Corpo Nacional de Escutas (CNE), Portugal’s largest youth organization affiliated with the Catholic Church, opens its doors to all sexual orientations and gender expressions. “Every person should be welcomed and respected for their dignity, regardless of their sexual orientation,” says the CNE in guidance on emotionality and sexuality, which is delivered to its regional and local units.
The institutional positioning, which emerged from the work of the Entre Linhas project created by the CNE in 2020, includes a glossary with explanations of terms such as “sexual orientation”, “attachment”, “sexuality”, “sex”, “intersexuality”, “gender” ” and “gender non-conformity”.
In the document, the CNE “recognizes the contribution of attachment and sexuality to the project of a happy life,” emphasizing that it does not ignore “the existence of situations of pain, suffering and isolation.” CNE pays attention to the situation of people with different sexual orientations and rejects “any aggressive behavior and unfair discrimination in interpersonal, emotional and sexual relationships.”
However, the CNE emphasizes that based on Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation “Amoris laetitia”, which “does not identify with educational and ideological proposals that promote personal identity and affective intimacy radically separated from the biological diversity between man and woman.” He affirms that “the sacrament of marriage is based on the relationship of a man and a woman” but acknowledges that “the Christian experience of love is not limited to this type of union.”
The CNE is the largest scouting association and the largest youth association in Portugal. It consists of 68,000 Scouts in 1,000 groups. In Portugal, scouting took its first steps in Macau in 1911. In 1913, the Portuguese Scout Association was founded. CNE was born on May 27, 1923 in Braga.
English Baden-Powell was the founder of the Scouts.
The Englishman Baden-Powell (1857-1941) was the founder of scouting. When he was little, he went camping with his older brothers. He distinguished himself in military life (Transval War, in South Africa). Returning to England, he organized a camp for boys from 12 to 16 years old. In 1908 he wrote a book, Scouting for Boys, which was published in parts and sold on newsstands. This marked the beginning of the scouting movement.
