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[quote=Anonymous]My husband was raised in a conservative, extremely religious community.  It was difficult to tell where the boy scouts stopped and the church began.  He has many fond memories of his many years in the scouts, but he is an Atheist now, as am I.

We are reaching cub scout age with our oldest son and many of his friends are joining up.  We have good relationships with many people in the troop (school friends and neighbors) many of whom I know are Christian, and all of whom are quite liberal (example, all are perfectly respectful toward homosexuality - at least in public.)  We have no reservations about our child being exposed to religious observations or traditions, and in fact we have found it to be a good educational opportunity.  "Stand quietly while people pray, be respectful, listen to their words."  "Why do you think they do that?"  "What do you think they get from it?" "It doesn't matter what people believe nearly as much as how they treat other people."

We explain to him what we personally believe, but try to encourage him to keep an open mind so that he can make his own decisions as he grows.  While we have concerns about the Scouts' stance on homosexuality, I am quite confident that would not be made an issue in this urban troop, and likely never mentioned at all.  We like the idea of many aspects of scouting: a sense of community, learning useful life skills, encouraging trustworthiness, and service.  That all stated, we are experiencing pause when it comes to joining the scouts since God is proffered as an authority so very often, and it's right there in the Scout Oath right?  It's one thing to not address sexuality, but believing in "a God" feels like a requirement of the organization and it may send the wrong messages to our little guy.

We have been discussing it, and we are truly torn.  We know this is likely the first of many situations that we will run into where our atheism is in conflict with what he is hearing. I was wondering if anyone has had an experience or insight that might be helpful to us as we navigate.  Have you been in a very liberal scout troop?  If the local troop takes it easy on the God/homosexuality component should I still be concerned with the larger organization's clear omission of respect toward atheists? [/quote]

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