by Marvin Shilmer 37 Replies latest jw friends
can someone explain to me, what does the WTS mean by stating that from their understanding "in many situations, many blood donors would be needed to get a sufficent amout of required fraction for treatment"?
So are they saying according to one's conscious, it's ok to get blood from many other people to attain a required fraction? Am I missing something? It's hard for me to enlarge the print from this letter in order to read the rest. I hate when that happens.
as a side note, I'm not trying to refute this post or condone it. Just trying to understand what does the WTS mean...
Marvin is correct. The Roche letter changes everything. It matters not what the official line is as published in the Watchtower literature - unless that line specifically refers back to the private letter and explicitly retracts it. The Watchtower will not be doing that any time soon. The letter is a two-edged sword: It protects the Watchtower Corporation's legal interests but it also exposes a suprising duplicity (well, to the naive reader it would be surprising but to those of us jaded by the Watchtower's dishonesty it's not at all surprising ).
Standing back from the Roche letter and the "official" Watchtower line may not be necessary because many of us know - at least anecdotally - that Jehovah's witnesses as individuals have shown themselves highly capable of self-preservation when push comes to needing blood.
It would be churlish of me to reel off the specific instances of persons in good standing in the organization who have come to very private and quiet agreements with their surgeon and the surgical team to have blood - or to have it on stand by just in case. My elderly JW mother who died last year had a virtually "unspoken" agreement with the family medical practitioner to have blood ready during at least two of her difficult (child birth) labors. She never needed the blood as things turned out. She told me on the quiet about this a few years ago. She did not feel quilty about it and I was astonished when she chuckled as she told me. Of course she did not want non-family members to know. I know from other disclosures I have heard over the years that my mother's trust in the family practitioner in having "help" on hand if needed is not at all uncommon.
The biggest danger to an JW in this understandable position is not getting the blood but the harshly condemnatory reactions of the "loving" elders in the local kingdom halls should they find out about it.
Where did you get the letter, Brother?
Answer: I received it anonymously from somebody who obviously loves me enough to see that I get the Society approved help I need. I'm like that Ox in the ditch on the Sabbath.
Interesting article, but I think it makes it difficult for a JW to donate to the general blood supply, since it states the blood can only be used for "minor fractions" but not the 4 "components". It does state the "the remaining bulk was discarded." I get the impression that it is recommending the person could donate for a specific situation, but not give to a blood bank where they do not have control over how the blood is used.
About your query mindblown: One blood component that JWs are allowed to have is Factor X which is derived from a high-speed blood-fractionation process that needs the blood of literally scores of donors. The Watchtower letter is perhaps the sole written acknowledgement anywhere that, while they forbid donating blood for other's use, it requires a very high number of individual donors to keep alive those JWs with hemaphiliac disorders. The letter explicitly states that, under that type of specific scenario an individual could donate their blood for their own later use. However, the problem is the individual with that type of disorder does not have the component (i.e., blood-clotting) in his blood that he is donating it to presumably get. It is at about this point that the reader - and thinker - needs a Panadol or two. The letter is classic butt-covering - something that organized religions need to do from time to time to survive in this litigious age.
Thank You steve2
Yes, I can see what you mean. What a percarious situation.
When I recently started researching the WTS, I was shocked to find out even fractions were alowed, because of the WTS hard line blood stance for years.
Undercover,
You write:
“Yes, if the JW chooses to do so based on what he reads in the Roche letter. But, really, how many dubs know about that letter?”
Few Witnesses know about the letter, but lots of Witnesses have access to Watchtower’s policy that Witnesses can accept all fractions of all components of blood. If Witnesses can accept all fractions of all components of blood then Witnesses can donate all fractions of all components of blood. Unavoidably that is Watchtower policy, and any Witness who needs confirmation of that conclusion need only phone or write Bethel.
More than a few Witnesses have discovered this upon close scrutiny of Watchtower’s blood doctrine and concluded the above. For these, Watchtower's doctrine regarding blood donation is self-evident. This is the basis upon which they can choose to donate blood and not hide the fact. If, as you suggest, when local elders learn of this donation they invite the individual to a judicial hearing, they have no need to cite the Roche letter. All they need to do is cite Watchtower doctrine that Witnesses can choose to accept all fractions of all components of blood, and it is on this basis that they chose to donate all fractions of all components of blood. They can take it further and invite those elders to phone Bethel before making a stupid mistake that will be overturned on appeal. It would be overturned on appeal because Watchtower does not need to read the Cliff Roche letter to know is its own doctrinal position.
Marvin Shilmer
The JWs are social parasites who suck up all the help from society they can get, but contribute almost nothing for the common good back to their neighbors.
Blondie,
You write:
I clipped off the beginning of my quotes to say that this information is what "good" jws would have access to and a letter from behind the scenes would most likely not be available to them (perhaps to the elders). As my earliest quote from 2005 shows, the concept of it not being "right" for a jw to donate blood still prevails in material available to the rank and file.
Thanks for sharing that.
I agree with all you write above insofar as Watchtower’s has expressly stated its position on blood donation. But this is one reason for my blog article under discussion. That is, my article is to encourage Witnesses to take a closer look at what Watchtower has said about blood in order to extract an important detail of the doctrinal position on donation blood that it has neither articulated nor condemned in its widely published statements.
Watchtower has said that Witnesses can accept all fractions of all components of blood. This is the basis for choosing to donate all fractions of all components of blood; not the Cliff Roche letter.
The Cliff Roche letter is confirmation of Watchtower’s position on donating blood for purposes of transfusing its fractions; it is not the basis for choosing to donate blood for the usage. The basis for that choice is Watchtower’s stated position on accepting transfusion of fractions, which is widely available to all Witnesses.
Marvin Shilmer
