scouting

The LDS Church announced on May 8, 2018, that it will launch a worldwide initiative for children and youth in January 2020. Along with the announcement of this initiative, the church also announced it will conclude its relationship with the Boys Scouts of America as a chartered organization. (Mormon Newsroom)

Natalie Benson, 5, and Holly Sweezer, 6, carry extra flags as Boy and Girl Scouts place flags on each of the 5,000 headstones at the Grand Rapids Veterans State Cemetery in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The October 2017 Boy Scouts of America announcement to admit girls throughout its ranks will transform what has been a mostly cordial relationship between the two iconic youth groups since the Girl Scouts of the USA was founded in 1912, two years after the Boy Scouts. (Katie Greene/The Grand Rapids Press via AP)

The LDS church announced changes to its Boy Scouting program. (Photo courtesy of Mormon Newsroom)

SALT LAKE CITY — One of the largest Boy Scout councils in the country is laying off employees because donations are down — possibly a side effect of tension between the Scouts and the Mormon church over this summer's decision to allow gay Scout leaders.

A Boy Scout wears his kerchief embroidered with a rainbow knot during Salt Lake City’s annual gay pride parade. The Boy Scouts of America's top policy-making board planned a vote Monday, July 27, 2015, on ending its blanket ban on gay adult leaders while allowing church-sponsored Scout units to maintain the exclusion if that accorded with their faith. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, File)