Boy Scouts Welcomes Girls, Gays. Mormon Church Says, 'Bye'

As the BSA moves into the 21st-century, the Mormon Church backs away after a century-long partnership.

Neal Broverman

Neal Broverman is the Editorial Director, Print of Pride Media, publishers of The Advocate, Out, Out Traveler, and Plus, spending more than 20 years in journalism. He indulges his interest in transportation and urban planning with regular contributions to Los Angeles magazine, and his work has also appeared in the Los Angeles Times and USA Today. He lives in the City of Angels with his husband, children, and their chiweenie.

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Neal Broverman

May 09 2018 11:15 AM EST

May 09 2018 12:00 PM EST

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The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Boy Scouts of America are separating after collaborating for over 100 years, but the two organizations are painting it as a civil severing.

The LDS Church, aka the Mormon Church, and Scouts released a joint statement on Tuesday announcing the end of their partnership -- for decades, membership in the Boy Scouts was nearly compulsory for young male Mormons, with Mormon males making up nearly 20 percent of its over 2.3 million membership. The LDS Church claims it is creating its own youth development program now, partly because so many of its followers live outside the United States, NPR reports.

In truth, fissures have been developing between the organizations for years, ever since the Boy Scouts moved to allow openly LGBT scouts and leaders. Back in 2015, just a few years after allowing queer scouts to join, BSA moved to open up leadership positions to openly LGBT people. The LDS Church responded to the news by saying it was "deeply troubled" by the move and even threatened back then to rescind their partnership.

The BSA tried to quell the blowback by stating that church-sponsored groups aren't required to accept openly LGBT leaders, but it didn't appear to help matters with the Church, which has taken some shockingly antigay positions in the past few years.