Question for the Board

chappy

I just finished talking to my uncle for the first tim in quite a while. He's a long time elder and in charge of setting up all of the local circuit Assys. and partially in charge of DA., so he knows a lot of bro's. I brought up the subject of the UN scandle and he says that this was the first he has heard of it. Even though a WT elder he's a really straight up guy, so I can't believe he hasn't even heard of the scandal. I thought all the elders had gotten some kind of info from HQ about it. Is this even possible or is he pulling my leg?

chappy

Doubting Bro

Chappy,

If a member of the congregation writes to the Society about the matter, then the elders may get copied on the response. But, there hasn't been any communication, at least in the US branch, regarding the subject. I found out on the Internet. The experience of some here shows that many BOE will even declare that it is totally false, until they write to WTS and find out that it actually did happen.

He's probably telling you the truth.

fullofdoubtnow

I believe the wts sent out a letter to all congregations at the time, which he would have seen if he was an elder then. You can probably find a copy of the letter easily enough, I am sure it's on Freeminds. It was designed to play down the wts NGO status and, from what I remember, make it appear that they did nothing wrong.

I guess the majority of jws believed that, and don't see it as a scandal.

AK - Jeff

I'm not certain if the US brothers got one - but I saw a scan of a letter to the elders in UK that was made to difuse the Guardian articles when it first broke.

Jeff

Tyrion

Unless I'm very much mistaken that letter was sent only to the branch offices, not to the congregations. So it's probable that he never heard of it before.

Dismembered

If you were able to take a survey of ones who were made aware of, or even have heard of the UN scandal, I believe you'd find almost none of the dubs are aware of what happened. They're to busy with the membership drive, and fund-raising. As AlanF posted in another thread, the average JW could not even explain the simple beliefs they have, let alone something as scandalous as the UN thing.

All in all, most JW are simply out of the loop. Even ones like your uncle, who sounds like he's up there on the "I'm a brown-noser watchtower totem pole".

Dismembered

OnTheWayOut

I have been an elder from about 1993 to 2006 with a slight gap in 1995 while changing congregations after moving. I never ever heard of any information about NGO and the UN. I never heard publishers or elders or COs discuss it. I'm sure it was swept under the rug in the US before I was appointed, and I'm pretty sure there was no letter issued in US congregations.

bronzefist

(Welcome to the board tyron) back to the question;

Can't believe the elders haven't discussed the UN thing among themselves. Haven't heard of a letter from NY, but I'm sure one was sent to "advise" the BOE how to deal with the question if it comes up. Wouldn't doubt some are sweeping it under the rug by denying to know anything about it.

sspo

I was en rlder until the end of 2004 and i had never heard of the UN scandal. There was no letter sent to the BOE.

I have friends and relatives in many states and no one ever said a word about it.

When i was taken before the elders recently ( being turned in for apostasy by my wife ) and mentioned about the UN scandal, none of the elders knew anything about it and they were shocked and asked me where I got that info.

Only one elder in the area knew about it but he excused the Society saying they needed to get in the library.

Shooting Star

Instead of going to Freeminds for the letter, one can go directly to the UN-NGO site where there is a link to Watchtower! Check it out. Let's see..."I was just doing some research and bouncing around the UN site when I FOUND THIS LETTER!..." Much more credibility than going anywhere else. Here is the link...

http://www.un.org/dpi/ngosection/ngo-docs.html

Use it well!

Shooting Star

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