Updates on Boy Scouts, Ministerial Profiles
As announced in a United Church News article in May and as shared in our previous communication, the United Church of Christ profiles system will be moving to a new platform by the end of 2021, as the current platform will no longer be providing support after December 31st.
MESA has been working with Suran Systems, which has included regular check-ins and opportunities to provide feedback. The progress on the new system has been steady and on schedule. We are pleased to assure all users that there will be no interrupted service as the new system prepares to launch.
Once again, the change to the Ministerial Profiles Portal does not include any content revision to the Ministerial Profile. However, the new layout will be organized in a more user-friendly manner.
MESA is now able to share more details on the new system, including training times for users:
The official cutover date for the new system will be Monday, December 6th. All information will need to be saved by 4pm ET on Friday, December 3rd.
As part of this cutover, the current profile system will experience an outage beginning late on Friday, December 3rd and continuing through Sunday, December 5th.
While users may manually save information as they wish, all information will also be migrated over automatically as part of the new system’s launch.
The current schedule for Ministers, Validators, and References will be on the following dates and times; look for registration for these trainings to follow in a subsequent email:
Minister Training: December 7 and 14, 4:00 – 5:00pm ET
Validator Training: December 8 and 15, 4:00 – 5:00pm ET
Reference Training: December 9 and 16, 4:00 – 5:00pm ET
For those who cannot make these trainings, video tutorials will be made available at ucc.org for ongoing use.
From Heather Kimmel, UCC General Counsel: Over the past several days I’ve received a number of inquiries from both Local Churches and Conferences related to the relationship of Local Churches and the Boy Scouts of America, and the BSA bankruptcy.
One line of inquiry is what advice I would give a Local Church that has received the “Summary Regarding Chartered Organizations’ Options Under the BSA’s Chapter 11 Plan.” (see attachment) This document gives several opt-in choices and an opt-out. Each choice involves waivers of important rights. A Local Church that is a chartering organization should consult with its attorney to carefully review its options in the context of its history with BSA and knowledge of potential abuse claims for the best advice on how to proceed. I cannot advise Local Churches individually on this issue.
A second line of inquiry is whether a Local Church should sign the attached Charter Agreement. The decision to be a chartering organization for the BSA is a decision that has always been up to the Local Church and should be made in consultation with an attorney who can review this agreement with the church and specifically attend to whether the church is prepared to undertake its obligations under the agreement. The church’s insurer should also be consulted. The obligations under this Charter Agreement for the church are significant, including making the scouting program a ministry of the church and putting the burden of conducting background checks and approving leaders on the church. This agreement may be different from what the church has signed in the past; some churches have indicated they have never been asked to sign such an agreement.
Third, some churches are noting that the United Methodist Church has urged its congregations not to continue their relationships with BSA and are asking what the position of the UCC is on this. The UCC, given its polity, would not make such a recommendation to its churches and neither should the lack of a statement be considered approval of the relationship. It has always been up to the Local Church to determine whether to have that relationship with BSA. The UCC does continue to have a Scouting Working Group that can provide resources to churches with scout troops, especially as relates to inclusive scouting; the National Setting liaison to that group is Michael Schuenemeyer.
Finally, some churches are also asking about the possibility of a facilities use agreement in place of a charter agreement, so that the troop has access to the church building. My advice here is to have an attorney draw up such an agreement in consultation with the church’s insurer and to ensure the appropriate certificates of insurance are in place. I do not know if local BSA councils are accepting such agreements.
See also: BSA Options, Boy Scout Charter Agreement