"Purple Power"

Purple Power propels positive people! Is our cheer. Also retired a flag, gained a testimony and met new friends.

I went as an univited guest last night to a Stake run Little Philmont. Philmont is the premier Scout training station located in New Mexico and it's amazing. One of the Stake Presidency attends annually the LDS relations seminar. Anyway...the entire stake presidency also attended Woodbadge this year and things have really stepped up a notch since this has happened. So they thought they would do a small training locally for leaders. Overall, a wonderful event. The best I've seen from the stake since being here.

The evening started out by having us in patrols...randomly chosen. Then we needed to come up with a patrol name and a cheer. Then they gave us a few minutes to just visit amongst each other.

We moved into the RS room and had a PowerPoint presentation discussion led by Pres. Brady. He hit all the high points. I believe the most interesting point was about uniforming. It got a little bit heated. One young SM said he hated wearing a uniform when he was a kid and still hates his now and since he's only 27 or something like that, feels badly asking his boys to do something he hated. This point is very important for something that happened later.

So, we learned about why we have Scouting and we also thanked the spouses. It was an important evening so that they could say thank you to the women behind the men. The women who hold the families schedule and activities down on weekends and weeks when the husband is camping or at summer camp. For the sacrifice of giving a week of their vacation to the boys they serve at camp. Pres. brady got really chocked up about that. He also talked about progression from program to program and how we are not giving our youth that progression that they need and want! He touched on how advancement and earning the rank of Eagle is not the end-all, but a method of developing great young men. I rarely made a comment but on that note, I talked about how the 5 presidents within the Venturing program are the same as the positions in a mission presidents office. They raised the bar and expect prepared missionaries, in all aspects of the program.

Then we had a patrol activity of racebuilding and lauchning paper airplanes. It was totally fun and we bonded as a patrol. Every patrol was sure that that their's was the best, of course.

Then we wrapped up with a few reflection moments. Then it was announced that we would be having a closing ceremony with a flag retirement included. What an opportunity! Then we heard who was going to be leading it and I was shocked that it was the leader who not only wasn't wearing his uniform, but didn't wear it that night! Other than that "big" item, it was a beautiful and wonderful ceremony. We all left feeling uplifted and inspired about how to help the boys in the Stake.

God Bless America and may the Lord bless Scouting in our small stake of Zion! We have about 250 boys in our hands.