American Heritage Girls to Develop Character - with Patti Garibay

Rick Green: 0:09
Welcome to the intersection of faith and the culture. It's WallBuilders. We're taking on those hot topics of the day from a biblical, historical and constitutional perspective. You can find out more about us at our websites WallBuilders.com and WallBuildersLive.com Always a chance for each and every one of us to do more to restore this constitutional republic. Bring back biblical values and constitutional principles, and you can always be the catalyst for that. You can go to WallBuilders.com today. Get the Biblical Citizenship courses, foundations of freedom courses, all those different tools that you can then open up your living room or at your church. Get people together and go through those things in a group setting. There's something about building that community like that and having that opportunity. In fact, we're going to talk a little bit about community today and building that for kids as well and giving them the chance to learn what it means to be good biblical citizens. There's a lot of great stuff headed your way today. Again, visit the websites, make sure and check that out. My name is Rick Green. I'm an American Constitution Coach and a former Texas legislator, normally here with David and Tim Barton David, of course, America's premier historian and our founder at WallBuilders. Tim's a national speaker and pastor and president at WallBuilders, and today, though, we're going to spend the rest of our time together with a very special guest that I had the chance to interview that I, honestly, was blown away. I mean, I am so excited about what they're doing. I'm going to talk about a couple of things that I've been doing, and I'm going to talk about the organization called American Heritage Girls. We've talked about them before a little bit on the show, we've talked about trail life on the show. We've had people from trail life on the show, and, of course, both these organizations essentially response to Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts going woke, going really anti-biblical, moving completely away from the morally straight and all the things that they stood for for so long, and so we followed that. Well, I think, with trail life and there I've had a lot of Patriot Academy students that went through it We've had some of our best team members and volunteers from Patriot Academy that have been involved with American Heritage Girls. I just did not realize how long they've been around, and I did not realize how incredibly effective they are and how thorough their programs are, but now Patriot Academy is teaming up with American Heritage Girls, and we're going to be providing them with a lot of the Constitution and citizenship and Biblical Citizenship and all that. So, anyway, lots of good stuff and I think you're going to love this interview. We had a chance to visit with the founder of American Heritage Girls, Patti Garibay, and we were both just a few days ago at the Texas Homeschool Coalition and speaking there at their convention and had a chance to visit, and I'm just telling you you're going to enjoy this. So, without any further ado, let's jump right into that time and catch spin with Patti Garibay. Alright, we're here with Patti Garibay from American Heritage Girls. What a privilege to have you. I'm so excited about this.

Patti Garibay: 2:47
No thanks for having me. It's been too long, but now it's here, right it's here, it's here and you've already been in the trenches.

Rick Green: 2:52
You have built an amazing organization. The Lord has blessed y'all greatly, brought you so many great people from across the country. I just got to start by saying what an answer to prayer. I mean. You are fulfilling, really the men of Issaqar kind of a thing here, understanding the times and knowing what to do. You know, my friend, John Stenberger at Trail Life same thing had poured his heart into Boy Scouts and God had moved in so many ways over the years. Same thing for you and Girl Scouts. And you know, as Dennis Prager says, the left destroys everything they touch. And but y'all, neither of y'all said well, well, I guess we'll just go home and do nothing. You said we're going to pick up the pieces and rebuild. And have you ever? This has exploded. Tell us about American Heritage Girls Great name, by the way. Only name I can think of better than American Heritage Girls as Patriot Academy, but I mean American Heritage Girls. Even when I first heard about you I was like that is the perfect name.

Patti Garibay: 3:43
Right, you know American Heritage Girls really is is founded around God, family, community and country and service to that, and so God comes first. We were started as a response really to what the Girl Scouts USA had done in the 90s, and I had been a Girl Scout leader at the time and felt really a call from the Lord that we need to start something for my daughter. I thought it would only be for my daughter for just a few formative years and the Lord had a much bigger plan. But we started to realize that it wasn't just changing the Girl Scout promise, which was really the what, shall I say, the explosion that happened. They were suddenly saying that no longer did you have to make an oath to God in the Girl Scout promise. Well, if you're having a character development program that's supposed to help build girls in morality and you don't have a basis, what is it going to be based on? Right, right, and so we knew it was moral relativism at the time.

Rick Green: 4:37
We were seeing that everywhere, you said 90s, yeah, in the 90s this was not the the whole, you know, like 2015,. 16, when things started getting really bad. All the way back in the 90s you saw those big changes happening.

Patti Garibay: 4:47
That's right and I had God had given me discernment, and I don't know why I have that gift, but I do and I was. I was looking at not just this Girl Scout promise, which every girl stay says at every Girl Scout meeting.

Rick Green: 5:00
So you're really embedding that. I mean you're putting it in the hearts of mind.

Patti Garibay: 5:03
It's a mantra, it's a mantra what you say, and now you know an asterisk is by the Lord's name, which means you can leave it out. I started to also impede the onion a little bit more. As a Girl Scout leader of three troops, you think I might have known more, but I didn't. I had to dig a little bit and we had quite a controversial sexuality and new retreat happening in our Cincinnati Ohio camp. That was funded by Girl Scout Cookie Money and it was very controversial. I brought it to a pro-life leader of the nation, dr Jack Wilkie, who started National Right to Life, and he says Patti, this is all pro-abortion right here, this entire curricula. It was also about sexuality being on a spectrum and that adrogyny is the best way to be. Wow, does that?

Rick Green: 5:44
sound familiar. How long ago was that?

Patti Garibay: 5:45
1993. Patti, you're kidding me? No, I had no idea it was that far back, that far back, and now today, look at it.

Rick Green: 5:54
So think of all the hearts and minds of girls. I mean that now are in leadership positions all over the country that ended up having that poured into them. I had no idea A force for good really turned into a force for bad it did.

Patti Garibay: 6:08
And you wonder why. Why did that happen? Well, mission Creep, the wrong people came in. You had Betty Friedan was on their board. There was Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. They love Planned Parenthood at Girl Scouts. So all of this sort of death, culture and moral relativism and just gender neutrality, all of that was happening already in the 90s, so I had to do something about it. I never thought it would be national and even international in scope, but you know, when you say yes to God, he can use you in ways that you would never dream. And so that's really the story of American marriage girls.

Rick Green: 6:43
Well, I'm just. I mean, now I'm realizing the 90s was not only really bad for country music, it was bad for Girl Scouts, it was in fashion. Everything went downhill, okay. So when, then, did you actually start American Heritage Girls, and how much, I guess how much pushback did you get from your friends, you know, and girl scouts, from the people that you had worked with all those years? I mean, walk me through that kind of that creation side of the story.

Patti Garibay: 7:09
Oh, that's really an interesting part. Well, 93 was when I realized I have a problem, right 94. I spent that year trying to change the girl scouts. I solemnly believe we need to take an active role and change, yeah, and when that becomes inevitably we can't do that, that's when we have to start something new. I don't think we should just always run, because that's part of why the culture is the way it is. Yeah, that we need to engage to the Point where there's no more engaged. Why that takes discernment and wisdom.

Rick Green: 7:35
Oh, love this story. I wish we had three hours because that, right there, if we could do a Jill Rogan style podcast right now, we'd spend an hour on that absolutely write a book about just that part. Okay, go ahead, I cut y'all.

Patti Garibay: 7:45
So we went ahead and I had nothing. I was a mom of four. I felt like I was not good at anything. I was a jack of all trades, a master of none, literally. And so when God had this calling and that it was really supposed to be Bigger than even my daughter's troop, I'm like how in the world am I going to do this? A scouting organization, how are we going to have uniforms and badges and camps and all the things that I thought came with something like that? And the Lord just stepped that out little by little by little, and he also said you don't really need camps. There's plenty of places that I have camps that they want you to rent. So that I kept putting all the reasons why I shouldn't do it and God kept knocking them down. And then he would bring people that helped me knock them down. And I started to learn that if I go through every door that he opens, there will be something there, and it's not always immediate and I know you could probably Testify to this with Patriot Academy but it will come in time.

Rick Green: 8:35
I keep praying for patience, but he won't hurry up and give it.

Patti Garibay: 8:37
No, no so I bet your Psalms versus yours too, right. You know, be still and know that I am God and that is what I've had to do. But I think, all in all, as I look back at the, at the trajectory of it all, it was supposed to be. Girl scouts were supposed to be exposed. I did do the good fight. I did lose tons of friends. It was a very lonely situation because, leading three troops, I was the Girl Scout lady in my city. You know I was the one that was starting them and loved it and it used it as ministry. So that was okay. Being lonely and being alone is okay because that's what leaders do. But by the same token, it's really difficult on your family, and so you have to be able to stand alone and and just understand that the power of courage that God can give you through his Holy Spirit is what will bring you through. And so that was really my story Still trying to be courageous in this big fight. What would.

Rick Green: 9:28
What would you pick as Kind of the turning point or the, the inflection point when it it really took off, where you felt a real change. You're like okay, wow, this is the guys really in this. This thing, this thing's growing.

Patti Garibay: 9:40
It was about 1998, I would say. By that time it was so funny. We started to see people being interested in what we were doing. We started with about a hundred girls, ten troops. They each had ten, ten girls in it in Cincinnati, ohio, and we felt some momentum and we're like we were praying. We're saying, lord, we will grow this wherever you want us to grow this. We feel this is of you. And then we said we'll grow it anywhere but California. And so the first troop that we had out of the state of Ohio was in California. So we were so worried about.

Rick Green: 10:12
Jonah, I'm going to call you Jonah from now on. No Lord, not Nineveh.

Patti Garibay: 10:15
I'm not going to Nineveh and that's where you're going. That's exactly it, and so that troop today still exists. But it's unbelievable how God was showing me I am far greater than your plans, girlfriend. You know, I got this and that was the very first step and I think that was my turning point of obedience, that I was praying against something, yeah, but he was for wow, and that just humbled me and I I retracted real quick as, like, you've got this.

Rick Green: 10:40
You're at how many years now? 20, 28, 28 years? How many, how many troops now in all 50 states, right about?

Patti Garibay: 10:46
1500 troops, 60,000 members. So those 1500 troops represent 1500 churches. Wow, because that's how we do, this is, it's part of the church ministry. And then we come along. We helped to start chairlife USA in 2013. Love it, because another really neat piece, Rick, of what happened to us that I thought our ship had come in, is in the year 2009. The Boy Scouts of America signed a memorandum of understanding with American Heritage Girls. I didn't know this either the very first Girls organization for them to do that with really, and we thought it was great in that we modeled some of our foundational documents, like the Boy Scouts, because we love the idea that how did they stay true to their mission for so long? Yeah they had the Supreme Court in Dale case. Remember that to keep morally straight. Yeah, and all these things. So we linked with them in 2009. Unbelievable. Here we have openings for film on training in camps. Remember my camp concern? Wow, solved, it's all done. The Boy Scouts are there.

Rick Green: 11:48
One rabbit trail on this. Were you thinking at the time too, because they're under attack, we're going to be able to help them too and be a positive? I mean? I'm sure that with all of that, you're thinking, wow, this is going to be great for everybody. And, by the way, I used to, when I was a legislator and if you were, if you were an Eagle Scout, if you do those things I was I didn't look at anything else on your resume. I was like, yes, I want, you can't. And I mean, what a positive influence all those years. Yes that was all the way. That was 2009.

Patti Garibay: 12:11
Yeah, okay, 2009.

Rick Green: 12:12
Okay, back on where you were.

Patti Garibay: 12:13
So we enjoyed our relationship for four years and I was down in Dallas all the time, you know, at the national meetings, and I started again. My discernment started going a little wacky and I'm in the religious committee, committees, national committees, and I'm like there's something going on here and I'm still surprised to this day that the atheists because that's what I thought that they would get sued over, but rather it was a morally straight issue. So in 2013, may of 2013, I was in Dallas when they had the big announcement and I had two envelopes one for the chief scout, one that said way to go, great decision we continue to be your partner.

Rick Green: 12:48
The other one, sirenara, you're kidding, you went into that meeting prepared.

Patti Garibay: 12:53
Oh yeah.

Rick Green: 12:54
Basically, with your acceptance speech, we won the award and we lost the election, or whatever. That's right, that's wisdom, oh wow.

Patti Garibay: 13:02
So that's what we did and we had to get that, according to the chief scout. And then you can imagine, we were poised and positioned because we had had so many people concerning, because this had made the news that this might be happening and people wanted us to start American Heritage Boys Very, very much. And our board went to prayer and fasting and felt that the Lord was not calling us to do a boys organization but to have the men that are interested do that, but rather we were to be a consortium to make sure that all these people that were interested in starting organizations weren't making splinter groups but one unified body. And so that's how we helped to start Trail Life USA. Wow.

Rick Green: 13:37
And now they've grown to I don't know thousands, I guess as well. Oh, yes, that's incredible. I am so thankful because, as you know well, better than most, what we're teaching the kids of today is what the government's going to look like tomorrow Absolutely, and the ability to have that fellowship and community that your troops create. I mean because it gives them the chance to grow up together and to have this stuff poured in. I mean, I think, maybe even more important than what happens in the classroom, because it's just something about the learning environment and all of those things. So you're I don't some people say I exaggerate sometimes I mean you're literally helping to save the country. I know you see it that way and I think people should see it that way. It's that important. You're raising up leaders, you're raising up the people and the patriots and the citizens of the next generation that will now be grounded. In fact, your creed, the creed that American Heritage Girls recite, give us that one. Oh, you're going to have to hang on for that creed, that motto so stay with us folks, quick break. You're listening to Wild Brothers ["Wild Brothers"]. ["wild Brothers"]. Have you noticed the vacuum of leadership in America? We're looking around for leaders of principle to step up, and too often no one is there. God is raising up a generation of young leaders with a passion for impacting the world around them. They're crying out for the mentorship and leadership training they need. Patriot Academy was created to meet that need. Patriot Academy graduates now serve in state capitals around America, in the halls of Congress, in business, in the film industry, in the pulpit in every area of the culture. They're leading effectively and impacting the world around them. Patriot Academy is now expanding across the nation and now's your chance to experience this life-changing week that trains champions to change the world. Visit patriotacademycom for dates and locations. Our core program is still for young leaders 16 to 25 years old, but we also now have a citizen track for adults, so visit the website today to learn more. Help us fill the void of leadership in America. Join us in training champions to change the world at patriotacademycom. We're back on WallBuilders. Thanks for staying with us. Our interview with Patti Garibay, American Heritage Girls and as we went to break, she was just about to share the American Heritage Girls creed, their motto, that they teach very different from what the Girl Scouts went to and much more. What we want to instill in the next generation. Here we go.

Patti Garibay: 16:09
I promise to love God, cherish my family, honor my country and serve in my community.

Rick Green: 16:15
I mean, how many kids would you like to see go through and have that? That is the foundation I mean. Right, there is what the Founding Fathers would have said. This is what we need to be instilling, so powerful. And while we're talking, founding Fathers, your highest award, the Stars and Stripes, tell us about that and how you developed that Right.

Patti Garibay: 16:33
The Stars and Stripes Award is not for every girl. It's for those girls that really want to achieve something and set a goal. They do over a 100-hour service project. They could be helping the Patriot Academy. I like the sound of that yeah they sure could, and they also are able to learn about project management, fundraising, advocacy, as far as they're doing PR.

Rick Green: 16:54
Life skills, huge life skills.

Patti Garibay: 16:57
It is collaboration, team building, recruiting volunteers. All of this is bundled into this Leadership skills, life skills and leadership skills.

Rick Green: 17:04
What's important?

Patti Garibay: 17:04
is their faith award, learning to grow in the Lord. I am so blessed. I read every Stars and Stripes project that comes down the pike and I learned that the girls have learned so much spiritually and how to rely on the Lord to get them through, because there's not one that says it's easy. And in their busy time of life, during their senior year in high school, there's lots of other choices to make, right, but they've determined that this is what was important and they are forever changed from it because the Holy Spirit's power is in that project and in that journey.

Rick Green: 17:36
I know you see it and you may already have some, but I mean I see members of Congress, legislative leaders, titans of industry, moms that are raising the next generation, I mean all of those things and going in with that kind of a foundation Part of your challenge. Our challenge really is that the values that made the country great are unpopular now and you're taking a lot of that head on. You're teaching. You're not running from the gender issue. You're not running from. You've got a book now that has come out. I mean all of these things. Those are tough fights. Talk to us a little bit about that and how you stay. How do you stay bold on those things? Because I'm sure you have, even in your own circle probably people say, eh, let's not touch that one. You know we might take, you know, a heat for that or whatever. But yet here you are and you're taking on the tough ones.

Patti Garibay: 18:24
Well, you know, I have found over the years that when you're taking on the tough fights and the adversary is throwing darts at you, you're probably doing the right thing Right. And so that feeling that sometimes would make others shirk sort of emboldens me. It doesn't hurt either that about three weeks ago it came back from the Holy Land. That gives me a lot of steel in my spine right and the fire in our belly which you share, by the way about the love of our country and the fact that our first citizenship is heaven and, secondarily, we are here in this country and we can bring heaven to earth around that. So I believe that it's so integral that we are courageous and I speak about courage to the girls all the time, because this generation wants to do the easy thing and I guess it's not that unusual, although I think when I was growing up we couldn't wait to get out on our own. You know now a lot of times the kids are wanting to stay at home and not having to do the hard thing. So we're encouraging the girls to do the hard things, to get dirty, to be gritty but with grace. Yes, and that's our leadership program. It's called Grit with Grace.

Rick Green: 19:27
I was going to say what a great title.

Patti Garibay: 19:28
Grit with Grace, girls Rooted in Truth with Grace, oh, that's so good, I love it.

Rick Green: 19:34
Okay, now this book, this e-book, this new project A Raising Godly Girls Guide to. Gender and Identity, that talk about hot topics and right now, how are the girls responding to that? Because they're getting hit from all over.

Patti Garibay: 19:47
They sure are, and, a matter of fact, all the studies that are coming out most recently are that girls are more affected by this than boys, and I believe that that's part of their wiring, in that they want relationships, they want to be accepted a lot, and there's something called social contagion which affects girls more than boys. And so when somebody says you know you like to ride horses or you like to tinker with your dad's car, you might be a boy, and they start thinking, well, maybe I am a boy. And then their friend encourages them, and then their friend is going through this. This is starting to really snowball, and that's what we're seeing, and we're even seeing it in American Heritage Girls as well. So Christians are not exempt. Home schoolers are not exempt.

Rick Green: 20:28
Well, in fact, even grit would be seen, as they would label that. If you've got a really gritty girl Like my wife I mean she was gritty just like you're talking about She'd get down on the trenches. She's one taught me to hunt, I mean she would have been they would have said, oh, you must be a boy. I think so.

Patti Garibay: 20:41
And you know labels are cool now and back when I was growing up we didn't want labels. Stereotypes were bad. But now we're all wanting labels because I think kids today want, they want a box to be in and they need to know. They need to know the truth of scripture, and what you said today with biblical worldview is absolutely the antidote to all of this, and so our newest ebook that just came out on Monday is a Raising Gawley Girls Guide to Biblical World View. Oh, great Alright. So it talks about what's going on in our culture and what God says about that, showing the relevancy of the Holy Word in today's world. And it's very relevant, right oh?

Rick Green: 21:17
Patti, that's so good. Okay, before we end the interview, just some basics the age of girls that can participate, ladies and I should ask if men can start a club. So, like ladies and parents right now that are listening, that are saying, wow, we need that at our church and we need that for our kids, how do they start that? So, first of all the ages and then folks that want to start. Sure.

Patti Garibay: 21:40
American Heritage Girls serves girls ages five to 18. So really all of girlhood girls can enter at any point. You don't have to be five to be able to enter. You can be 12, you can be 14, you can be 17. And you can still get a lot of benefit from American Heritage Girls. And as far as starting a troop, if your church is wanting to grow in membership for young families, this is a great way. If your homeschooling co-op is wanting to have this Christ-centered boy, the curricula is unbelievable for homeschoolers. They can build their whole curricula around these badges. We have over 320 opportunities for the girls, but we're so much more than badges, also service. I mean think about how many times you wanted to serve as a family but you really don't know how to orchestrate that Well, it's built into our program to do that kind of thing Seems like this is all would make a co-op almost sticky Like.

Rick Green: 22:28
In other words, it gives something for the co and a church group For people to want to come and their families to want to be a part of it, and now, as the girls are getting in the troop and getting more involved and all that, it's going to make the whole family want to be more apart. So I would think everybody listening that has a homeschool co-op or you got a church group or whatever you ought to want to do this.

Patti Garibay: 22:44
Absolutely this. Alongside trail life, you've got family ministry and it is so easy to implement. Not only that, you have ladies and men's ministry, because what it does for the leaders is just unbelievable. So yes, guys you had the question about the guy you know if Dad could start absolutely Dad can start something like this. So you know, we have a lot of child protection kinds of rules and so forth just to make sure that everybody is on the same page with that and we do a lot of training. That's all inherent in what we do, and we've been around for 28 years and some of our volunteers have served just that long. Wow. And you don't have to be a mom or Dad to be part of this, by the way. You can be a grandparent. You can just be somebody that doesn't have children, wants to serve and cares about youth. So really it's open to anyone. They can, adults that can agree with the statement of faith and that's on our website, and girls of all ages, and really we're trying to bring them to the Lord. So incredible.

Rick Green: 23:38
I was thinking as you were describing that my years as a Little League coach and a lot of times you think of something like this is well, I've got to sacrifice all this time or whatever. The reward is immeasurable. And, like you said, there's people that want to be in ministry of some kind, or they want to give back, or they want to just serve and they want to be a part of the solution right To turn the country back. What a great way to do that, and I know you see it every day with your troop leaders and you probably get those calls all the time. It's like. I'm so glad I did this. I have hope for the country now because of what I'm seeing inside the American Heritage Group. I mean, these are wonderful opportunities, not just for the kids, for the adults that are listening as well. Okay, website to send them to if they want to sign up. And then what about when you do start a club, the training and all that? I'm assuming you all provide all of that. You just sign up and then you all walk them through.

Patti Garibay: 24:20
We sure do so. Americanheritagegirlsorg is our website, and you can go there to finda troop in your area or if that troop is full, which does happen a lot, because this has become very popular. Parents are looking for counter cultural kinds of extracurriculars that have an eternal impact, and American Heritage Girls has that. You can also start a troop. There's five steps to starting a troop. You need five people, five adults that are interested in really ministering to girls and to create a lifelong legacy for the Lord, and that's really what American Heritage Girls provides.

Rick Green: 24:54
Very last thing, we are partnering Patriot Academy, American Heritage Girls coming together we're going to provide some of the patriotic education and fun training with chasing American legends and some of the other things. I am so excited about this, Patti, I really think we're going to see an incredible synergy. But I have to ask you because I just don't know if world domination is possible without an alternative to Girl Scout cookies. So you get that asked that all the time what's the replacement for the mint cookies?

Patti Garibay: 25:18
Well, you're going to love this because in true rugged individualism, we allow each troop to choose what they would like to do that is best suited for their troops, so they get to keep all the profits. No child labor here, so they do fundraising efforts locally.

Rick Green: 25:32
Yes, they've got a big project coming up or whatever Another way for you to support back home. Right, find that troop. If you don't want to start a troop, the least you can do is donate or help them to do a fundraiser as well. That's right, Patti, you're helping to save the country, no kidding. And even more important, I mean honestly. I say this to people all the time I don't know if we're going to save the country, and who knows what's going to happen to America. More importantly, you're raising godly women, and I mean what an answer to prayer. I'm so looking forward to partnering with you. It'll be great. Thanks for coming on. That was Patti Garibay. What an exciting interview. I am so excited about what they're doing, what we're about to do in terms of teaming up with them. So, WallBuilders, patriot Academy, American Heritage Girls it's just going to be great for the next generation. And so if you want to learn more AmericanHeritageGirls.org AmericanHeritageGirls.org, you can get a troop started right there at your church and your community, at your home. Let's do our part in passing the torch effectively to the next generation. That takes community. It takes things like this, where you come alongside organizations that have already figured out so much of this. Thanks so much for listening. Today You've been listening to WallBuilders.