Why Mormons are so devastated by the Boy Scout vote on gay leaders
The Boy Scouts’ vote Monday
to lift its ban on openly gay troop leaders was a blow to traditional
faith groups heavily involved in scouting, but perhaps to none more than
the Mormon Church, in which scouting and the religious life of boys are
deeply intertwined.
Mormons
have been deeply invested in Boy Scouts for more than a century, and
any boy who goes to a Mormon congregation is automatically part of the
Boy Scouts. The rites and rituals of the church are intentionally
connected with those of the scouts: As you rise through becoming a
deacon, a teacher and then a priest – rites of passage for Mormon teen
males – at the same time you rise through scout positions as well. The
local bishop selects scoutmasters. Many of the 16 presidents of the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints received high scout honors.
The
Boy Scouts is, literally, the youth program of the Mormon Church for
boys, a bond forged because the church saw their core values as the
same: Patriotism and devotion to God. The Mormon Church is also the
largest Boy Scout charter; about 20 percent of all scouts are Mormon.
Eric
Hay of Scouts for Equality praised the Boy Scout leaders' vote to allow
gay adults to lead. Pastor Robert Jeffress criticized the decision,
saying Christians may now send their boys to other organizations. (AP)
Reconciling
its relationship with the Boy Scouts as the national youth group become
more accepting of gay equality appears to be growing more difficult
for the Mormon Church, whose press office put out a statement Monday,
saying leaders were “deeply troubled” by the lifting of the ban, as
well as by the fact that they had asked for a delay in the vote because
the church bureaucracy takes off in July.
Facing litigation, the Scouts Monday approved a new policy allowing
troops to pick openly-gay volunteer leaders and banning discrimination
in the hiring of employees. But it leaves it to individual troops and
councils, most of which are faith-based, to choose leaders who reflect
their own values.
Church officials declined to elaborate on the statement Tuesday.
But it puzzled some observers because the Mormon Church has made
high-profile efforts in the last year or so to soften its comments about
sexuality and the place of gays and lesbians.
This
spring gay advocates and Mormon leaders in Utah made headlines when
they announced they’d been secretly meeting for many months and had
hammered out a compromise to ban discrimination in housing and
employment against LGBT people. Both sides said they were willing to
recognize the needs of the other.
One
detail of that compromise, however, may shed light on the new tension
over the Scouts: The sole requirement church leaders had at the time was
that there be an exemption in the compromise legislation for the Boy
Scouts, so they could continue to not hire openly gay employees.
On Tuesday
Mormons and longtime church observers were trying to sort out what was
going on. Was the church being sidelined by its longtime partner? Why
did the church seem blindsided by a vote that had been in the making for
some time? Was this really a shift away from compromise? Is it possible
to imagine the Mormon Church separating from scouting?
Jim
Dabakis, an openly gay Utah senator who was involved in that
compromise, said the church statement was “puzzling” but that he
suspected it was part of the overall flux in a country feeling the
push-pull of competing rights – those of traditional religious believers
and those of LGBT people.
“I
suspect there is some post-same-sex-marriage-ruling jitters there,” he
said, referring to the Supreme Court’s recent finding of a
constitutional right to same-gender marriage. “It’s been a long, hard
road on LGBT issues for all sides, and these social battles go back and
forth, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.”
Rather
than making a dramatic move away from scouting, a core of Mormon life,
Dabakis – who grew up Mormon – said he hopes his bargaining partners
would wait a while to see how the changes plays out. “Don’t respond in
the heat of either victory or losing. It’s just bad policy.”
Mormon
blogs from progressive ones to those closely affiliated with the church
showed a range of views, from church members applauding the move either
because they don’t like Boy Scout programming or because they oppose
gay equality, to those who were embarrassed by the church’s statement
because it seemed condemning of gays. When the Scouts welcomed openly
gay youth in 2013, the Mormon Church made clear that its teachings call
all youth to chastity and that gay youth are welcome along with straight
youth. In other words, they tried to downplay the difference.
“Wow.
What an I’m-taking-my-ball-home comment! If Scouting is good for young
American men, then it will surely remain good whatever the outcome of
the vote. And to be grumpy like this in public seems remarkably
impolitic,” Ronan James Head wrote on the popular progressive Mormon blog bycommonconsent.
Some complained that the girls’ youth programs aren’t as extensive.
Commenters on the church-run ksl.com news site debated
the wisdom of church officials who said this week that the Mormon
Church may break off and form its own youth program, one that matches
church teachings and thus would be easier for the church to adapt to its
many overseas missions. Some said the Scout vote was a good reason to
leave while others said the prominence and history of the Boy Scouts
would not be simple to replace.
“I’ve
been waiting for the day when the church will drop the scouting
program. I hope this was the last straw. It overshadows the Duty to God
program which is paramount to anything regarding the young men these
days. Forget the basket-weaving merit badge; time to refocus our efforts
on that which really matters,” one ksl.com commenter wrote.
Quin
Monson, a political scientist at Brigham Young University – who is also
a Mormon who was in scouts, and whose son is in scouts – said Tuesday
that the church statement doesn’t reflect the fact that the Mormon
Church has sought more conciliatory positions on hot-button issues than
some other religiously conservative faiths.
Monson,
who last year published “Seeking the Promised Land: Mormons and
American Politics,” said his research shows that Mormons – more than
evangelical Protestants, among others – are more open to compromises
such as civil unions and are becoming increasingly so.
“I think if you read between the lines [of the church’s statement Monday],
they were just trying to get this to slow down and have a conversation.
My guess is it’s not necessarily a visceral negative reaction,” he
said.
The Catholic Church’s scouting association put out a statement Monday
saying the new policy seemed workable — if it continues to allow
church-affiliated troops to pick their own leaders, and if clear
guidelines are set for how “sexual orientation” is described. Catholic
teaching accepts that people are gay or lesbian in their identity but
forbids same-sex sexual behavior.
Russell
Moore, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s public policy
arm, said Southern Baptist churches have been “cooling” toward the Boy
Scouts in recent years due to their opening on gay issues. “This will
probably bring that cooling to a freeze,” Moore told The Associated Press.
Mormon Church leaders said Tuesday that they wouldn’t expect any comment until August, when their full leadership regroups.
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