The president of the Boy Scouts of America, Robert Gates, yesterday essentially called for the organization to drop its ban against openly homosexual adult troop leaders, a move that evangelical leader Franklin Graham said would prove the group “is bending to LGBT activist groups” and which would put “young, innocent boys at risk.”
“Robert Gates, shame on you for not having the moral courage to do what is right,” said Rev. Graham in a May 22 post on Facebook. “Yesterday Gates, the president of Boy Scouts of America, called for an end to the group’s ban on gay troop leaders. What are you thinking?”
“We shouldn’t shift as the winds of cultural change blow through society; we need to stand for God’s truth and things that are morally right,” said Rev. Graham, the son of world-renowned evangelist Billy Graham.
“This move is bending to LGBT activist groups and would put young, innocent boys at risk,” said the reverend.
He continued, “I encourage every former Boy Scout and every parent involved in the Boy Scouts to let Robert Gates know how displeased you are and that if he leads the organization down this road, they may lose your support, your participation--and your sons.”
At the Boy Scouts of America’s (BSA) National Annual Meeting on May 21, its president, Robert Gates, “We must deal with the world as it is, not as we might wish it to be. The status quo in our movement’s membership standards cannot be sustained.”
“The country is changing and we are increasingly at odds with the legal landscape at both the state and federal levels,” said Gates. “The one thing we cannot do is put our heads in the sand and pretend this challenge will go away or abate. Quite the opposite is happening,
The BSA is one of the largest youth organizations in the country with an estimated 2.7 million youth members and 1 million adult volunteers.
The Boy Scout Oath reads, “On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country, and to obey the Scout Law; to help other people at all times; to keep myself physically strong, mentally awake, and morally straight.”
Franklin Graham, 62, is married and has five children. He is the president of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and also oversees the international Christian aid group Samaritan’s Purse.