No one was contemplating secret child abuse when they said you needed two witnesses to a sin.
No one needed to be contemplating such things when Torah was written. Remeber, God himself gave these instructions to Moses. And there was no mention from god of an age of consent. I guess it must have slipped his mind. Then there is the ole 'it was the culture back then' thing. Exactly. That is why we say god didn't have anything to do with these or other writings. If he was giving us regulations, let him start where he needs to, with how we treat children.
As to the two witnesses, and judicial hearings and so on...Well my father confessed, and got six months dfing. The elders must have felt that he reformed years of behaviour in that time. Then the court gave him 20? or so. But he was out in two. Again he must have reformed. He was after all a model prisoner. Since prisons are just full of kids, they had plenty of time to watch him and realize that he wasnt molesting those kids eh?
A friend of mine remembers in the seventies there being some hubub about some pictures at an art gallery, child pornography. Apparently it was not made illegal until shortly after then. Though I don't know the facts. If it is true, well the watchtower society, is like the rest as far as I am concerned. It is time we evolved.
Repressed memories are a touchy subject. Some psychologists and other professionals accept them, others do not. If you were talking about two seperate people remembering the same fella molesting them, in the same pattern, say from far flung congregations, I think that would do well to verify. On the other hand people have had false memories implanted as part of research studies. We know that memories can be implanted, we as yet have no verifiable research into whether repressed memories are real.
But all in all who cares? The society uses this ploy in those articles to beg the question. We are not talking about them hiding molestors of people who have repressed memories surfacing. We are talking about brother and sister So and so, whose son, little johnny, comes to them and says that brother whatshisname has been touching him. They get details, maybe even from janie his sister, who says the same thing. Go to the elders, are told there is not enough evidence. If they report to the police they will be disfellowshipped for spreading malicious gossip. Why is it that only in regards to child molestation can people get dfed for gossip?
Are there cases of people who have real or imagined repressed memories surfacing and reporting them to the elders? Sure. But by and large they are the smallest number of cases. Most are things that are right now happening.
The same goes with rape cases.
We will deal with repressed memories later GB. For now stop the current molestors.