To forgive is to pay
The issue of the offended as well as the offender belonging to the same high control religious group and both seeking their own justice and pardons from the same weighted tribunal has rightfully attracted the attention of the national and local medias.
Based on my experience and research, the Jehovah’s Witness's hierarchy takes a course designed to reinforce the façade, often not to the best interests of the principles or to the other group members.
The high control groups are a context owning content. That means the Jehovah's Witnesses are a society, like a small town or a small country. The complex composition of the aggregate is made up of various corporations and divisions called zones, districts, circuits, and congregations. The owners of the group see the members as citizens with (taxes) dues owed, and rights as well as privileges. The content is the writings, rites, rituals, traditions as well as the oral and written laws.
The members dispense with individual autonomy upon application for "approved for association" status and imply agreement with the group rules and authority by continued association. There is an illusion of safety and freedom.
A conflict often arises when one member harms another member and the matter is decided by a group managed court and is subject to the rules (the content) of the group leaders (the context). So it is with the case of an abuser of a child.
The abuser confesses to the court (called committee) and is sentenced. The sentence might be a short or long disfellowshipping (shunning), or maybe probation or parole on the condition of sustained, perceived, lawful behavior that may be subject to monitoring by an officer of the law (in Jehovah’s Witness's group the officer of the law is called *elder*).
Typically the charges, the proof as well as the confession are kept a secret from other group members, members who may have children who may be in harms way and who need and want to know of dangers to their children. All that the members may see is the punishment.
The irony of the system is that it often sees the victim of the abuse as a criminal (sinner) too. The court is involved and often the victim is required to forgive the abuser and return to maintaining the facade and paying due to the group leaders.
However, a debt is owed to the victim and the abuser can pay it or the victim can pay it. Either way, upon payment, the victim issues a certificate of satisfaction of payment and the debt is forgiven. Only the victim can do this. In a free society, the victim decides what is owed on a personal level. In a high control group like the Jehovah’s Witnesses, the religious corporation decides what is owed to the victim and the personal decision is removed. The victim is directed and submission is required.
The individual that is easy for the keepers of the law to control is the abuser. Often the victim is outraged and demands justice and not always religious justice. Sometimes the victims want secular justice.
For one member to seek secular justice from another member is to break protocol, and often the group court tries the breaker of protocol. When the victim is tried, found guilty, and sentenced, another assault has occurred.
Most of us were victims of circumstance to become involved with groups in the first place. Unfortunately these high control groups will continue to micromanage the lives of their subjects as long as people continue to willingly follow the rules and subject themselves to the directions of the group managers.
Maybe it’s time to just say *NO*.
May 29, 2002