My son had been a scout since first grade. My husband had been a proud Boy Scout and I also wanted to be a Boy Scout if only I were a boy.
I was proud when Matt finally crossed over to Boy Scouts this year in great anticipation of the many adventures ahead and with high hopes of the ultimate achievement of Eagle Scout.
Matt had crossed over to one of the best and most reputable Boy Scouts troop in our area and we looked forward to many campings and high adventure activities where he will learn how to survive in the wild, sail, rappel, trek, swim and be an over-all outstanding outdoorsman. I also anticipated him blooming into a self-confident leader and a selfless contributor to his community and most of all, becoming a boy of courage and moral integrity.
For the past 100 years the BSA has been a stalwart organization which remained true to its core values when other organizations like the Girl Scouts of America and the Scouts of both the UK and Canada have buckled to outside pressure to conform to pop culture. Over the years, its opponents have worked to challenge their membership policy not to allow open and avowed homosexuality and gay activism within its ranks.
Early this year, the BSA made an announcement that it is reconsidering the same policy. Why the change?
Gay rights activists, BSA corporate sponsors like ATT, Intel and UPS, renegade elements within the organization, and members of the general populace riding on the waves of the tides of pop culture have challenged the BSA once again, and this time the BSA finally caved.
We are deeply saddened to see this institution that we love and respect embrace this risky and unprincipled proposition.
"The Boy Scouts of America has a logo that bears the phrase ‘Timeless Values.’ It has demonstrated by its actions that the organization’s values are not timeless, but are governed by the changing tides of polls, politics and public opinion."
(Statement in quote from John Stemberger of Florida Family Council)
By turning its back on its century-old values the BSA is teaching my son that when your values become unpopular, just change them, when your convictions are challenged, just cave to peer pressure; public opinion polls are more important than principles; you should not stand up for what is right instead you should stand up for what is popular.
Our family has decided to pull out from the Boy Scouts of America. It was a sad decision for Matt, and a teary one for me. I have prayed and fasted for this organization first of all because I so wanted Matt to be a Boy Scout for all that it had stood for. We have invested an enormous amount of our time, energy and resources into it over the years.
This sad course of events has taught us a few, hard lessons:
1. Standing up for one's values entails a cost.
2. In life we will be faced by choices. If Christ is indeed Lord of our lives, we will make the choices that will speak of His Lordship. If what God wants is not what we want, we still will choose to obey.
If what God wants is what we want, then we are blessed.
3. Certain things may not make sense right now but we should trust that He works everything for our good; that He is working something out for us...
It is a process of grieving for me... to have to put away my son's scouting uniform was symbolic of putting six years of our lives away and our hopes and dreams of the future.
When Matt and I had the heart-to-heart talk about this decision, he confessed he was sad because he liked Scouting. He agreed that it was the right thing to do and gave me a hug in a striking act of emotional maturity.
My son may never become an Eagle Scout, but today he has learned what being an Eagle truly means: having the courage to stand up for one's principles; being able to make brave, hard choices and endeavoring to honor God even when doing so is difficult and unpopular.
"He who honors me, He also will I honor."
"God works all things for the good of those who love Him." We can see it even now.
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