Posts by defender of truth

9

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't: Religious Shunning and the free exercise clause

by defender of truth in

the following link is to a pdf file found on the penn law legal scholarship repository website.. " the penn law legal scholarship repository is the institutional repository of the university of pennsylvania law school.

its purpose is to collect and preserve the scholarly output of penn law.

http://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/.

defender of truth

Giordano an hour ago
The issue of coercion was not brought up. Being shunned if you refuse to shun the person that was DA or DF. Especially close family members.

Firstly, have you read the whole paper?

That point was mentioned, even here in the few parts that I quoted in my second post:

"Members of the Jehovah's Witness community are prohibited-under threat of their own disfellowship-from having any contact with disfellowshipped persons and may not even greet them." Paul v. Watchtower Bible & Tract Soc'y of N.Y., Inc., 819 F.2d 875, 876
see also J. BERGMAN, JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES AND KINDRED GROUPS at xxiii "(1984) (discussing how dissenting Witnesses, who in 1938 voluntarily left the Society because of doctrinal differences, were "treated with indignation and animosity by their former brothers").
Family members are required to shun other family members who are disfellowshipped.

When families are involved however, or economic interests are at stake, a blanket refusal to recognize a cause of action for the former member goes too far the other way.
The former member is effectively foreclosed from changing her beliefs or taking issue with church authorities...
[because she is at risk of losing her family]
The second difficulty in applying the Sherbert rationale to shunning cases, is that free exercise issues will almost always apply to both parties.
For example, imagine that a woman has been a member of a religious group for ten years. During that time, she has married, had children, and built a business that depends largely on trade with members of the group. The woman becomes embroiled in a doctrinal dispute with the group, and the group expels her. According to the group's beliefs, all persons expelled must be shunned. Therefore, even though the woman's husband has great love for his wife, the group elders order him, on pain of expulsion, to cease all physical and emotional contact with her. The children are also instructed to shun their mother, and individual members of the group stop doing business with her. The marriage ends in divorce and the woman sues the group and the elders for alienation of her spouse's affection.

As for 'not bringing up coercion', you have to read it carefully.

This is all written from a legal perspective, remember, not an article about cult control.

I was amazed by how much work went into this...

Here are a few quotes, again taken from my above post, which is only a sample of a 32 page document.

First, assuming that smaller religious sects are comprised mainly of converts from other, more "mainstream" sects, the threat of sanctions may persuade converts to remain faithful to their new sect after the first blush of inspiration wears off.

This appears to have been the case with the Jehovah's Witnesses, who adopted the practice of "disfellowshipping" sometime during the middle part of this century-in apparent response to the group's rapid growth.

The Mennonites and the Jehovah's Witnesses comprise relatively small, but cohesive, segments of their surrounding populations.
The experiences of Robert Bear illustrate the strength of pressures to conform in the Mennonite church:

"I should have known how submissive the church had [my wife] to do its bidding out of fear of losing 'unity' with the one 'pure' body, for her to turn so completely against a husband she had lived with for thirteen years." R. BEAR, supra note 5, at 38.

121

No more printing of WT and Awake in my country.. Shit just got real

by cognitivedizzy in

jw
friends

guys .

a letter was just read in out kh stating that all printing of wt and awake is ceased for the coming year and we will just place tracts on fs, countries which were cared by our branch will be cared by other countries...along with this they read the new fs form and stuff about reporting links of videos wtf..lol.

i can't tell which country perhaps that will give away a lot, any one with a similar information.

defender of truth

I have two things I am wondering here..

1) Is the organisation going to send some of that estimated 1 billion dollars from the Brooklyn HQ sale, in order to allow their brothers in India to keep distributing the magazines?

Especially after they requested that some Witnesses in the USA move back to India, to preach there?

“Everyone in the world will be taking a look at them,” said Tucker Reed, the president of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, a local development corporation. “The barrier to entry for a lot of those folks will be how high land values have gone. I’m sure they will fetch a very high sales price.”
Mr. Reed estimated the value of the three properties being marketed as “somewhere between $850 million to $1 billion.”

www.nytimes.com/2016/01/31/realestate/jehovahs-witnesses-brooklyn-headquarters-for-sale.html?referer=&_r=0

Indian elders, ministerial servants and regular pioneers are to be particularly encouraged “to consider whether their circumstances may allow them to return to India to assist with the preaching work.”

http://jwsurvey.org/cedars-blog/watchtower-urges-us-elders-to-ask-indian-nationals-to-consider-returning-to-india

2) When are they going to update the page on their website?

They should not be lying to the public. Once the website's statement is updated, we would have further evidence that this is true.

Tours
Monday to Friday8:00 a.m., 10:00 a.m., 1:00 p.m., and 3:00 p.m.
Duration 1.5 hours
Highlights
Translates Bible literature into 18 Indic languages.
Prints publications in 24 Indic languages.
Ships literature within India and to nine other countries.

www.jw.org/en/jehovahs-witnesses/offices/india/

p.s. After writing that first question, I watched the India branch report from last year:

http://tv.jw.org/#en/video/VODOurOrganization/pub-jwbrd_201510_4_VIDEO

He stated that they can't receive funds from other countries, so they have to rely on local funding.

Apparently, Jehovah was blessing the hard work of the Bethel brothers in 2015. (It was mentioned at the end that 377 brothers make up the 'Bethel family.)

So unless he has removed his blessing, it should all turn out just fine(!)

69

Could the Independent Inquiry in England and Wales expose jw.org's child abuse failures? And how can we help?

by defender of truth in

with all the talk about the org's policies and failures regarding child sexual abuse being publically exposed in australia, i thought that it may be a good time to highlight this... i apologise if this has already been discussed, but on the 9th of july the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in england and wales was opened.

here is some information regarding it's aims.. "about the inquiry.

the inquiry offers an unprecedented opportunity to examine the extent to which institutions and organisations in england and wales have taken seriously their responsibility to protect children.. the inquiry will investigate a wide range of institutions including:.

defender of truth

Just wanted to add these:

www.aoadvocates.com/news/2016/2/16/kathleen-hallisey-featured-on-bbc-4-sunday-segment-on-jehovahs-witnesses

www.jwvictims.org/2016/03/11/the-bbc-thinks-jehovahs-witnesses-have-some-explaining-to-do-when-it-comes-to-destroying-documents-relating-to-child-molestation/

9

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't: Religious Shunning and the free exercise clause

by defender of truth in

the following link is to a pdf file found on the penn law legal scholarship repository website.. " the penn law legal scholarship repository is the institutional repository of the university of pennsylvania law school.

its purpose is to collect and preserve the scholarly output of penn law.

http://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/.

defender of truth

Well, I found it to be a fascinating read...

I've never read anything like it before.

OK, assuming that people don't have time to read the whole thing, here are a few highlights:

Jehovah's Witnesses shun members after a process called "disfellowshipping."
"Members of the Jehovah's Witness community are prohibited-under threat of their own disfellowship-from having any contact with disfellowshipped persons and may not even greet them." Paul v. Watchtower Bible & Tract Soc'y of N.Y., Inc., 819 F.2d 875, 876 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 108 S. Ct. 289 (1987); see also J. BERGMAN, JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES AND KINDRED GROUPS at xxiii "(1984) (discussing how dissenting Witnesses, who in 1938 voluntarily left the Society because of doctrinal differences, were "treated with indignation and animosity by their former brothers"). Family members are required to shun other family members who are disfellowshipped.

By definition, shunning seeks to quell dissent and subject individuals to the will of the group. This Comment questions whether the Constitution should elevate the rights of religious groups above the rights of individual members of religious groups. It concludes that absolute constitutional protection for shunning is inappropriate.

The second difficulty in applying the Sherbert rationale to shunning cases, is that free exercise issues will almost always apply to both parties. For example, imagine that a woman has been a member of a religious group for ten years. During that time, she has married, had children, and built a business that depends largely on trade with members of the group. The woman becomes embroiled in a doctrinal dispute with the group, and the group expels her. According to the group's beliefs, all persons expelled must be shunned. Therefore, even though the woman's husband has great love for his wife, the group elders order him, on pain of expulsion, to cease all physical and emotional contact with her. The children are also instructed to shun their mother, and individual members of the group stop doing business with her. The marriage ends in divorce and the woman sues the group and the elders for alienation of her spouse's affection. The group, however, responds with a free exercise defense: by shunning the plaintiff, it was merely practicing what it believed.
If the court allows the woman's suit to proceed and requires the group to pay tort damages to the wife, it burdens the group's free exercise of religion. On the other hand, the woman may claim that she was exercising her own religious beliefs by disputing the group's religious principles."

One possible objection to the conclusion that the group and the individual have equivalent free exercise concerns is that the religious group can show state action, but the individual cannot. The religious group could argue that its religious belief, which required shunning, would be burdened by state action

"' The message sent by the court would be that once the woman joins a group that practices shunning, she is effectively foreclosed from altering her beliefs. The impact of this result is magnified by the fact that a religious group may change its doctrine at any time before, during, or after a member leaves, and may retroactively impose punishment. This was precisely the situation in Paul v. Watchtower Bible and Tract Soc'y of N.Y., Inc., 819 F.2d 875, 876 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 108 S. Ct. 289 (1987), in which Paul voluntarily withdrew from the Jehovah's Witnesses in 1975, only to have the governing body of the church amend its rules in 1981 to provide for the shunning of persons who had left voluntarily. See id. at 877. Paul subsequently was shunned and brought a legal action against her former church for the harm she had suffered.

As applied to the Paul case, this result is unsettling. Paul joined and left the church while one set of rules was in effect; under Hull, when the church later changed the rules to her detriment, she had no legal recourse.

Likewise, a church's treatment of former members should be limited to the conditions in force when the former members belonged to the church. This approach would not inhibit the free development of religious doctrine because the church would remain free to alter its doctrine at any time without altering its rights with respect to existing members; church members would be free to resign in the event that their church changed its doctrine without warning. It would also avoid the result in Paul, which permitted the majority to exercise control over its members past and present.

If the court is a state actor when it upholds the church member's tort claim, then it is a state actor when it upholds the religious group's free exercise defense.4
Another likely response to the woman's complaint is that she assumed the risk of shunning when she joined the group. The case law, however, does not uniformly bear out this contract-type model in practice.4 In fact, churches are free to change their doctrine at will, and church members cannot complain to the courts.

For some reason, this fact has never been recognized by courts or asserted by litigants in shunning disputes. If a court is willing to recognize the free exercise defense asserted by religious groups that practice shunning, then it should also recognize that a member who left the group may be protected by the free exercise clause. Although court recognition of the plaintiff's claim would place some burden upon the group's shunning behavior, recognition of the group's defense will burden the decision of a member to leave, at least from groups that sanction "shunning" of former members. The free exercise clause should not protect the group more than it protects the individual members of the group.

The Purposes of Shunning
The unity of any group that adheres to a given body of religious ideas is dependent to some extent upon its members' fear of being forced to live apart from the group." Generally, the more a religious group is considered to be in the minority, the greater its need for strong sanctions against deviations from the faith.55 There are a number of common sense explanations for this phenomenon. First, assuming that smaller religious sects are comprised mainly of converts from other, more "mainstream" sects, the threat of sanctions may persuade converts to remain faithful to their new sect after the first blush of inspirationwears off.

This appears to have been the case with the Jehovah's Witnesses, who adopted the practice of "disfellowshipping" sometime during the middle part of this century-in apparent response to the group's rapid growth.

Strong pressures toward uniformity exerted by groups tend to depend on the following characteristics: (1) little discrepancy of opinion within the group;
(2) greater degree of relevance of the disputed opinion to the functioning of the group;
(3) high group cohesiveness based upon close interpersonal relationships;
(4) exhibition of certain personality characteristics by members of the group, including authoritarian personalities, low self-esteem, self-blaming, a high need for affiliation, low intelligence, anxiety, and low tolerance for ambiguity; and
(5) cultural factors that seem to exist in societies that have birth and death rates that are both either high or low.).
1 See id. at 329 (discussing how deviants from one group will seek more compatible alternative groups).
The Mennonites and the Jehovah's Witnesses comprise relatively small, but cohesive, segments of their surrounding populations. The experiences of Robert Bear illustrate the strength of pressures to conform in the Mennonite church:
"I should have known how submissive the church had [my wife] to do its bidding out of fear of losing 'unity' with the one 'pure' body, for her to turn so completely against a husband she had lived with for thirteen years." R. BEAR, supra note 5, at 38.
" See M. PENTON, APOCALYPSE DELAYED: THE STORY OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES

1. Harm to Family Relationships
Shunning severs all contact between members of the group and the outcast.
1 The effect of shunning often depends upon the shunned person's relationship with the group. To the member who is a relatively recent convert having minimal economic ties to the group, shunning may mean only the loss of a few close friends.
2 Conversely, for the member who was born into the sect or has an extensive social or economic commitment to the group, shunning can cause much greater harm.

The acts of which Paul complained included one occasion when a close childhood friend told Paul, "I can't speak to you. You are disfellowshipped." Id. at 887. On another occasion, Paul attended a Tupperware party at the home of a Witness only to be informed that the church elders had instructed the congregation not to speak to her.

When Paul voluntarily left the Jehovah's Witnesses, there was no express sanction for withdrawing from the group; not until six years later did the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses rule that disassociated members were to be shunned.

The Paul court's holding that state common law torts always impose an unconstitutional burden upon religious exercise, was unwarranted.
In Paul, the Ninth Circuit fell prey to a distortion precisely opposite from the one that confronts courts dealing with an individual's free exercise claim in the statutory context.
20 The individual plaintiff who asserts her free exercise claim against a large bureaucracy capable of justifying almost any action in terms of sweeping governmental interests runs the risk of appearing to be a troublemaker.
12 In the shunning context, however, these roles are reversed; the disgruntled former member with dubious-sounding claims of intangible emotional harm confronts a unified church bureaucracy wielding the twin-edged sword of scriptural mandate and constitutional protection.
In reality, shunning cases almost always involve good-faith disputes over religious doctrine.
It is the difference of opinion on religious issues that compels the former member to leave the church or the church to excommunicate her.
22 Both parties to the dispute invariably act according to the dictates of their respective views of religion.
If a court recognizes a cause of action for the former member, it burdens the free exercise of the group's faith.
When families are involved however, or economic interests are at stake, a blanket refusal to recognize a cause of action for the former member goes too far the other way.
The former member is effectively foreclosed from changing her beliefs or taking issue with church authorities, while, under Paul, the church is free to fashion a suitable "sanction" retroactively

and Paul, (both the church and the individual changed their positions on issues of conscience, but only the church's free exercise rights were protected).

See, e.g., Paul, 819 F.2d at 876 (plaintiff withdrew from church because she disputed the disfellowshipping of her parents and was prohibited from discussing this feeling with other members)

CONCLUSION

This Comment has adopted an approach to religious shunning that has never been used in a court of law.
The approach advocated by this Comment, however, is very simple: when religious groups shun their members, more is at stake than the religious freedom of the group.
Each member of the group has free exercise rights at least as compelling as the group that shuns them.
The test of Sherbert v. Verner' 75 should be applied with this guiding principle in mind.
When courts ignore the free exercise rights of individuals and look only at the religious claims of groups, they elevate the group's religion over the individual's religion.
This is a dangerous path to follow. It gives religious groups virtually unfettered coercive power over their members and former members and blocks dissent and doctrinal development.

9

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't: Religious Shunning and the free exercise clause

by defender of truth in

the following link is to a pdf file found on the penn law legal scholarship repository website.. " the penn law legal scholarship repository is the institutional repository of the university of pennsylvania law school.

its purpose is to collect and preserve the scholarly output of penn law.

http://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/.

defender of truth

The following link is to a PDF file found on the Penn Law Legal Scholarship Repository website.

" The Penn Law Legal Scholarship Repository is the institutional repository of the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Its purpose is to collect and preserve the scholarly output of Penn Law. "

http://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/

Please share any thoughts you have on the reasoning used in this document.

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't: Religious Shunning and the free exercise clause

If you don't trust my link, which would be fair enough, simply Google the following search term as I write it:

'religious shunning tax exempt'

It should be the very first page that comes up.

12

TheAtlantic.com - Disowning a Daughter Over a Church

by defender of truth in

a reader from south carolina has a heartbreaking story:" i am 31 years old.

i was raised in a strict bi-cultural (af-american and nigerian) jehovah’s witness family, one of six children.

though it’s generally looked down upon for jws to attend liberal arts universities (vocational schools are recommended), i somehow convinced my parents to allow me to go to university and major in theater (!!

defender of truth

This article summarizes most of the points that can be reasonably made on the subject:

www.miskeptics.org/2013/05/shunning-how-jehovahs-witnesses-discipline-their-own/

@Menrov

I'm going to post this as a seperate topic I think, but just so you don't miss it, what do you think of this document?

Damned If You Do, Damned If You Don't: Religious Shunning and the free exercise clause

69

Could the Independent Inquiry in England and Wales expose jw.org's child abuse failures? And how can we help?

by defender of truth in

with all the talk about the org's policies and failures regarding child sexual abuse being publically exposed in australia, i thought that it may be a good time to highlight this... i apologise if this has already been discussed, but on the 9th of july the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse in england and wales was opened.

here is some information regarding it's aims.. "about the inquiry.

the inquiry offers an unprecedented opportunity to examine the extent to which institutions and organisations in england and wales have taken seriously their responsibility to protect children.. the inquiry will investigate a wide range of institutions including:.

defender of truth

This article is well worth reading, especially when you consider how this applies to many religions, Jehovah's Witnesses included:

www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/15/damning-report-reveals-church-of-england-failure-to-act-on-abuse

And this is the story of the survivor:

www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/15/i-told-so-many-bishops-survivor-tells-of-system-that-protected-priest

12

TheAtlantic.com - Disowning a Daughter Over a Church

by defender of truth in

a reader from south carolina has a heartbreaking story:" i am 31 years old.

i was raised in a strict bi-cultural (af-american and nigerian) jehovah’s witness family, one of six children.

though it’s generally looked down upon for jws to attend liberal arts universities (vocational schools are recommended), i somehow convinced my parents to allow me to go to university and major in theater (!!

defender of truth

In between the responses, the page states:
" To join the dialogue, drop us an email. "
[ the address is: [email protected] ]

12

TheAtlantic.com - Disowning a Daughter Over a Church

by defender of truth in

a reader from south carolina has a heartbreaking story:" i am 31 years old.

i was raised in a strict bi-cultural (af-american and nigerian) jehovah’s witness family, one of six children.

though it’s generally looked down upon for jws to attend liberal arts universities (vocational schools are recommended), i somehow convinced my parents to allow me to go to university and major in theater (!!

defender of truth

A reader from South Carolina has a heartbreaking story:
" I am 31 years old. I was raised in a strict bi-cultural (Af-American and Nigerian) Jehovah’s Witness family, one of six children. Though it’s generally looked down upon for JWs to attend liberal arts universities (vocational schools are recommended), I somehow convinced my parents to allow me to go to university and major in theater (!!).
I was always really devout, but I harbored doubts about the teachings since I was a child. I finally came clean to my family about it at the end of my first year of college when I was 19 years old and told them that I no longer wanted to be a JW.
After heart to hearts with each family member, all five of my siblings and my parents stopped talking to me. I was followed around town by members of the church. My family withdrew financial support.
Though I had plenty exposure to shunning and excommunication, I was naive enough to believe that my family would never do that. I thought if I was honest they would respect my decision and embrace me. Nope. I can’t even begin to describe the depression and loneliness that ensued.
Recovery has been a long process. I’ve been very proactive and I guess I’m fairly resilient. I ended up transferring schools a year after the shunning. I left my hometown in South Carolina and finished my degree at Temple University. I am doing an MA in journalism next fall. I’ve done some research on religious shunning and have interviewed lots of folks from various religious backgrounds who have been shunned. I also co-facilitated a workshop last fall for people who have been shunned or have endured other forms of spiritual abuse. I’m working on an investigative piece about the practice.
Thanks for posing this question about religious choice. I think it’s an important part of making this conversation a part of a larger dialogue, something I think is a major part of my life’s work. "-----------
Update from a Jehovah’s Witness reader:
" I am a Witness, been one for over 30 years. As Witnesses we don’t look down on education, although in light of the last days we are living in, one is wise to focus on what is priority. Ultimately it is one’s decision and is respected.
Also, if this daughter was baptized and then chose not to continue, she is not ostracized. But I would prefer to socialize more with those who serve God. Now if she were practicing wicked and immoral behaviors condemned as willful sin and was disfellowship, then this is from scripture: 1st Corinth 5:9-13. It is a loving provision from God for the person to recapacitate as well, as to keep the congregation clean. It’s not from the church as in a doctrine opted; it is from God’s own word, the ultimate authority. "
www.theatlantic.com/notes/all/2016/03/choosing-your-religion/475164/#note-475824

60

I would rather be in the JW cult than the ex-jw cult

by questioningmyfaith in

jw
friends

i have posted one other time on this website.

just for the mere fact that i wasn't anger and bitter and ready to declare the gb the sociopathic criminals that so many here ascribe to, my initial question digressed to bickering over ad hominem attacks against the gb and not my beliefs that i'm questioning.

some did give me some help on my questions.

defender of truth

@Questioning my faith:

You do realise that the topic you were referring, where I was one of the ones that was quite rude to you, and I apologise for all that (going through hell at the time, I should not have been posting)... all of that was 7 months ago!

Bloomin' heck.

I thought you were just going to move on from your JW past?..

I have only just popped back in to see if anything caught my eye, after months of relative happiness and relaxation.. and I find someone still harping on about some topic that everyone else has moved on from, forgotten about completely in my case.

You seem to be wasting both your own time, and other people's time.

If you are now living a happy life with no issues, great. Good for you.

Genuinely, that is what we all want, people to leave this cult and just move on.

But why post to tell us that you are not going to post any longer?

If you need support and someone to talk to about all of that pain and anger you are feeling, or maybe you are just lonely and need someone to chat to, this site will welcome you and offer you countless friends if that is what you need.

Here's a hint: If you are still quoting from a conversation that happened 7 months ago...

If you feel the need to announce to a group of people you have only spoken to one time 7 months ago (it'd be impressive if they even remembered yoi really) that you are not going to be talking to them anymore, and you don't want to be a part of their 'group'... there is definitely an issue there. ;) )

Maybe find a meet-up near you?

Not everyone on here is a rabid lunatic with no social skills, like I have been in the past. People change, anyway.

There are loads of normal people having fairly normal conversations about their experiences or how their lives are going.

If you ever need someone to talk to about the pain you are going through, feel free to pop back in sometime.

Or maybe just come back to tell us you are not going to post again. ;) ( I'm only kidding, you know.. You have to laugh or you'd go mad. )

Have a great life. :)

"I am going to use the extra time I have from not being a witness learning a language or maybe even just watching tv."

Sounds like a pretty sweet plan to me. Given a choice between reading anything with the word Watchtower on it and watching Star Trek...

Captain Kirk wins every time. ;)