recollections

having flashbacks to your childhood is never fun, i was recently on youtube where my former church has put up vids of their Pathfinder Club.
for you non- adventists the pathfinder club is an organization mirroring boy/girl scouts with a strict and clear religious message. pathfinders are taught dicipline, personal care, arts and crafts, religion, community involvement, and social skills. it is for children 10-16, and is pretty much unparalleled. catholics have CCD, but the Seventh-Day Adventist pathfinders take it to a whole new level.

The truth is, I loved Pathfinders. Like soccer parents, my family was entrenched in it. My Uncle and Aunt (a husband and wife team) were both club directors, my mother and aunt were club directors and counselors. and everyone was trained as a Master Guide (the equivalent of an Eagle Scout) but for my brother and i it turned from heaven to hell.
I was teased horribly, people made fun of me for my weight, and the fact i was gay. they practically slaughtered my brother because he was antisocial.

I remember one of the dividing facts that cemented my leaving the church, was the fact that the club was highly unfair in the area of Gender, which made playing to my strengths difficult. for the longest time te only activities available at camps were as follows:

Arts and crafts
basketball
volleyball
pinewood derby
fancy drill and drum corps

foe boys, the only competition available were basketball and drumcorps. I HATE basketball, so being a musician i decided to try drum corps. peoples didnt want me on drums, and made it difficult for me to join. finally they kicked me off. not content, i stopped going to club meetings, and found mself leaving the church.

i was a scared youth who came from an ultra religious family, and now i am both gay and i cant attend church. looking for answers led me to SDA Kinship http://www.sdakinship.net/sdakinship/
it was the only genuine safe space, for one, because the devils were in the walls. sites i thought were gay friendly were actually run as guilt trips for possibly self destructive people.
the sad thing is, i miss the comraderie offered by church, but i cant see myself going to church ever again as a gay man.