by biblexaminer 4 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
Dear Brother elder, if my neighbor was molesting a child and I saw it, should I tell the police?
Br. Elder: YES, absolutely.
Dear Brother elder, if a brother in the congregation was molesting a child, should I go to the police?
Br. Elder: Well.... that would be a matter for the elders. You see, you should trust in Jehovah and his perfect Organization
Dear Brother elder, why the different rules? Why can I turn in a Catholic, but hide a pedophile if he’s a Jehovah’s Witness
bro elder:
are you questioning the authority of god's visible organization?
Where does the Bible offer "Scriptural support" for a double standard?
We all know how it works, don't we?
The same reason we are told to behave well at conventions and during the hotel stay. We wouldn't want to "bring reproach on Jehovah's name"...
Translation: We don't want the world to see us for the whitewash we are.
bro elder:
i will arrange a committe meeting for you.
would tonight before the meeting be to soon?
This is so true!
I remember an incident where a little girl did some things to my little girl when she spent the night.
Later my daughter told me about it. The things that she did could only have been learned by someone doing them to her.
I went to the elders like a good little dub. The elders called the father of the little girl.
Later, when pressed by me to see how it had been handled I was told, "Bro X said his daughter learned it from watching videos on MTV."
So I said, "Well, videos do show a lot, but I've never seen a porn music video. This is obviously a lie. Which leads me to believe this little girl is being molested."
The elder told me that he had just been to the theocratic ministry school and that I was "never ever ever to say the word 'molest' with regard to ANY brother."
I don't know if she was being molested. I don't know if it was her dad, her mom, her grandfather. I didn't know squat. But I can vouch for the reluctance of the elders to even get involved. They didn't even want to press on a teeny tinsy bit.
Yet I also remember when I was married to my first husband who was Catholic. I remember all the "advice" I was given on how to handle things with him. I was urged to "press" on and find out things by many well meaning 'brothers' and 'sisters'.
I think this is a good question to ask a dub. Any dub. What would be their advice if they knew joe-blow across the street was molesting his child? And why don't they follow that same advice when it was joe-elder?
Thanks for this post. It's another good one!
Edited to add that my ex wasn't molesting my little girl. I was urged to press on regarding other criminal activities like having possession of drugs in the house with the kids, etc. But my point was to illustrate how the same elders who wanted me to drop the possible hurt against a child by a JW were also the ones who wanted me to press on and get to the bottom of the possible hurt by a Catholic.
