(17 Sep 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Santa Clarita, California – 11 September 2025
1. Various of Troop 228 Patriots Day ceremony at Saint Kateri Tekakwitha Church
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Los Angeles – 29 August 2025
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Roger Krone, Scouting America CEO:
++PARTIALLY COVERED++
"We just got to the point that said, frankly, if you can fill out a membership application and you have a Venmo account, you can join our organization. There is a place, we think, for every child in our organization, but we say prayers at meals. We say prayers a campfires. We do, in our Scout oath and Scout Law, I said, you are all welcome in our organization. There may be certain youth, certain adults who are not comfortable being in our organization with the way we go about our meetings, and I’m okay with that, you know, but I will tell you, anyone can join."
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Santa Clarita, California – 11 September 2025
3. Various of ceremony
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Christine Tezai, Chartered Org Representative for Saint Kateri Tekakwitha:
"You don’t have to, you know, say prayers and preach about God at the troop meetings, but you know what we do by showing kindness and being helpful, that’s all a part of being reverent as well. And you know when we have our dinners and our camp out, we’ll say a prayer. We don’t say you need to pray to you know Mary or to, you know, God, it’s just, it is reverence. So we bring it all together without, you know, making it actually a focal point."
5. Various of ceremony
STORYLINE:
For the Boy Scouts of America — recently renamed Scouting America — the past 12 years have been arduous. Opening its programs to gays and later to girls sparked dismay in some quarters. Its 2020 bankruptcy declaration led to prolonged wrangling over compensation for thousands of men claiming they were sexually abused as scouts.
Yet the 115-year-old organization — though serving far fewer youths than at its peak decades ago — seems to be stabilizing, with a slight uptick in membership last year. A key factor is the abiding loyalty of major religious denominations who still view scouting’s mission as uniquely in tune with their own.
According to Scouting America’s latest data, faith-based organizations account for 42% of the nearly 40,000 units operated by chartered organizations. The Catholic Church and its affiliates are No. 1 — overseeing 3,514 units serving more than 87,100 of the roughly 1 million boys and girls now active in scouting.
Other major sponsors include the United Methodists, the Episcopal Church and various Lutheran and Presbyterian denominations. Nearly 250 units, serving more than 6,500 scouts, are sponsored by Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist organizations.
Roger Krone, Scouting America’s president and CEO, took the post in 2023 as the organization emerged from bankruptcy proceedings. He appreciates scouting’s religious diversity.
The Boy Scouts lifted a ban on openly gay youth members in 2013 and began accepting girls in 2018 — steps Krone depicted as a message of welcome to any family considering scouting.
One step that the organization will not take, Krone said, is abandoning the religious credo at the core of its mission. The famed Scout Oath begins “On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God,” while the Scout Law’s concluding message is: “Be reverent toward God. Be faithful in your religious duties. Respect the belief of others.”
Krone acknowledges that some nonreligious families, while admiring aspects of scouting, might be uncomfortable with the “Duty to God” pledge. He encourages them to try scouting nonetheless.
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