Atheist expects Boy Scouts to change, but not soon

The 19-year-old Eagle Scout, the subject of national attention after being booted out of the organization last month for being an atheist, doesn't think his recent appeal will reverse his situation. Not soon, anyway.


		Loren Callahan / P-I
	Darrell Lambert of Olalla, who was kicked out of the Boy Scouts for being an atheist, has appealed the decision. But he says he won't go to court. "I'd like them to realize it is the moral thing to do."

"I think eventually the Boy Scouts will change," the Olalla teen said yesterday. "It'll just take longer than I like."

Lambert, who earned 37 merit badges in 10 years and assisted in leading a Port Orchard troop, sent his appeal last week to the Scouts' Western Region office in Tempe, Ariz. His letter started a process that likely could take months to resolve.

If the regional office turns down his appeal, Lambert could appeal to the national office in Irving, Texas. The national office's decision is final.

Lambert doesn't expect to win at either the regional or national level, and says he won't go to court "to fight my way into the Boy Scouts. I'd like them to realize it is the moral thing to do."

He acknowledges that the Scouts, a private organization, has the right to establish requirements for membership. The Boy Scout Law says members must be reverent, and in their oath Scouts pledge a duty to God.

Lambert's stance became known in October, when he challenged a Scout leader who had said that atheists would have to go around the rules to be in Scouts.

"Legally, (the Scouts) have a right to discriminate," Lambert said at a presentation on the issue yesterday. "Morally, they don't. That's what I'm fighting. They can't teach good citizenship and practice bad citizenship."

Local and national representatives for the Scouts could not be reached for comment yesterday. Last month, local spokesman Mark Hunter said that the Boy Scouts maintain that "duty to God is one of our founding principles. It's been that way for 92 years."

The Scouts "realize that not every individual nor organization prescribes to the same beliefs that the (Boy Scouts of America) does, but we hope that all Americans can be as respectful of our beliefs as we are of theirs . . .," according to a statement in support of diversity on the national office's Web site.

Lambert, a freshman at Tacoma Community College, has the support of Troop 1531 in Port Orchard, where his mother, Trish Lambert, is the Scoutmaster.

Two advocacy groups have joined his cause: Scouting For All, based in Petaluma, Calif., and the Coalition for Inclusive Scouting, a group started in New England by Mark Noel of Hanover, N.H.

Noel, who appeared yesterday with Lambert, is an Eagle Scout and former assistant Scoutmaster who was kicked out of the organization in 2000 after revealing that he was gay.

"The values of Scouting are good," Noel said. "The values work in spite of discrimination, certainly not because of it."

In his letter of appeal to the Scouts' national office, Lambert said the reason for his dismissal was "un-Scout-like and un-American" and that "morals come from more than a belief in God."

Being told that he could no longer be in Scouts was like being "asked to leave my family," he said.

"A Scout is loyal. . . . I'll always consider myself a Boy Scout."

PRESENTATION TONIGHT

Darrell Lambert, who was kicked out of the Boy Scouts of America for being an atheist, will speak at 7 tonight at South Sound Center, 308 Tacoma Ave. S., Tacoma. Appearing with him will be Robert Raketty, regional director of Scouting For All.

P-I reporter John Iwasaki can be reached at 206-448-8096 or johniwasaki@seattlepi.com

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