It was perhaps Thomas Sacco who best summed up what Scouting with Troop 28 is all about.
"I wouldn't go on camping trips otherwise. You're in the middle of the woods. You leave all your devices and your cares behind."
And this from Henry Sanzo: "When we were in New Mexico, it was just you and the outdoors. It was one of the most intense things. You hike in the desert and you learn to rely on your friends."
And from Sam Kooper-Johnson: "Most of us would trust each other with our lives."
And from Matthew Shea: "It's part of my life. I can't see not doing it."
They sat in the basement of Central Congregational Church in Providence before the Tuesday meeting. It was a night, like others, to recall good deeds of the past week and recite the oath and the Pledge of Allegiance and maybe do some push-ups for a uniform not quite complete.
It was a night to be reminded of good things that have endured for decades in an organization that is, on a national level, slowly moving into the late 20th century and struggling toward the 21st.
But at Troop 28's meeting, there is a copy of a letter on the table in front of the big fireplace. The letter is a statement of purpose that puts these Scouts, drawn from all over Providence, in a very good place.
The letter, written in November 2012 to the national president of the Boy Scouts of America, says that Troop 28 "respectfully disagrees" with the organization's decision to reaffirm its ban on gays.
"We think that the Boy Scouts should live by the creed it encourages in all its participants, that of respect and inclusion for everyone."
Dr. Brian Duff is the scoutmaster and says the troop has a history of being publicly opposed to the ban on gays.
"When the letter surfaced, we got a lot of inquiries—60 Minutes, The New York Times."
So this is a Boy Scout troop with a social conscience. The ban on gays was lifted last year, but there is disappointment here that a ban still exists on scout leaders. A gay Scout can be a Scout until he's 18, then he's officially gone. It's silly and out of touch.
Some of the troop leaders said Tuesday that some young Scouts catch flak for the policy on gays, even when they're doing something as selfless as collecting food for the Rhode Island Community Food Bank. Ironically, they say some parents still use it as an excuse not to let their sons join.
And that's too bad, because in many ways there has never been a better time to be a Boy Scout. For what Brian Duff calls the "Xbox Generation," Scouting is a source of natural balance, an antidote for the numbing effects of too much stuff on a screen.
"I grew up in a rural environment, a family farm," he said. "Now, I live on the East Side."
There is a need for some distance, he said.
So the Scouts hike and climb and do community service projects. They learn the proper care and handling of a gun and how to build a fire and, yes, how to tie a bunch of knots. They take a high adventure trip every summer.
Sometimes, they ride trash.
"I'd never ridden trash on a five-mile lake before," said Kooper-Johnson, referring to a recent first in his Scouting experience.
Riding trash, he explained, is sitting in the center of a canoe while others paddle. It is a rite of passage.
They have something good and they know it. They are doing things, learning things, that other boys aren't. They are forming friendships based on the kind of shared experience that comes with moving out of their comfort zone.
"Our troop was on a mountain and there was a guy who broke his leg," said Henry Sanzo. "We carried him down."
They know how to do things like that. They learn things in Boy Scouts that can serve them well on a mountain or a desert or a river — even in the big city.
Last summer, the high adventure trip was to Colorado, to the Rockies. The Scouts raise money for the trips. Their biggest fundraiser is the World's Greatest Pancake Breakfast. It is served in the great hall of Central Congregational Church at 296 Angell St. in Providence. This year it is on May 3 from 8 to 11 a.m. You can chow down, and, while you're at it, you can watch a demonstration of Scout skills at an indoor campsite.
At Tuesday night's meeting, there was a good feeling of a church basement, like hundreds of other church basements, turned to the business of Scouting. I remembered my own church basement a long time agoߞx;and the uniform inspection.
On Tuesday, the Scouts talked about an upcoming ski trip and about an event called The Klondike Derby at Yawgoog, which involves, among other things, a sled race.
For someone far removed from the knots and the campfires, it was reassuring to stand to the side and see something that has endured with so little change. Sure, the prehistoric policies on gays need to go, but in the right place with the right people, Scouting is as it has always been.
And it seems best to leave the final word on Troop 28 to Tyler Tsang, who spoke at his Eagle Scout ceremony on Jan. 10:
"Of course, school taught me how to be efficient in my study habits, but Boy Scouts taught me that it is easier to learn when you think of how the things you are studying will actually come up in real life and not on paper."