Contenders of the Faith

Contenders of the Faith is a boys' character club program published by Keepers of the Faith, awarding badges across nine categories spanning outdoor skills, mechanical trades, scripture memory, and Christian biography. Modeled on an older Scouting tradition and oriented toward conservative evangelical families, it functions as an extracurricular formation program rather than an academic curriculum, a distinction that matters in how families budget time and expectations around it.

Last updated: 2026-04-24 · Every Homeschool Editorial Team

At a glance

Method	Subject-specialist, badge-based character club, hands-on practical skills
Worldview	Christian-evangelical (conservative Protestant, family-integrated church orientation)
Grades	Approximately 3-12 (age 8 through high school)
Formats	Print handbooks, hands-on activities; optional local club participation
Cost tier	Budget
Parent intensity	4 (significant parent time required for badge verification and activity supervision)
ESA-common	No (extracurricular enrichment; not typically core-curriculum eligible)
Accredited	No
Established	1995 (Keepers of the Faith publisher)
Website	keepersofthefaith.com

Our scoreboard (1-5)

Criterion	Score	One-line reason
Academic rigor	2	Not an academic program; practical-skill and character focus
Ease of teaching	3	Activities are straightforward but require parent time and occasional outside expertise
Content quality	3	Handbooks are functional; badge content varies in depth across categories
Flexibility	4	Self-paced; badges can be earned at home or in local clubs
Value for money	4	Handbook under $25; badges inexpensive; most activities use everyday materials
Worldview scope	1	Explicitly Christian evangelical; Scripture memory and Christian biography are core categories
Visual/design	2	Plain softcover handbooks; minimal illustration
Support resources	3	Local club network in many communities; publisher answers email and phone

Who the publisher is

Keepers of the Faith is a small family-run Christian publisher that launched Keepers at Home, a girls' character club program, in 1995. Contenders of the Faith was introduced as the companion boys' program shortly thereafter. The publisher is owned and operated by the Susek family, and the program's editorial orientation reflects conservative evangelical family-integrated-church theology: the program emphasizes biblical manhood and womanhood, practical trades and domestic skills, and explicit Scripture-memory and Christian-biography elements within the badge progression. Programs of this kind emerged during the 1990s homeschool movement's period of rapid expansion, often as alternatives to Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts for families seeking an explicitly Christian character formation context.

The organization is not a membership body in the formal Scouting sense. Families purchase the handbook and optional companion books, and badges are awarded by the parent or by a local club leader based on verification of completed activities. Some communities host local Contenders clubs that meet weekly or monthly for group activities; other families complete the program entirely within the home. The publisher maintains a directory of local clubs but does not operate a national membership program or charge annual dues. This lightweight organizational model keeps costs low and scheduling flexible, with the tradeoff that the program's depth depends substantially on parent engagement or the quality of a local leader.

Theologically and culturally, Contenders of the Faith sits within the conservative evangelical family-integrated-church movement. The program's framing assumes traditional complementarian family structures, Scripture memory as a devotional practice, and practical-trades instruction as part of Christian masculine formation. The literature selections, biography recommendations, and Scripture portions reflect this orientation consistently across the handbook. Families outside this specific subculture will find the worldview embedding present throughout rather than confined to an optional Bible-study track.

The core pedagogy

Contenders of the Faith organizes its content into nine badge categories: Woodworking, Outdoor Skills (including camping, fishing, orienteering), Auto Mechanics, Christian Biography, Scripture Memory, Physical Fitness, First Aid and Safety, Home Economics (basic cooking, cleaning, and household maintenance), and Christian Service. Each category contains a series of individual badge requirements scaled from beginner to advanced. A boy earning the Woodworking badge at the beginner level might complete four small projects (a birdhouse, a cutting board, a bookshelf, a stool) with supervised use of hand tools; at the advanced level the same badge might require projects using power tools with proper safety instruction and completion of a significant multi-week build.

The pedagogical structure is closer to a merit-badge system than a graded curriculum. Badges are earned by completing requirements, with parent or club-leader verification, and the time to complete each badge varies from a few hours (Scripture Memory at the beginner level) to many weeks (Auto Mechanics at the advanced level, where a boy might be expected to perform an oil change, replace brake pads, and understand basic engine diagnostics under supervised instruction). The Contenders of the Faith Handbook lists badge requirements; supplementary volumes (Additional Contenders books) expand the badge inventory.

Signature mechanics: (1) Badge-based progression. Unlike time-based curricula, Contenders moves students forward on completion of defined activities, which scales well across age and ability. (2) Nine-category breadth. The spread across physical skills, mechanical trades, outdoor competence, and spiritual formation is deliberately broad. The program is not trying to be a trade school; it is trying to expose boys to a wide range of practical skills. (3) Scripture memory as an explicit badge category. Scripture memorization is treated as a trainable skill with graded passages and verification. (4) Local club or home-only options. The program works equally well as a home-only structure for an only child or as a club-based structure for groups of boys meeting regularly. Most families use some combination.

A day in the life

Contenders of the Faith does not produce a daily school-day rhythm. Instead, families typically carve out one to three sessions per week dedicated to badge work, with additional time for individual memory work or reading. A ten-year-old working on the Woodworking beginner badge might spend a Saturday morning in the garage with a parent, building the first of four required projects under supervised use of hand tools. The same student later in the week might spend twenty minutes on Scripture memory practice, and the weekend after might go on a family hike to satisfy part of the Outdoor Skills badge. A typical week involves two to four hours of badge-related activity, scheduled around the core academic curriculum rather than replacing it.

For boys participating in a local Contenders club, rhythms add a weekly or monthly meeting where the group works on a shared project, learns from a guest skilled-trade instructor, or completes outdoor activities together. These meetings are organized by volunteer parents and vary substantially in polish. Some clubs operate nearly like Boy Scout troops in terms of structure; others are less formal family gatherings. A boy advancing through the full program to its highest badges typically needs three to seven years of engagement, depending on how actively the family pursues individual requirements.

What they do exceptionally well

Practical skills with real tools. One of the program's clearest strengths is that boys who complete badges in Woodworking, Auto Mechanics, or Outdoor Skills genuinely learn to use tools and complete projects. The program assumes that a twelve-year-old can safely use a drill, a hand saw, or a jigsaw under appropriate parental supervision, and the badge requirements are structured to build skill progressively. Families using this program often report that their sons emerge with competence in everyday practical skills that peers in screen-heavy environments do not develop.

Affordability. The Contenders of the Faith Handbook is priced at approximately $22 as of April 2026 per the publisher's site. Badges themselves are inexpensive fabric patches. Most badge activities use materials families already own or can source cheaply (wood scraps, basic tools, ordinary outdoor gear). A boy can work through multiple years of the program with an all-in curriculum cost of under $100.

Breadth without overreach. The nine-category structure deliberately trades depth for breadth. A boy does not become an expert woodworker or mechanic through the badge, but he does encounter the field, develop basic competence, and identify areas of interest for deeper pursuit. For a broad-strokes character and practical-skills formation program, this breadth is the design feature rather than a weakness.

What they do poorly

Editorial polish is modest. The handbook's production is plain, softcover, limited illustration, functional typography. Compared to publishers with in-house art and editorial departments (the Boy Scouts handbook, for instance, or polished Christian character-formation curricula), Contenders is visibly bootstrapped. This keeps costs low but means the program reads as a family-publisher product rather than an institutional one.

Depth varies by category. The badge requirements in some categories (Scripture Memory, Physical Fitness) are relatively shallow; the requirements in others (Auto Mechanics at advanced levels) assume access to expertise the average family may not possess. Families completing the program at home need to either locate outside instruction (a grandfather, a church member, a neighbor) or skip badges the parent cannot meaningfully verify. For a boy in a community with adequate skilled-trade mentorship, this is fine; for an isolated family, some badges are effectively inaccessible.

Narrow cultural framing. The program's assumed audience is conservative evangelical family-integrated-church families. References to "biblical manhood," the explicit complementarian framing, and the Scripture-memory requirements are baked into the handbook rather than segregated into an optional track. Families outside this specific cultural context, broadly evangelical but not family-integrated, mainline Protestant, Catholic, or secular families looking for a skills-based program, will find the framing present throughout and will either need to adopt it or look elsewhere. The Boy Scouts' more religiously-neutral structure is the most obvious alternative for families seeking a skills-based badge program without this specific evangelical framing.

Who it fits / who it doesn't

• Pick Contenders of the Faith if: you are a conservative evangelical family seeking a character-formation and practical-skills program with an explicit Christian worldview; you have parent time and skill to supervise hands-on badge work; you value a badge-based rather than time-based progression; you prefer a low-cost program without annual dues; you want flexibility between home-only and local-club participation.

• Skip Contenders of the Faith if: you want a secular or religiously-neutral skills program (Boy Scouts or Trail Life USA may fit better); you cannot commit the parent time for supervised hands-on activity; you want an academic curriculum rather than an extracurricular enrichment; you are outside the conservative evangelical family-integrated-church tradition; you prefer a visually polished published curriculum to a bootstrapped family-publisher product.

Cost honest assessment

The Contenders of the Faith Handbook is priced at approximately $22 per the publisher's site as of April 2026. Additional Contenders volumes range $15-$25 per volume. Individual badges (fabric patches) are typically $1-$3 each. Supporting materials (badge vests or sashes for display, if a family uses them) run an additional $20-$40. An all-in first-year cost for a family starting the program is typically $60-$100, with annual recurring costs dropping to $20-$40 thereafter as new badges are earned.

Compared to alternatives, Contenders sits at the budget end of character-formation programs. Boy Scouts of America annual registration plus handbook and uniform runs $200-$400 per year. Trail Life USA, a Christian alternative to Boy Scouts founded in 2013, runs $100-$200 in annual registration and materials. Contenders does not involve organizational membership fees because it is not a membership organization.

ESA eligibility notes

Most state ESA marketplaces do not typically reimburse extracurricular character-club program fees, because ESA funds are generally targeted at core academic curriculum, tutoring, and formal enrichment rather than badge-based volunteer programs. Families in states with broader ESA definitions (Arizona's ClassWallet, Utah Fits All) should verify with their program administrator before assuming reimbursement for Contenders materials. Because the publisher does not operate a dedicated ESA workflow and the handbook is relatively inexpensive, most families using the program treat it as out-of-pocket rather than seeking reimbursement.

Alternatives

• Trail Life USA, a family would choose Trail Life over Contenders of the Faith if they want a formal membership-based Christian boys' character organization with local troop structure, regional events, and uniformed program.
• Boy Scouts of America, a family would choose Boy Scouts over Contenders if they want a secular skills-and-character organization with nationwide recognition, established advancement paths to Eagle, and broader community mentorship resources.
• American Heritage Girls (companion girls' program context), not a boys' alternative but commonly considered by families seeking a Christian complement to Boy Scouts/Trail Life; Contenders' girls' companion is Keepers at Home.

How we verified this

Our editorial team reviewed the Keepers of the Faith publisher site, the Contenders of the Faith Handbook product page, the local clubs directory, and the publisher's about page. We cross-referenced against the Boy Scouts of America and Trail Life USA membership programs for pricing comparison. Pricing and program details verified April 2026.