Several churches across the country have severed ties with the Boy Scouts of America after the organization voted last week to allow openly gay scouts to remain in the organization, according to ABC News.
In the weeks leading up to the controversial vote several groups with religious ties were vocal about their opposition to lifting the ban on gay scouts and had warned the organization of the possible ramifications of lifting the ban. Frank Page, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's executive committee talked to ABC News about his group's disappointment with the Scouts.
"I think I can say with pretty strong accuracy that the vast majority of Southern Baptists are very disappointed in the latest change in policy...deeply disappointed," Page said.
Page told ABC News that when the Southern Baptist Convention meets in two weeks for their national meeting they will likely recommend that the 47,000 churches affiliated with the group pull their sponsorship of the Scouts.
Of the 100,000 Boy Scout Troops in the U.S. roughly 70 percent of them are sponsored and supported by religious groups, according to USA Today.
Elders at Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Ky., have voted to remove the church's ties with the BSA, reports WHAS. With 30,000 members the church is one of the largest in the country. The church's executive pastor, Tim Hester, told the Louisville Courier Journal that the church did not agree with the direction the organization is headed.
"Truly for us it's a logical decision," Hester said. "We cannot be distracted from the mission God has called us to. We want everyone, including ourselves, to live by biblical standards."
Our Lady Star of the Sea Catholic Church in Bremerton, Wash., has also cut their ties with the organization. Father Derek Lappe spoke with KING 5 News about the decision.
"My concern is this definition of a young man, a 10 to 18 year old boy as 'openly gay' or 'openly homosexual,'" Lappe said. "How is that supposed to be lived out within what we believe as Catholics and what we teach about Catholics."
One of the first groups to denounce the decision by the Scouts was the Assemblies of God, according to ABC News.
"We believe that the BSA policy change will lead to a mass exodus from the Boy Scouts program, as Assemblies of God and many other churches can no longer support groups that are part of an organization allowing members who are openly homosexual," a statement released by the Pentecostal organization read.
The vote to lift the ban on gay scouts was passed with 61 percent of the vote, according to USA Today. Along with the support from within the scouting organization there are more than a few religious organizations who have supported the move. The Mormon church, the largest religiously based supporter of Scouts, has supported the decision to include gay scouts. Other supporters include the Episcopal Church, the United Church of Christ, the National Jewish Committee on Scouting and the Unitarian Universalist Association, reports ABC News.
Ross Murray, director of news and faith initiatives for the gay rights advocacy group GLAAD spoke with ABC News about the possibility of churches abandoning the Scouts.
"There's a lot of noise around folks that are leaving, and there's probably not going to be as much attention about what new troops may actually start or get sponsored by places that didn't want to be associated with the discriminatory policy before," Murray said. "There will be a lot of noise around them leaving and a lot of words like 'torn apart' will be used to describe this, but, in the end, the organization will probably come back in a stronger place because it's more inclusive."
