The people who care about Scouting don't know how to do ministry. The people who know how to do ministry don't care about Scouting. The laity and the clergy in the same church speak different languages and move in different circles. And all sorts of people want to grab hold of the piece they can reach and move the whole UM Scouting Ministry community, without understanding or coordinating with other people interested in doing the same thing.
It didn't have to be this way.
I could tell you why things are as they are, and what should have been done to make them better. I could rehearse the ups and downs of my thirty-six years of leadership in this field. But the lessons I have tried to teach are all coming up against a deadline. There may not be a United Methodist Church in two years, or at least, not one I can feel comfortable trying to be a leader of. At this point, trying to get everybody to work together toward a worthy goal is like leading a group of tourists in an exercise class on the deck of a sinking cruise ship.
My reach has shrunk. I do what I can do to move the ball forward from where I am. We are still doing important things. We have a Conference Scouting Retreat scheduled for next August. We're trying to finance a Jamboree in Congo in memory of Bob Walters. I am trying to help with this Bishop's event -- out of sheer loyalty (I have little enthusiasm for the project). I have completed the non-profit tax return for The Indiana UM Pathfinder, Inc. But in two years' time, the whole denominational apple cart may be upset, and all the people who actually know how to do Scouting as ministry may be scattered, depending upon their perception of their various spiritual needs and loyalties.
At the beginning of this quadrennium, I offered to stay on as the Secretary-Treasurer of The Pathfinder, since we had just completed incorporation and were in process of obtaining our tax-deductible-donations letter from the IRS. I had set all that up, and thought I should stay on to shepherd the process through for a while. Plus, my daughter is the President of The Pathfinder, and I want to support her leadership. But if we fail to dodge the iceberg headed toward the good ship UMC, or if the Conference UM Men take over the whole shebang and make a bollocks of it, this quadrennium is my last, and what happens afterward I will take no further responsibility for.