The Daily Signal - Boy Scout Alternative Aims to Solve the 'Boy Crisis'

Episode Date: December 11, 2023

Trail Life USA isn't just a Christian alternative to the Boy Scouts; it's an answer to the deep crisis affecting boys in America. "We're growing boys into godly men," Mark Hancock, the scouting organi...zation's CEO, tells "The Daily Signal Podcast." "We've discovered a proven process for turning boys into godly men, and it involves four things." Hancock, today's guest on the podcast, diagnoses four major problems American boys face: They are unguided, ungrounded, unappreciated, and uninspired. Enjoy the show! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:30 They go from being unguided, ungrounded, unappreciated, and uninspired, to being guided by men, grounded in the word, appreciated because we know boys and girls are different and inspired through an awards program and Christian men who are leading them in these sorts of adventures. And it's making a difference. Welcome to the Daily Signal podcast for Monday, December 11th. I'm Virginia Allen. And that was CEO of Trail Life USA, Mark Hancock. Trail Life USA is a Christian alternative to the Boy Scouts, and Tyler O'Neill is sitting down with Hancock today to talk about where the Boy Scouts went wrong and how Trail Life USA aims to avoid those pitfalls. They also discussed why it's so important to give boys a virtuous example of manliness.
Starting point is 00:01:21 Stay tuned for their conversation after this. Conservative women are problematic women. Why? because we don't adhere to the agenda of the radical left. Every Thursday morning on the Problematic Women podcast, Kristen I, Cammer, Lauren Evans, and me, Virginia Allen, are joined by other conservative women to break down the big issues and news you care about.
Starting point is 00:01:50 Whether you're interested in hot takes and conversations on pop culture or what Congress is up to, problematic women, has you covered. We sort through the news to keep you up to date on the issues that are a particular interest to conservative leaning, that is problematic women. Find problematic women wherever you like to listen to podcasts and follow the show on Instagram. This is Tyler O'Neill, managing editor at The Daily Signal.
Starting point is 00:02:20 I'm honored to be joined by Mark Hancock, CEO of Trail Life USA. It's a great pleasure to have you with us. Tyler, it's a pleasure for me to be here. So you and I were just chatting, and I'm an Eagle Scout. I know your son is as well. And can you talk a little bit about, you know, why Trail Life USA really got started, why it's so important to have an alternative for one of the most established, you know, organizations in American history?
Starting point is 00:02:51 Yeah, well, it really is tragic. You know, an organization that gave us presidents and astronauts and civic leaders and generals and tons of great men over the years suddenly decided that it was going to abandon some of its traditional values and the way that the secret sauce that they had for building good, good strong men. And so about 300 of us gathered back in 2013 and began to talk about what an organization would look like, one that honored the original values of Boy Scouts. It was Christ-centered and boy-focused. We think those are two magical things that help us turn boys into godly men.
Starting point is 00:03:25 So we're Christ-centered boy-focused. What would it look like? And then 50 of us gathered in Louisville, Kentucky in 2013, sort of our own Continental Congress and then launched on January 1st, 2014. Now Trail Life has grown to over 50,000 members in all 50 states. We're in 1,200 churches now, 1,200 troops across the country. Boys from 5 years old all the way up to 17-year-old
Starting point is 00:03:46 participating in Trailf, USA. Yeah. So what, you know, do you do normally? Like, give me a, you know, 1,000-foot view. You know, Boy Scouts, I grew up with that, but for our listeners who may not be as familiar, you know, you have the Cub Scout program, the Boy Scout program, you know, focused on camping, learning key skills for life, for outdoor survival skills, and then also for citizenship. Is that the exact same model? You know, you know, there's a lot that is similar.
Starting point is 00:04:23 You'd say, well, we have uniforms and handbooks and patrols and outdoor adventure and, you know, robust awards. program, you say, well, that sounds like Boy Scouts. Well, it does, but there's those two delineating factors. We are Christ-centered, and we're unapologetically Christian, and we are boy-focused. We believe, and I hope this isn't too radical for your listeners, we believe that boys and girls are different. What? What? What do you say? If boys need a program that's aimed at them, of course, in 2017, 18, and maybe, the Boy Scouts opened up to girls, which I think is, you know, I think girls need an organization. They have organizations like that. American Heritage Girls is our sister organization. They do a great job
Starting point is 00:05:02 with girls. But when you put boys and girls in that same environment, it changes the dynamics. And boys are getting shamed enough everywhere they go. And it's really tragic when you're getting to look at the numbers, the effect on boys, we need an organization that's aimed at their strength that doesn't shame them. Boys are not some sort of defective girl. They're not a social disease that needs to be eradicated. There are these wonderful, marvelous creatures that need a program that recognizes the rough and tumble, risk and competition, the strength of boys that gives us men that will storm the beaches of Normandy and get on a rocket and get to the moon and do all these wonderful things.
Starting point is 00:05:37 We need to encourage that type of things in boys. So when you say, is it like Boy Scouts? Yeah, it is. It kind of looks like it. But at our core, we're not just an outdoor organization that's having this Christian experience. We are a ministry that's using the outdoors to grow boys into godly men, and that makes us very different from Boy Scouts. And so, you know, you touched briefly on admitting girls, but where did you really see Boy Scouts lose its way? I mean, I think there's kind of a timeline to that.
Starting point is 00:06:08 Yeah, there is. In 2013, they began to float this idea about opening up the organization, open and aviote homosexual boys. Now, of course, there's always been homosexual boys and Boy Scouts. But the concept of being open and avowed, which means that the leaders, the charter organizations, mainly churches, would need to, acknowledge and agree with and encourage a lifestyle that maybe their doctrine doesn't allow their terms. Theologically, they can't stand alongside. So we knew that there was a need for an organization that had said that stuck with those principles. I talked about simple things like the definition of marriage and virtuous living and those sorts of things.
Starting point is 00:06:46 So we knew there was going to be a need for it. So that was the beginning of trail life. But we also knew that that one decision would necessarily have to lead to other decisions. If you're going to allow open-in-avout homosexual boys, you now have to allow open-avout homosexual Scoutmasters. And if you're going to do that, you're going to need to allow transgender. And then if you're going to have transgender, you need to allow girls. And so we knew that the organization over time, the Boy Scouts organization, was going to change radically. We just didn't know how quickly it was going to happen.
Starting point is 00:07:16 And it's a very different organization than the one that you earned your Eagle Award in. Yeah. I mean, I heard mine back in 2007. So it was, you know, it was itself back then, I think. But I recently, you know, in 2017, when they endorsed transgenderism, this ideology that essentially, you know, violates the truth telling. You know, I was told a scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. And all of those values, so many of them, seem utterly rejected by the idea that, oh, if you believe that you know better than God, that you're really a boy when you're biologically a girl, we want you to be part of this. That just, you know, that seems utterly false to the nature.
Starting point is 00:08:13 And, you know, I take your point. I think it was almost inevitable, perhaps, when they started a little. allowing, you know, openly gay boys. It's like it's a kids organization. Do you need to have an open sexual identity for these things? Yeah, or even a policy around that and does it need to be part of a discussion of a five, six, seven-year-old boy? It's really tragic. In our own family, we were active in the Boy Scouts.
Starting point is 00:08:41 My sons were members. I was never a member. But we had to sit down with my young sons and have this conversation about why we can't be in Boy Scouts anymore. Here's my oldest who just earned his Eagle Award and had just worked so hard on that. We had devoted so much time and energy to doing that. And I've had this conversation and say, we just can't be part of this anymore. It's not honoring to God. And it's a strange thing, Tyler, is that he got an email from the Boy Scouts saying,
Starting point is 00:09:05 hey, you got your Eagle Award when you join the National Eagle Association. And they said, you know, we notice that you haven't. There's a reason that you haven't joined us. And he said, Dad, can I respond to them? He was 14 years old. He said, Dad, can I respond to them? I said, yeah, sure, son, but pray about it and be respectful. And he came back the next day.
Starting point is 00:09:27 He said, Dad, I've got my response to him. I'd like for you to read it over. And I thought, he was a philosophy major in college. He's brilliant. I thought I'm going to read this toome of Hawaii. Tyler, he wrote three words was his response to the Boy Scouts. He said, you weren't brave. Ooh.
Starting point is 00:09:44 Yeah, me too. That's how it hit me. But I'll tell you what it spoke to me. it said to me, listen, you better be brave before your son. You better stand for what it is that you think is right. You better not compromise. I'm telling myself because my son, who had invested so much time and energy in this award, was willing to walk right away from that organization.
Starting point is 00:10:04 And it taught me, you better be brave for your son. And so we took a stand in our family. We said, we're not going to do this. And we got kind of caught up in this trail life thing and the idea of trail life. And we're able to launch, like, gosh, and on January 1st, 2014 with 10,000 members on our first day and we've just continued. We've had over 120,000 people come through the program now. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:10:26 Well, I think there is a strong desire and need for a program like this that actually follows. You know, I think the original values of the Boy Scouts, it's interesting to me because I come from, I was very glad I went to Hillsdale College in Southern Michigan, which is now a Christian college. It was founded as a Baptist college. When I went there, it actually wasn't an officially Christian college. And I mean, it had such a vibrant Christian atmosphere there. But it was, you know, nominally secular.
Starting point is 00:11:00 I think they ultimately adopted more of a Christian stance after I graduated, partially preparing for what we're seeing in a hostile culture to any sort of conservatism. And they wanted to have, you know, they, they, wanted to be able to say, look, we stand on these values because of our faith, which is a really important thing to do. I think, I mean, I hesitate to say, but I think there are a lot of secular Americans who are ashamed at where the Boy Scouts is today, too. And I mean, I'm a Christian. I'd love to join an officially Christian group. But what I always loved about the Boy Scouts was that it was just the American values, you could, you know, there was, you did have to acknowledge God. You didn't have to
Starting point is 00:11:51 be Christian or sectarian or anything like that. How does, you know, trail life deal with that? Do you have a big tent sort of approach even while you are explicitly Christian? We do have a big tent when it comes to boys. You know, our adults need to sign and agree to adhere to a statement of faith and a statement of values. It talks about things like human sexuality, marriage, integrity and stewardship and those sorts of things. Our charter organizations have to be churches that agree with those sorts of principles, and they sign a, there's a statement of faith that unites out of us, although those dozens of denominations and faith traditions that come under that umbrella.
Starting point is 00:12:30 But the adults have to sign the statement of faith and the statement of values. But boys of any faith are no faith at all are welcome to join, because we feel like that's a great place for those boys to be. And we have that. We have a lot of families that they may be conservative in names, nature, but, and they want the best for their kids. So they're seeking out organizations that have high standards that are teaching things like character and leadership.
Starting point is 00:12:54 You know, character and leadership are the things that parents are drawn to. The boys are drawn to the adventure. So we put those things together and the parents are loving it, even if they're not people of faith. Now, they don't become members, but their son can't serve in that troop as a leader in that troop, but their son can be in that troop and be exposed to these men of good character, these good, godly men, and they're loving it. And of course, we see a lot of times where that unchurched boy will join the troop and then that
Starting point is 00:13:19 unchurched family will join the church because they see the product of living in a community of faith where people who are honoring, honoring God and honoring each other and living at that high level of character. But that isn't a requirement of our leaders or our adult members for them to join to put their son in. And it's not a requirement of the boy to express any faith at all in order to be a part of true. Trail life. Cool. Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense. How does it work? I know there's a very big, you know, Mormon population in Boy Scouts. And I, you know, have a tremendous respect for Mormons,
Starting point is 00:13:58 but I have, you know, I don't consider them to be, you know, to be Orthodox Christians, the small Orthodox. How does Trail Life deal with that sort of issue? Yeah, well, our statement of faith includes a statement about the Trinitarian nature of God. And so good Mormons would not agree with that as a statement of faith. So we do not charter Mormon churches. Now, whether Mormons are putting a boys in trouble, they're free to do that. But as an adult, they wouldn't be a leader in that troop. But certainly they would likely be drawn to the type of environment that we have that honors God
Starting point is 00:14:39 and honors our country and honors the, things that they hold high as people. So you talk about the adventure aspect, being the big draw for boys. Are there, I mean, I think, you know, growing up in the Boy Scouts, there were certain areas that we would always hear about across the country. Are there, you know, where is trail life based? Are there high adventure camps for trail life? Are there places that you tend to go?
Starting point is 00:15:07 I was ridiculously lucky and was part of a troop that we went to Italy. Oh, my goodness. We went on a backpacking trip to Italy. But, you know, that's not necessarily representative, but a lot of Boy Scouts would go up to like Lake Tahoe. West of Philmont, those sorts of places. Yeah, yeah. No, we don't have properties like that. Our home office is in Greenville, outside of Greenville, South Carolina, on 127-acre complex.
Starting point is 00:15:36 that we have an administrative complex that we were gifted in 2014. That's where our home office is. That's the only property that we own. And part of that is by design. When we look to the Boy Scouts, we said, okay, where did they go wrong? And a lot of it was around finances. I mean, camps are very expensive things. You're always raising money for them.
Starting point is 00:15:55 And so at first, that was a question. A lot of troops asked us, particularly troops that were previously Boy Scout troops that said, okay, we want to come over to Trail Life. They said, well, we've been camping at Camp such and such for 50 years. So where do we go now? And it took us a little bit of training for them to say, hey, listen, there's national parks. There's state parks. There are Christian adventure organizations that are private organizations that compete for your dollar that you'll find actually provide better facilities because they have to compete every day.
Starting point is 00:16:23 They don't automatically have this scouting population that comes in every year. They have to compete for your business. And we haven't had that question. I don't know. The way in the last time I've heard that question from inside our organization. Like, what do we do? Because there's just plenty of places to get. So they are planning these sorts of things.
Starting point is 00:16:38 These great adventures, the boundary waters, I'm going with a group to retrace some of the stuff of Montana along the Columbia River. I saw that trip pop up. I say, hey, you got room for one more guys. I get to do that this summer. We have troops going out and doing those amazing high-adventure kind of activities, Alaska, and some going overseas to do mission trips and things like that. So certainly has the same opportunities.
Starting point is 00:17:04 we found out that we don't need to own camps in order all for adventure for our troops. And so they're creating their own traditions of where it is that they're going. And some of them, which they had never done before, are going to a different camp every year, which is great for the boys because it's a new opportunity for them every summer. Yeah. So do you have, you know, the Scout Oath, the Scout Law analogs in Trail Life, USA, and what are they? We have our oath. and we also have our motto is walkworthy comes from Colossians 110 and so the boys will open the
Starting point is 00:17:38 meeting saying the oath and the motto and then we also have six essentials of Christian worldview which is something that runs throughout our entire program if you open up our handbook there'll be highlighted words and that points to one of the essentials of Christian worldviews that we're always pointing them boys back to the word and we talk about Christ and Christian in our program being kind of like carrot and the carrot cake you know if you if you're take a bite of carrot cake, you don't get a big chunk of carrot, but there's carrot in every bite. And that's how Christ and the Bible is infused throughout the program. So from our oath to our motto to every badge has something about faith or a scriptural reference or something like that.
Starting point is 00:18:17 But it's broad enough that, like I said, we have dozens of denominations, faith traditions, that chartered troops, and they can all get along with that. Great. How does that work with some of the Christian denominations with? you know, Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. And do you have Eastern Orthodox groups or like... We do have a really good mix. And as long as they can sign our statement of faith and our statement of values,
Starting point is 00:18:46 then we can charter them. And we have a one-on-one conversation with the spiritual leader of that church, whoever he is. Now, there's certainly complete denominations that we can't consider. But every church that charter is a troop. We have a conversation with the, whether it's the pastor or the priest, whoever's at the head of that organization, we have a conversation with them to talk about. Do you agree with these values?
Starting point is 00:19:08 And so certainly there are some denominations that don't fit with us anymore. But we have, there are so many boys out there who are desperate for some kind of organization like this. We don't have any shortage of churches or parents or boys who are wanting to participate or able to participate. So are there signs, you know, when I was growing up, we always did the Boy Scout popcorn. and do you guys do something like that? Well, we looked at that really closely, too. And, of course, that is an incredible fundraiser for the Boy Scouts. Yes, right.
Starting point is 00:19:41 Yes, it's all about money. It's just like the Girl Scout. Well, you know, now you really think about it. I like an organization where you had millions of little boys who are going out and selling your product for you. That's basically what that was. And we looked at it. We said, we don't want to put that kind of burden on our individual troops. So we make some suggestions.
Starting point is 00:19:59 We have some vendor partners for fundraisers. We vetted these people. They do a pretty good job. But all of the funds that are raised stay in that local troop. Trail life doesn't take a portion of the funds. If that troop raise that money, that troop gets to keep that money. And that's a very different approach than the Boy Scouts who had some of their mandatory fundraising products. We've built our organization not dependent on donor funds, although we have a lot of people who give generously to our organization.
Starting point is 00:20:27 And those funds are set aside for pilot programs. But the whole program has run on a member fee. which is about $35 a year and on store sales, because we sell our uniforms and our handbooks and those sorts of things. So we've built a streamlined organization that doesn't run based on corporate donations or even individual donations because that's another place that Boy Scouts went wrong. Their troops voted against making these changes, but they went ahead and made the changes because of the influence they had from corporate money.
Starting point is 00:20:56 And so we structured our organization so we can be resistant to that sort of change in the future. One of the first questions we used to get from troops at the beginning, Tyler, about half of our troops initially were formerly Boy Scout troops, was how do we know you're not going to do this to us? How do we know you're not going to abandon this? So we built into our bylaws. Any changes to our statement of faith, our statement of values, our membership standards, any of those core things that are in our bylaws require an 80% vote of the troops. The troops have to vote 80%, which is pretty strong. You know, when you sign them up and they signed up because they like these ideals.
Starting point is 00:21:32 The chance of those ideals changing are pretty slim. So we, and then also they elect our board of directors. These aren't guys who are appointed because they've given money. These are guys who are elected every year, one vote and every troop votes for those border directors. So that's the way we secure the ideals of Trail Life for, hopefully for generations. Yeah. Well, is there anything else you'd like to add about Trail Life, about maybe your favorite
Starting point is 00:21:58 adventures that you've had or that you've led your sons on? Well, I can tell you this, is that if you just reduced it to just the quintessence of what it is, one, we're growing boys in a godly man. And we've discovered a proven process for turning boys into godly men. And it involves four things. You know, boys we've discovered are unguided. One in four boys now doesn't have a father in his household. You know, they go to school, 76% of teachers are female, 80-something percent of Sunday school teachers are female.
Starting point is 00:22:34 So the girls have wonderful models of leadership and single moms and teachers and all that. Boys don't have that. So we are guiding boys. We think that's important. So we have a male-centric organization that guides boys and lets them be around good, strong men. We also know that they're ungrounded. You know, 58% of Americans no longer believe that God is a source of moral truth. That's Americans.
Starting point is 00:22:54 And so boys are ungrounded. How do they know what truth is? How can you even talk about right and wrong if you don't have a foundation for that? So we ground them in biblical truths. And we also know that boys are unappreciated. You know, it's like this gender blurring has, like I said earlier, it's like a boy is some sort of a defective girl. You know, they're twice as likely to be in special education,
Starting point is 00:23:12 three times more likely to have ADHD. They fall in behind girls in every single academic category. One category they are leading in is suicide rate, 10 to 14-year-old boys, the fastest-growing rate. And it's just tragic. If you looked at any other demographic, I was going through what boys are going through, right now. I mean, we'd be picketing in the streets.
Starting point is 00:23:29 You're saying, somebody's got to do something about this. And Trail Life is doing something about it. And the final thing is boys are largely uninspired. In a culture that's participation trophies or let's not keep score because we're going to hurt somebody's feelings, that's horrible for boys. They want to be challenged. They want something put in front of them that's bigger than they are. They want to identify with something that's doing big things.
Starting point is 00:23:50 And so in Trail Off USA, we've given this robust awards program, and we challenge them outside of their comfort zone to go beyond what it is. that they thought that they could do in a company of men. And that's just powerful stuff. So they go from being unguided, ungrounded, unappreciated, and uninspired, to being guided by men, grounded in the word, appreciated because we know boys and girls are different and inspired through an awards program and Christian men who are leading them in these sorts of adventures. And it's making a difference.
Starting point is 00:24:19 Call it our proven process. And we tell the churches, if this isn't happening, if the boys in your troop are not becoming godly men, you get your money back. Because it says we're not doing our job. To have a money back guarantee in a Christian ministry is a little bit strange. But when we say, like, listen, this is how strongly we believe in this proven process. And it's proven because we've seen now for 10 years what it is that it's producing a boys. Not too long ago, boy out in California from a single parent household.
Starting point is 00:24:45 He stood in front of that troop of men. He just got in the Horizon Award, which is like our second highest award. And he stood in front of that group of men, single mom sitting there in the audience. And he said, the men in this troop, I have to thank you. You taught me how to shave and you taught me how to love Jesus. And I thought, they nailed it. They nailed it. And if you're the single mom sitting there, it's like, man, I did the right thing by putting my son in there.
Starting point is 00:25:10 That's the kind of fruit that we're having in Trail of USA because we're following this proven process and it's working. Yeah. Yeah, you talk about those deep spiritual needs and I think our culture is, you know, I grew up watching movies like Gladiator and Braveheart. Oh, yeah. These days, you don't get that kind of thing and you get this constant message of like, oh, there's toxic masculinity. And you have to get, you know, this culture of consent and all these things where it's like the strength and the virility and the heroism that we all want is just like thrown out. And we want to also see women succeed. That's something that millennial men.
Starting point is 00:25:56 I mean, and I don't know, probably other generations too and especially younger ones. Like, we realize that we want women also to succeed, but that doesn't have to come at the expense of, like, demonizing men and what we want and what drives us. Yeah. I think over and over you see this, you know, this feminizing this. There's no question that there's toxic men. but they're not all toxic. And masculinity itself is not inherently toxic. That's the main thing.
Starting point is 00:26:32 It's like, yes, there are toxic men. There are men who abuse things. And by the way, a more open sexual culture is going to lead to encourage a little bit more of the toxicness than the guided virtue that a Christian society encourages. But, you know, that's the thing when men aren't looking at. soldiers, firemen, you know, when our examples are, I as a knowledge worker have to be a little careful about this, but like my dad's a volunteer fireman. And like he will rush to the scene and help people and throw himself in harm's way. And like there's something so heroic about that that you have that to look up to. And I feel like our culture is just pushing that
Starting point is 00:27:22 aside. Yeah, and we're actually creating more frustration and exclusion. We're shaming men at every turn. And part of what we're doing in Trail off USA is we're not shaming these boys. We're reminding them of who they are, giving them good examples of good strong men, reminding them of who the biblical heroes are, who the founders of our country, or the heroes who spoke in the beginnings of this country and did heroic things. And we call them up to that instead of shamed. shaming them for who it is that they are, even what it is that we're projecting on them, something that may not even be there that we're seeing and shaming them for it. So we believe in boys, and we believe that the best chance for raising a godly man
Starting point is 00:28:10 is focusing on godly men on boys and bring them into the next generation. So we love having the men approach. We have a lot of men in our program who don't have a son in the program. But they're like, I care about this next generation. And they find a brotherhood there, Tyler. It's like, these are guys who carry my values. I mean, and we had a guy come back from four tourists in Afghanistan kind of hidden away in his apartment. And the troops sought him out.
Starting point is 00:28:37 They say, hey, we need you. We know you got some skills. And he kind of went reluctantly. And he came to me in tears. He said, Mark, I'm so thankful for your program. I found my band of brothers again. And I'm working with these men side by side doing something that has meaning and purpose. that I can give my life for.
Starting point is 00:28:54 And I haven't had that since I had my brothers in Afghanistan. I'm like, man, there's always so many folks like that who say, where can I go? Men who are saying, I want to do something big. I'm going to do something meaningful. I'm going to do something that has purpose, creates a legacy. We say, come join us.
Starting point is 00:29:09 We've got these boys who are desperate for good, strong male leadership. And then, of course, fathers and sons, it's a great way for dads to figure out how to connect with their sons. Fewer or fewer ways for men to connect with their boys because of all the electronics trying to keep up with a digital age.
Starting point is 00:29:21 And we're losing our boys to these social media and all this other influences. And we can take in Trail Life. We can say, Dad, you go on the outdoors with your son. Then he's setting his phone down for gosh sakes. Can you get him to do that? And you're spending the weekend out camping or hiking or fishing or whitewater rafting or repelling or zip lining or whatever you're doing out there. And you're spending time together. You don't have to be a great outdoors guy yourself.
Starting point is 00:29:44 You're in a group of men out there. You're out there together. And then the boys bed down at night. And this is another secret about Trail Life. the boys bed down, the dad sit around that fire, and that's where men are connecting. The turn to the guy next to him, say, hey, I saw the way you talked to your son. How do I build a relationship like that with my son? I don't, we're not that close.
Starting point is 00:30:02 How did you do that? Or I'm struggling with work. I'm struggling with my marriage. That's where guys connect. We don't connect face to face over a cup of coffee. We connect side by side, turn in a wrench, or hiking a trail or sitting around a fire. That's where men are connecting. So for men, it's this great ministry in Trailf, USA, to find other men, to buy.
Starting point is 00:30:20 bond with who are like-minded. For fathers and sons, a great way to fathers to connect with sons. Men who don't have sons, a great way to find an opportunity to pour in the next generation. And for a single mom's who have a boy at home, where am I going to find men to help me raise my son to be a godly man? Put them in Trail off USA. So it answers a lot of questions that we're facing in our culture today. And the foundational truths that we have are working and they're true and they are unchanging. And you can't say that about Boy Scouts and some of these other organizations. Well, thank you so much, Mark. Really, really important stuff. Where can our listeners
Starting point is 00:30:56 find Trail Life USA get connected to find those opportunities for both the boys and the men? Yeah, well, TrailLifeUSA.com, Trail Live, 2Ls in the middle. Trailfusa.com is a get-connected tab. And you can see find a troop. It shows a map of the United States. You can put on your zip code or your address or your city and it'll pop up all the troops that are nearby and you can contact them or also is start a troop. If you don't have a troop nearby, it shows you how to start a troop. Just takes five adults in a church and has a vision for the next generation. Awesome. Well, thank you again so much, Mark, for joining us. Tyler, it's a pleasure for me to be here.
Starting point is 00:31:32 Thanks for joining us on today's edition of the Daily Sickle Podcast. We hope you enjoyed that conversation with the Daily Skill's Tyler O'Neill and Trail Life USA CEO Mark Hancock. If you haven't done so already, make sure that you check out our evening show. here in this theme podcast feed, and every weekday around 5 p.m. We bring you the top news of the day. And take a minute to subscribe to the Daily Signal or across all podcast platforms. When you hit that subscribe button or the little plus sign in the top of the page,
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