The EOCS has been hard at work updating the award booklets & course requirements for the Chi-Ro, St. George & Alpha-Omega Awards.
They are now available online FREE to download @ http://eocs.org/?page_id=12
Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America
Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting
Scout Sunday 2012
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
On Sunday, February 5, 2012, Scouts all over the United States will celebrate National Scout Sunday. This Sunday is set aside to honor God and to remind us that we are all His Creatures and made in His Image or more precisely – to image (reflect) Him to the world.
The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishop of the Americas has designated this also as Orthodox Scout Sunday. Through the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting, the Assembly and its predecessor, SCOBA, have been actively supporting both the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of the USA since the 1960’s.
Orthodox Scouts may earn one of three age-appropriate religious awards: Saint George for the youngest scouts, Chi-Rho for the “middle years”, and Alpha-Omega for the older scouts. The awards require progressively more challenging work including service projects.
The observation this year is a special one—the Girls Scouts celebrate their 100-year anniversary and the Boy Scouts celebrate 102 years. Both programs consider reverence and belief in God to be cornerstones for developing young women and men as leaders of their communities and their country.
Scouts will wear their uniforms to church—a very visible sign that they are members of the scouting organization but just as important, members of their parish.
As Orthodox Christians, we should honor our Boy or Girl Scouts and what they represent. The Scouting organization consists of young people aged 5 to 18 and adults who lead them. The youth spend time learning valuable life lessons from their leaders and also have a great deal of fun in the process. Camping, traveling, learning new skills, advancement, and high adventure all are based on a solid foundation of training and reinforcement.
The Boy Scout Pledge has twelve points: A Scout is Trustworthy, Loyal, Helpful, Friendly, Courteous, Kind, Obedient, Cheerful, Thrifty, Brave, Clean, and Reverent.
The final point – Reverent – ties the other eleven points together. Respect to family and others is important, but our relationship to God is paramount. Worshiping as we believe encourages us to live as His children. Holy Orthodoxy enables us to know, understand, respect and obey God’s Will and His Commandments.
Sponsoring a scouting troop or troops is a way that a parish can offer a safe, fun and exciting learning opportunity to our young people. There are probably adults in your own parish who were Girl Scouts or Boy Scouts and have learned valuable life lessons from their experiences. They may be willing to share these with the parish children as Scout leaders.
Scouts are formed by their families—both biological and parish—in their earliest years. School teaches them how to comprehend and apply advanced reasoning skills. Scouting takes these skills and applies them to specific life experiences that will benefit them forever. As the Church, we are responsible for nurturing them and giving them Christian values that will transform these experiences and enable them to do “God’s Will on earth.”
Whether your parish starts a new troop, sponsors an existing one, or encourages their young people to join another scouting troop, the results are a brighter future with more and certainly better leaders!
Read about the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting EOCS on the web site: http://eocs.org/
Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting (EOCS)
Episcopal Liaison:
Bishop Daniel (Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA)
National Chairman:
George N. Boulukos
St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary conducts an annual “Orthodox Education Day. For 2011, it was celebrated with the theme “For God and Country”. This year, the program began with morning Divine Liturgy, and the divine services were centered on remembering the veterans and those on active duty in the Armed Forces. They also honored the hundreds of loved ones both living and departed. It started with a parade that featured military chaplains, a color guard including Orthodox Scouts from Holy Trinity Orthodox Church, Troop # 325. This preceded the dedication of their new campus flagpole, erected in memory of Archpriest Vladimir Borichevsky, the first American Orthodox military chaplain, and in honor of all our military chaplains.
Global cuisines from places like Serbia, India, and Russia were served, and Greek, Macedonian and Georgian dance groups performed and electrified the crowds. In the Children’s Activity Booth, youngsters had the opportunity to write letters to our troops and to learn about military saints. Three amazing choirs filled Three Hierarch’s Chapel with glorious music: Holy Myrrh Bearers Choir, St. Tikhon’s Seminary Choir, and St. Nino’s Georgian Orthodox Church Choir.
There were many educational opportunities for those present. The exquisite icons and artifacts exhibits from St. Tikhon’s Monastery Metropolitan Museum mesmerized the multitude of people on campus. Two panels, one of current St. Vladimir’s students with military experience and other of Orthodox military chaplains, shared their experiences of being an Orthodox Christian in the Armed Forces.
Based on a follow up from the Seminary, we were told that the Scouts added a great deal to the success of the day.
This post was written for the SVOTS Synaxis , a new blog of St. Vladimir’s Seminary
In Father Alexander Schmemann’s important work, For the Life of the World, he teaches us that when we speak of “life” in the context of our experience of the Kingdom of God, we cannot separate “religious life” from our secular experience. Yet we slide easily into a weekly pattern of segregating our “religious life” into a “Sunday only” experience. Service through Scouting is one tool that we have to help “keep whole” or integrate a young Christian’s identity.
Parishes that support membership in community Scouting programs, such the Cub Scout Pack pictured, give rich character-development experiences to their youngest parishioners and also increase the visibility of the Orthodox Church in a supportive environment. (Pictured: a recent meeting of Pack 50 in San Anselmo, CA)Scouting in North America has a rich history of cooperation with the Orthodox Church. Indeed, the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting was one of the first significant efforts of the Orthodox in our land to work together. The model advocated throughout most of the twentieth century focused on the creation of Scouting units in the parish. This model has been particularly effective where the faithful live in geographically contained communities surrounding their parish.
Yet this plan is less workable when many of our parishes serve geographically dispersed families. I suggest that many parishes could purposefully encourage children to join local “neighborhood” Scouting units and create programming that brings together Scouts from these distinct local units as Orthodox Scouts in the parish. I write from experience with the Boy Scouts of America but other programs may also be effective tools for our parishes (see www.ecos.org for more information on the various Church-supported programs).
Utilizing the Scout Oath and Scout Law, Scouting helps youth develop academic skills, self-confidence, ethics, leadership skills, and citizenship skills in a program that is based on service. The focus on character and service makes the Boy Scouts of America a uniquely compatible program for the Orthodox Church.
While various activities teach basic skills and promote teamwork, Scouting goes beyond that and encourages youth to achieve a deeper appreciation for service to others in their community. This service to the neighbor is foundational. The highest achieving Scouts lead a service project as the culmination of their programs. This happens in a movement that holds “reverence” as a core of the Scout Law. We cannot measure faith, but in a recent study of the general population, eighty-three percent of men who were Scouts five or more years say attending religious services together as a family is “very important.”
Rigorous outdoor activities and a commitment to service are hallmarks of Scouting. (Pictured: Sea Scout Ship Viking (100) of San Francisco, CA, and other Sea Scout ships competing in a high school-age pulling boat competition)Orthodox Scouts are encouraged to work with their parish priests on earning a series of medals issued by the Church that help contextualize service in the faith of the Orthodox Church with age-appropriate content.
If we encourage our young parishioners to join “neighborhood” Scout units, the priest and other clergy and youth leaders in the parish can be visible in the life of these geographically dispersed units. Archbishop John (Shahovskoy) once noted “the purpose of ministry is to widen the Church beyond its material boundaries, to take it into the people’s homes, into their souls” (hyperlink svspress.com The Orthodox Pastor, p. 49). By utilizing and supporting membership in local units, the pastor has a new tool available to “widen” the Church both for his young parishioner and for other families in Scouting. In our Sea Scout unit in San Francisco, our bishop and other clergy have become “regular” presences at award ceremonies and other functions. The families of that unit are – at the very least! – aware of the Orthodox Church, and our parish youth involved in Scouting have memories of the Church and her servants that are integrated into major accomplishments.
A parish or regional grouping of parishes can further support membership of their Scouts in local units by bringing Orthodox Scouts together for events that facilitates friendship and common effort with other Orthodox Scouts. The Greater St. Louis area Orthodox parishes are working with this model of combining the best of neighborhood troop affiliation with regional Orthodox Scouting programming.
Our children are “pulled” in so many praiseworthy directions: academics, sports, and all sorts of activities. Membership in Scouting helps raise up young men and women who know how to lead themselves in lives of service and faith in the Orthodox Church. We can be active participants in this “game with a purpose” and help show that the Kingdom of God is real life.
Archdeacon C. Kirill Sokolov (SVOTS ‘07) is Director of Diaconal and Late Vocations for the Orthodox Church in America, Director of Technology at San Domenico School, and a doctoral student in leadership at Pepperdine University. Fr. Kirill is a Quartermaster Sea Scout and served on the Board of the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting (EOCS) from 2008-2010. He, his wife Sophia (SVOTS ‘05), and their three children live in California. Their six year-old “begins the journey” this year in Cub Scouts
This years Religious Retreat will be held at St. Basil’s Academy in Garrison, NY. The theme will be “Remember 9/11″. As in previous years the retreat will be lead by a group of seminarians from Holy Cross in Brookline Mass.
We look forward to a great weekend!
The St. Louis Chapter of the EOCS was established in the 1990’s under leadership of Leonard Cook. After a number of years, the leadership was continued by Tyler Burch because of Leonard’s illness and continued until 2008. It was disbanded because of lack of parental involvement and assistance. In 2010, the chapter was reconstituted under the leadership of Michael Tsichlis, PhD, with Tyler Burch as vice chairman. It continues to be a vibrant chapter serving all Eastern Orthodox jurisdictions in the St. Louis area.
Back in the 1990’s, Leonard Cook discovered that a great number of Eastern Orthodox Boy and Girl Scouts traveled a long distance to attend church, and for that reason they chose to join a local Scout Unit in their neighborhood. In order to bring these Orthodox scouts together, Leonard decided to create the St. Louis Chapter of the EOCS to promote Orthodox Scouting. He held an annual EOCS Retreat/Camporee and he encouraged the Scouts to participate in the Eastern Orthodox Religious Awards Programs by working with their parish priest.
Mr. Cook established a committee that promoted the EOCS programs by contacting all the area Eastern Orthodox Churches, announcing their events and programs and inviting all Orthodox Scouts to participate. As a result, a number of parents and Scouts answered the call and the St. Louis EOCS Chapter was on it’s way. It started small and grew as the years went by.
Quoting Dr. Tsichlis, “Remember, Orthodoxy and scouting make a great combination.”
For more information about the St. Louis EOCS Chapter contact:
www.stbsa.org/programs/religious-programs/Pages/Eastern-Orthodox-Scouting.aspx
Letter from His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew
Long time Scout leader, John Prekeges received the Prophet Elias Eastern Orthodox Adult Religious Award. The award is the highest honor recognizing adult leaders in Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts through the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting (EOCS).
Mr. Prekeges has been a Scouter for over 25 years, serving as a Scoutmaster for three different troops. He is currently an Assistant Scoutmaster with Troop 67 and recently became Crew Advisor for the newly formed Pan-Orthodox Venture Crew 67. He is also on the Parish Council of Assumption Greek Orthodox Church and has been teaching Sunday School for the past four years. His award was presented to him by EOCS North West EOCS Coordinator and an Eagle Scout Fr. Michael Johnson, a retired Orthodox Priest who has been involved in the Seattle area Scouting program for many years. Mr Prekeges is only the third person in the Northwest to receive the Prophet Elias Award, while Fr. Johnson was the second person to receive it. The first was George Plumis.
Scholarship winner Christopher Xanthos, of Troop 715, Holy Cross, Brooklyn, received a $ l,000 as the first place winner in the l9th national annual Scholarship Program sponsored by the Eastern Orthodox Committee on Scouting. He is flanked by his mother, Demetra, and Scoutmaster Jim Athanasatos, and George N. Boulukos, National Chairman of E.O.C.S There were two runner ups, each receiving $ 500 each.: Christopher Drake, New Jersey, and Alaina Bontales, New Jersey. Several hundred applicants from around the country applied for this award.
The Assembly of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of North and Central America (formerly known as the Episcopal Assembly of North and Central America) is one of twelve bishops’ assemblies which have been established in different geographical regions throughout the world. It is made up of all the active, canonical Orthodox bishops of North and Central America, of every jurisdiction.
The Assembly has been established in accordance with the Decision of the 4th Pre-Conciliar Pan-Orthodox Conference, convoked in Chambésy, Switzerland, June 6-12, 2009, at which met representatives from all the universally-recognized autocephalous Orthodox churches. These representatives recognized substantial canonical ‘anomalies’ in the organization and life of the Church in these regions, and realized that, though these anomalies had arisen from specific historical circumstances and pastoral needs, they nonetheless present a number of serious problems for the faithful; moreover, they give an appearance of disunity in the one holy Church. As such, these representatives unanimously agreed to the formation of the assemblies of bishops to heal, as quickly as possible, these anomalies.
The purpose of the Assembly of Bishops of North and Central America is to preserve and contribute to the unity of the Orthodox Church by helping to further her spiritual, theological, ecclesiological, canonical, educational, missionary and philanthropic aims. To accomplish this, the Assembly has as its goals: i) the proclamation and promotion of Church unity in North and Central America; ii) the strengthening of the common pastoral ministry to all the Orthodox faithful of this region; and iii) a common witness by the Church to all those outside her. In addition, the Assembly has as an express goal iv) the organization of the Church in North and Central America in accordance with the ecclesiological and the canonical tradition of the Orthodox Church.
The Assembly, which meets annually, functions by a consensus of all its members. It has established a number of committees to help further its work. These committees are charged by the Assembly with specific tasks; they are made up of member bishops, and are assisted by lay and clergy advisors. The Assembly understands itself to be the successor of SCOBA, and as such, it has assumed all of its agencies, dialogues, and other ministries.
Unlike SCOBA however, the Assembly is a transitional body. If it achieves its goal, it will make itself obsolete by developing a proposal for the canonical organization of the Church in North and Central America. This proposal will in turn be presented to the forthcoming Great and Holy Council, which will consist of all canonical Orthodox bishops throughout the world. Should this proposal be accepted, it is hoped that the Assembly of Bishops will then come to an end, ultimately to be succeeded by a governing Synod of a united Church in North and Central America.
