Emptywords! _ And after all that they went back to 'looney land'?!!! Pray, why? I have asked that once, she said she loved Jehovah and still believed that though corrupted like Isreal it is the only place she will go because she believes the docrtrines, I guess they are waiting for reform or something. He doesn't say much but goes occasionly, not regular in witnessing I think he's been inactive for long time, as I have slowly come out of the fog, our conversations have been more open, what I have got from some things they have said is they are carful what they say about the borg, as I have been a little wary with them, but its starting to look interesting and we may be able to meet on more common ground than we ever thought.
Arguments against Disfellowshipping
by TheListener 37 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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greendawn
The dubs and everyone else have the right to bar a member from participating in their religion and worship if that person broke certain biblical rules such as committing adultery or defrauding people of large sums of money.
Of course the problem with them is that they expel people for several unbiblical reasons such as criticising their leaders or their doctrines. In any case what they don't have the right to do is to ruin the families of the DFed or even shun them to an extreme degree as they do. Reducing intimacy is understandable (to keep away bad influences) but total shunning is needless. At the end of the day the "sinner" must be treated with love and understanding and not get crashed with total ostracism.
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Terry
There is a fine line; an almost invisible boundry between members in good standing and troublemakers in any group.
Intentional disorder is the worst behavior and unwitting incompetence define the extremes.
Danger to the group vs danger to the individual's freedom of choice create the foundation of scrutiny and assessment by custodians of the status quo.
Whose ways can be/should be mended and who is out of control and likely to destroy the order and peace of their fellows? That is the question.
Jesus set the standard of a shepherd with 100 sheep who discovers that 1% of his flock have strayed away. Should the shepherd cut his losses and remain with the 99%? No. The shepherd leaves the 99 and actively goes out of his way to regain the stray. It is not left up to the straying sheep to find his own way back into the fold.
What is the principle espoused by Jesus? It is the shepherd who owns the flock, cares for 100% of the flock and who is charged with the responsibility of maintaining the unity of the flock. A stray reflects on the competency and sense of responsibility of the caretaker.
What causes an individual to leave the safety and security of the group? How far away does the one stray have to go before the shepherd throws up his hands and abandons the stray? The answer is in the definition of "sheep". When one follows the herd one is a sheep. When one sets off on one's own they are a "stray" and when the shepherd goes after them and personally returns them they are competent to lead. A sheep cannot by nature turn on and attack the shepherd by biting him or trampling him alive.
So too with members of the local Kingdom Hall. To be a member one has to become "sheeplike". To stray one has to suffer disorientation and seek safety apart from the group. The responsibility of the flock's shepherds is not the following:
1.Confronting the stray in an adversarial session behind closed doors.
2.Ignoring the personal jeopardy of the stray's individual circumstances with a demand for compliance with rules of behavior
3.Judging the stray as unworthy of further attention and banning them from the flock
The act of disfellowshipping is the same act as Pontius Pilate in washing his hands of the prisoner Jesus' fate.
In the Book of Job we find Satan right among his fellow angels in heaven itself! Satan is allowed to be a troublemaker and even challenge God himself with accusations against innocent worshippers! Jesus "knew from the beginning" that Judas would betray him. But, Jesus never expels Judas from among the group of twelve.
Disfellowshipping is not the failure of one member to behave. Disfellowshipping is the failure of leadership to provide what is necessary for a sheep to DESIRE to remain with the flock. Disfellowshipping is the means by which we can identify elders who are incompetent and congregations which are NOT the fold of God.
Think of it another way. A mother with her children who has one misbehaving child does not abandon the child when it becomes unruly. The mother will find a child who has strayed NO MATTER WHAT and return the child to safety EVEN UNDER PROTEST. Why? Because the mother would be the worst caretaker imaginable should she do otherwise. The LOVE and sense of what is best for her children is the active principle which guides a parent and NOT the force and severity of the exclusionary punishment. The welfare of the child demands that the parent provide ALL THE NECESSARY SUPPORT to protect and preserve the unity of the family.
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jgnat
Father forgives the prodigal son instantly (Luke 15:20)
Work out your offences amongst yourselves, going to the brother yourself to make it right. If it does go to the congregation, it's public (Matthew 18:15)
How often do we forgive? Seventy times seven (Matthew 18:21-22)
Jesus came for the "sick", the sinners. We should likewise embrace people who need God's help. (Matthew 19:12, Mark 2:17, Luke 5:31)
The pharisees criticized Jesus for associating with "publicans and sinners" and were roundly rebuked. (Matthew 9:10-11, Matthew 11:19, Mark 2:15-16, Luke 5:30, Luke 7:34, Luke 15:1-3)
If we don't reach out to those who need our help, we are rejecting Jesus himself. (Mat 25:43-45)
Seek out the lost sheep and bring him home, (Luk 15:4-7)
If a witness asks, "Well who do we shun then? What was that scripture meant for?" simply reply, only the rankest evil people, the ones who would drag you down if they could. Don't you keep away from people like that anyways?
If a witness asks, "How do we keep the congregation clean?" reply, "Not by driving the sin underground! Don't you think people in the congregation are much more terrified of their brothers finding out about their secret sin than God himself?" We can keep the congregation clean the first century way, by open confession, repentance, ready forgiveness and a helping hand. The Holy Spirit can help us day by day as well. In our zeal in keeping the congregation "clean", we cannot discard Christian love!
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greendawn
Disfellowshipping is not the failure of one member to behave. Disfellowshipping is the failure of leadership to provide what is necessary for a sheep to DESIRE to remain with the flock.
That is the essence of the issue something the FDS never understood or rather pretends he does not understand. Have they done their part as they should? No, so why do they pass judgements on others? That's where "don't judge so as not to be judged" comes in.
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emptywords
From a practical point of view, shunning cuts off all possible supports for an addict, when it is the very people closest to him who can urge him to get the help he needs, and warn him if he's slipping back in to his old ways. I would never report an addict to the elders.
I agree with that..person isolated with an addiction is in real danger of getting involved deeper and with company that works against any worthwhile help. The thing I find most unloving is they (GB elders) look at the wrong not the person, they don't see a human being in front of them, they just see the fault, to me they are by far the most reprehensible before God than those they judge, it's really neglect of the person as a whole.
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greendawn
That's what phariseeism is all about being totally unimaginative and putting the letter of the law above the individual, the JWs are modern day pharisees. If they treated these "sinners" with love a lot would have gone back.
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WTWizard
Here is a more practical example. Suppose you are a member of a club that features certain benefits. You break one of the rules and are not repentant, and the rule is serious enough to terminate your membership. Or, you don't want to be a member any longer for whatever reason. At this point, the benefits end. The record clubs are a prime example of this: once you quit or are booted out, you no longer get the discounts on any music that you had been enjoying.
Do other members of these clubs shun ex-members of them? Hardly. I could be in the midst of many people who used to belong to a club that I still belong to, but went delinquent in paying or quit because the club was no longer providing value to them. There is no shunning involved. You are merely cut off from the benefits from that club.
And returning is easy. If, for instance, I quit a record club, I can later come back and join again. I might have to work back to earn the discounts, and lose whatever points I had under the old account. But, I would immediately be accepted back. In cases of delinquency, all I would have to do is pay the full amount in arrears, probably including extra fees, to be reinstated. Only the most serious cases (perhaps those involving intentional destruction of the club or hacking other members' accounts) would result in permanent banning--even then, no shunning of family members is involved.
Perhaps if the Watchtower Society would follow this pattern of disfellowshipping or disassociation, things would be easier. These people are no longer members and will not receive benefits from the organization. But, family will not cut them off from non-organizational matters, and those employed in Witless owned businesses or are in Witless-owned apartments wouldn't be fired or evicted at the same time. But then again, there is no value with that organization.
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greendawn
It's a good example which shows that the JW way of dealing with ex members is diabolically and needlessly extreme. The real reason they have such a draconian policy is because they use it as a defence against dissenters. They know their doctrines are very rotten and can't stand much scrutiny.
They invoke DFing as a defence against reproach that can be brought against their org by misdeeds of members but that doesn't explain why they need to destroy families or even totally shun all ex members. Or why celebrating birthdays is put at the same level as adultery.
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Narkissos
WTWizard's contemporary comparisons lead me to add: leaving aside the forms of discipline (cf. my former post), I don't think the social consequences of being expelled from, or deliberately leaving, an early Christian church would have been any milder than those which df'd or da'd JWs currently experience. And they would have been far worse as soon as Christianity became dominant in a particular village, town or ethnic group, or was embraced by a political authority. Being shunned by family and friends is a painful experience (which I have known firsthand), but there is still a wider world around to which you still belong, without needing to leave your usual settings in most cases.
The JW shunning is shocking in the modern Western world because it runs against our view of religious membership as a free individual option (like club membership indeed).