now we have all those HHS lawsuits.

 

[Cosmic Charlie]

My wife and I considered letting out son join Cub Scouts when he was smaller; but after one visit to one of their meetings, we kiboshed the idea. The scoutmaster was an incompetant boob who had absolutely no control over his charges, and the boys were a bunch of uncontrollable little monsters creating mayhem and havoc and destruction of all that was around them.

I thought, "WHY, in the name of all that's holy, would I want to place my sweet-natured, well-behaved, polite, and respectful little boy in with these little hellions so he can learn to imitate their behavior?" He was appalled, and we were disgusted. When we got back to the car, he asked me, "Dad, why were they acting that way?", and I replied, "They've never been taught the proper way to behave, son. Simply take it as a lesson on how not to act."

Of course, actually becoming a volunteer leader never actually occurred to you.

 

[Davidnic]

Scouts are great. Like I said I hope they can just keep away from some of the pitfalls and focus on where they excel as a group. I worry because both sides will push for direct statements and such. But I would love to see them make it through this in a way the Church can still support troops.

 

[Wolseley]

Of course, actually becoming a volunteer leader never actually occurred to you.

With my PTSD??? Are you kidding??? No, Charlie---not only for my sake, but for theirs. About the first time I asked them to settle down and pay attention and they paid no heed, I'd go off the deep end and turn into The Sergeant again......and believe me, nobody wants to deal with The Sergeant---not even me. I'm a pretty even-tempered guy most of the time, but The Sergeant is not. The Sergeant is a mean, intolerant, foul-mouthed, quick-tempered SOB, and you don't want to mess with him.

I'd have to raise my voice to get their attention----and the voice that The Sergeant uses is the same voice used on a gunnery range or a flightline: loud. Really loud. It's usually accompanied by physical gestures which indicate that any more horsing around will be to the perpetrator's eternal regret.

Try that with a bunch of six year old Cub Scouts, and when they got weeping to Mama about The Mean Ole Sergeant, I'd be lucky to wind up having the parents simply demanding my resignation---that is, if I didn't wind up in jail.

Not that I would ever touch one of them; I would never, under any circumstances, lay so much as a finger on any of them. But I can scream with the best of them; I can get two inches from their noses and bellow into their faces; I can scare the living daylights out of them. It gets results---and boy howdy. But it's not the sort of thing that these little white-bread suburban my-daddy-is-a-tax-accountant miscreants are used to, and it doesn't sit well with Mama at all, because her little darlings actually have to sit still, be quiet and respectful, and keep a disciplined tongue in their heads.

The Sergeant made his appearance numerous times when I was still working, when some smart-mouthed college kid, obstreperous drunk, or shuckie-jive ghetto turkey decided to give me a ration of crap. It always ended with the perp looking like somebody had smacked him upside the head with an oak plank about three inches thick, and I always ended up with some sort of disciplinary review. It wasn't something I could control, and under the wrong circumstances, I still can't.

No, Charlie---I wouldn't even entertain the idea of me becoming a scoutmaster. In the immortal words of Molly Hatchet, that's flirting with disaster. I'm much, much better off where I'm at right now: retired, not dealing with people, and taking my happy pills every day, and not having to put up with anybody else's nonsense. It's easier on me, and it's definitely easier on them. I don't ever want to have to be back in the position where the perp is so terrified of me that he ends up hiding behind my lieutenant and weeping, "You keep him away from me! He's crazy!"

(I don't know what he was so worried about; I hadn't even drawn my gun.)

And just for the record, I'm not crazy. Paranoid, quick-tempered, hyper-vigilant, angry, suicidal, and mean? Yeah, I've been all those things in the past. But that's due to a disorder, not insanity. And the lovely little pills the VA gives me have gotten all that down to a manageable level, and that's where I want to keep it, believe me. I don't like being a total @#$%&*^ any more than anybody else who has to deal with me does.

 

[WarriorAngel]

It is immoral to discriminate against people for merely being gay. This is affirmed in the Catechism. The boy scouts discriminated against people for their orientation, regardless of whether they were celibate or not. Now their stance is more in line with the Church than it was previously.

Actually - gay scouts did exist.
No one was excluded - but the boys didnt generally bring up the birds and the bees in their programs - so why they did this - i dont know.

They called attention to something that wasnt even an issue previously.
And yes, i do know of young boys who were gay who joined.

They wanted to hit the PC mark?

BSA was about kids getting together camping, archery, marksmanship...etc
Leaving behind them the worries of the outside world - just having fun - doing boy junk.

I do have an issue with them stating some discrimination occurred because it didnt. My husband is a troop leader.

I will say the majority of the gay kids i know didnt want involved in this kind of stuff anyway. Meh...

Also read that the BSA knows this may cause a 70% decrease in scout population...

In the end - it made no sense to even bring this up - since scouting isnt about sexuality.

 

[WarriorAngel]

Now, I hope it does not happen. I hope the Scouts can just not make sexuality or sexual activity or any further issue with the agenda part of what they do.

But I worry that will not be possible.

My DH is worried about this too. I think he is preparing to quit... he doesnt have the desire to go into that stuff.

 

[ebia]

If Christians consider abortion murder, then they should have the right not to participate in any form of that act. Or should Christians be forced to participate in something they consider to be murder?

I can't say I've ever been forced to perform any kind of medical operation.

If you mean indirect funding, that's a different question.

 

[ebia]

Health insurance initiatives forced on Catholic employers that make them pay for abortions would still be in conflict with Catholic/Christian teachings. How is it any different than someone paying for a contract killing? You don't do the actually killing, but you pay for someone else to do it. And if Catholics consider abortion murder, then paying someone to perform them is a part of the abortion process.

I have to pay taxes that fund things I'm opposed to for faith inspired moral reasons. It simply doesn't happen that we can (or even should be able to) decide how money is indirectly spent.

 

[Tallguy88]

Actually - gay scouts did exist.
No one was excluded - but the boys didnt generally bring up the birds and the bees in their programs - so why they did this - i dont know.

They called attention to something that wasnt even an issue previously.
And yes, i do know of young boys who were gay who joined.

They wanted to hit the PC mark?

BSA was about kids getting together camping, archery, marksmanship...etc
Leaving behind them the worries of the outside world - just having fun - doing boy junk.

I do have an issue with them stating some discrimination occurred because it didnt. My husband is a troop leader.

I will say the majority of the gay kids i know didnt want involved in this kind of stuff anyway. Meh...

Also read that the BSA knows this may cause a 70% decrease in scout population...

In the end - it made no sense to even bring this up - since scouting isnt about sexuality.

I'm just glad the kids won't be shown the door because of their sexuality, which they can't help.