Posted on 10/30/2002 3:39:31 AM PST by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - The assistant Scoutmaster of a Pacific Northwest Boy Scout troop is currently faced with the decision of professing his belief in a "supreme being" or facing banishment from the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). However, 19-year-old Darrel Lambert said he's been an atheist since the ninth grade and he's sticking to his convictions.
Lambert's track record with the Seattle-based Troop 1531 is impressive. Throughout his 10-year scouting career he earned 37 merit badges to achieve the rank of Eagle Scout; served as a quartermaster and three-time senior patrol leader; and has dedicated himself to more than 1,000 hours of community service.
But Lambert is also passionate in his rejection of the existence of any supreme being, even though the BSA's regional Chief Seattle Council informed him that expressing a reverence for Mother Earth would be an acceptable form of worship.
Although Lambert admitted to his scout troop's review board that, for years, he had intentionally neglected to demonstrate the principles of faith and reverence to God contained within the Scout Oath and Law, he was awarded the BSA's highest honor last year - Eagle Scout. Coincidentally, his mom is the Scoutmaster of that troop.
Mark Hunter, spokesman for the BSA's regional Chief Seattle Council, said he could not comment or speculate whether Trish Lambert influenced members of the Eagle Scout review board that approved her son's Eagle Scout application, which mandates all applicants must: "Demonstrate that you live by the principles of the Scout Oath and Law in your daily life."
Ironically, Lambert addressed parents Monday night in the basement of a chapel at a retirement home, the Seattle Times reported. He urged those in attendance to look beyond the issue of his atheism and support his proven dedication to the Boy Scouts.
"I think the only power higher than myself is the power of all of us combined," Lambert said.
Additionally, Lambert said he wants to see the 92-year-old BSA repeal its national membership requirements, which includes on its application a Declaration of Religious Principle. He proposed that individual troops be given the right to devise the standards by which they extend their membership to Scouts and adult leaders.
Hunter said Lambert would be permitted to continue his leadership role and interact with members of Troop 1531 while he takes some time to "search out his feelings on this."
"If they're truly what they are," Hunter said, "his membership will be terminated."
Atheism rejected in court
A similar battle erupted in 1991 when twins, Michael and William Randall, refused to recite the Boy Scout Oath's reference to God and faced expulsion from the Orange County, Calif., Boy Scouts Council, said BSA spokesman Gregg Shields.
"At the time, they were eight-years-old ... and they said they were agnostics," Shields noted. Merriam-Webster's Dictionary defines an agnostic as "a person who holds the view that any ultimate reality (as God) is unknown and probably unknowable."
The Randall twins' father, an attorney, argued a successful seven-year case in an Orange County district court only to have it overturned by the Calif. State Supreme Court in 1998.
Shields said the twins fulfilled all of the requirements to become Eagle Scouts, but since the Calif. Supreme Court ruled that the BSA could legally refuse to accept them as members, they were never awarded with the BSA's highest honor.
Teenage rebellion normal
"We recognize that in your early teenage years you go through a formative period where you question and you prod beliefs and you think about and you explore ideas," Shields said. "That's natural and to be expected."
But Shields said Lambert is now an adult who has chosen to lead a group that requires its young members and adult leaders to believe in a supreme being. He stressed that the organization places a high importance on the spiritual development of scouts to recognize a being greater than themselves.
"We expect an adult has the ability to make their own mind up about a belief," Shields said. "If one doesn't agree with the Boy Scout belief system, then perhaps boy scouting is not for that person."
E-mail a news tip to Michael L. Betsch.
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How about you just form your own group with the standards you desire, rather than attempt to destroy an institution that has benefitted young males for 92 years?
If it ain't broke, don't fix it....
Frankly, based on what you've been saying, it doesn't sound like you have much faith at all. Just a sort of 'oh, that sounds nice, I'll pretend to believe that' kind of thing. Faith means being convinced and convicted that something is correct. If you aren't convinced and convicted, then you don't have faith.
the ultimate sin - disbelief
So you're saying if I don't say "There is no God but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet" I am a sinner?
I think I'll be shakin' the dust off my sandals now....
Exactly.
I'm about to become the Assistant Scoutmaster in our Troop because the Troop can't find another father who will take the job.
My medical practice takes up quite a bit of my time leaving me with little free time and sometimes pretty burned out at the end of the day. I volunteered on all the Troop campouts last year. However, becoming an Assistant Scoutmaster that will set me up to become Scoutmaster when the current Scoutmaster moves on to Venture when his son does is something that I feel will stretch me quite thin.
I wish some other Dad would step up and volunteer but not a single one has. That leaves me. My wife will also be an Assistant Scoutmaster for those nights that, when the Troop meeeting starts at 7:30 PM, I'm still at the Hospital.
One of my cowokers is the female Scoutmaster of a Troop in a community in the south side of the County. In that community, not a single father has volunteered.
What the scouts are doing is also dishonest and un-Christian. There is no scriptural basis in any monotheistic faith for saying that Idolatry is preferable to Unbelief. By saying that people must believe in a "higher power" but that it does not matter which god they worship, the scouts are saying that people should pray to false gods. If someone does not know God or is unsure of God's existance, is not the right thing to be an athiest until convinced otherwise rather than to bow to an idol just to get along? The reason that people think the scouts position is reasonable, is that it support spirituality and ecumenicalism which are both popular and politically correct. Spirituality says that it is preferable to believe in the supernatural rather than only believing in the natural world. Ecumenicalism says that all religions are at least partly true. The problem is that genuine religious faith usually involves a belief that a specific religion is the one true faith while a purely objective scientific position requires proof before believing in anything.
During the Roman Empire there was a form of religious tolerance in which you could worship any pagan god you chose so long as you accepted that the Roman Emperor was a God. This worked well for polytheists because the Roman state would not object to their household god being added to the approved pantheon of gods and it was no big deal to make an offering to the Roman Emperor. It did create a problem for Jews and Christians who believed that worshipping anyone other than the one God was a mortal sin. When they refused to pray to the emperor, they were persecuted and attained martyrdom.
Even if they are legally within their rights, is it reasonable for the scouts to single out one religious position for exclusion while permitting all others?
LOL! I have been baptised in a Baptist Church.
From the non-believer's point of view though, why should he choose Christianity over Judaism or Islam or Hinduism for example? From the non-believer's viewpoint they are all making claims that can't be readily verified. Why shouldn't he be wary? Particularly when some of these religions state that something exceedingly nasty will happen to you if you don't accept it? You've got the Islamics saying the infidel should be killed, you've got Christians saying he will be cast into a lake of fire. Presumedly the Mulsims believe in some form of perdition as well. From the non-believer's viewpoint- he's screwed no matter what. If chooses to become a Christian, he'll go to the Muslim hell after they have cut his throat. If he opts for Islam- he'll get bombed by the US and then go to the Christian Hell.
This is one reason I don't like to discuss religion. Everybody is deadly certain their point of view is the only correct one and many are even willing to kill over it. It's just one more thing for humans to fight each other about.
Atheism is not a religion.
One major difference is that an atheist believes that human reason alone suffices to create and resolve an ethical system, whereas all the various religions say that there is a power beyond human reason that human reason must obey and use in order to create and resolve an ethical system.
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