Governing Body member Stephen Lett has slammed criticism of the organization’s child abuse record as “apostate-driven lies and dishonesties” in a video released on Watchtower’s new “JW Broadcasting” website.
Lett, who recently raised eyebrows by saying there is more evidence that Jesus’ kingdom began ruling in 1914 than there is for “gravity, electricity, wind,” insisted that “Jehovah’s organization” takes action against those who would threaten its young ones, whom he says it protects.
The comments came in the final part of a 10-minute Orwellian speech in which Lett reminded bethelites to pursue “oneness” even if it meant foregoing personal rights, such as one’s right to decide on one’s own dress and grooming.
A video of Lett’s comments on child abuse can be seen below. To watch the full 10-minute talk, please click here.
In case you didn’t catch it (or couldn’t bear to watch the video) this is what Lett said…
“Another way we can contribute to the oneness: rejecting false stories that are designed to separate us from Jehovah’s organization. As an example, think about the apostate-driven lies and dishonesties that Jehovah’s organization is permissive toward pedophiles. I mean, that is ridiculous, isn’t it! If anybody takes action against someone who would threaten our young ones, and takes action to protect our young ones, it is Jehovah’s organization. We reject outright such lies.”
Aside from the fact that the above words represent a flagrant, bare-faced lie as respects the organization protecting children from pedophiles, it is noteworthy that Lett begins his rant with a straw man argument.
“Apostates” do not necessarily say that Watchtower (“Jehovah’s organization”) is permissive toward pedophiles. Though technically speaking Watchtower’s policies are permissive to some extent, saying the organization is permissive toward pedophiles implies that the organization endorses those who engage in pedophilia and/or doesn’t object to child molestation in its printed material.
Activists like myself have never denied that Watchtower publications strenuously condemn child molestation and those who engage in it. What we are horrified about is the fact that, despite outwardly condemning pedophilia, Watchtower effectively shelters pedophiles by allowing allegations against them to go unreported to the authorities if there is no witness to their heinous crimes.
Rather than this being an “apostate-driven lie” this is a sad truth, as borne out by (1) Watchtower’s own instructions to elders (which urge them to “leave matters in Jehovah’s hands” if an accused pedophile denies the accusation – see below) and (2) the numerous legal battles Watchtower finds itself embroiled in due to this very policy.
And as I point out in my video rebuttal to Lett’s remarks, investigative journalists like Trey Bundy (who has blown wide open the story of Watchtower’s mishandling of child abuse in recent weeks) are not “apostates” at all, and would not be foolish enough to put their careers on the line by reporting stories that cannot be substantiated.
What we have in this frantic rant is a seemingly desperate attempt at stemming the flow of bad publicity by flat-out lying about Watchtower’s involvement in protecting pedophiles. The fact that “Jehovah’s organization” would rather default on a $13.5 million judgment than release its pedophile database in response to a subpoena, as Trey revealed in a Huffington Post interview, says everything about their priorities. Secrecy comes first, safety of children – a poor second.
It will be interesting to see whether floundering tirades and flat-out denials by Governing Body members regarding child abuse become more of a feature of Watchtower propaganda over the coming months as the media begins to really turn the screws.
After all, when you make yourself so visible to your adoring followers, only for your dirty secrets to be exposed on the evening news, sooner or later they will expect answers.
Further reading…
- Is the media finally grasping just how bad Watchtower’s child abuse problem is?
- PBS airs trey Bundy’s must-see documentary on child sex abuse among Jehovah’s Witnesses
- Stephen Lett: More evidence for 1914 than for “gravity, electricity, wind!”
- AAWA.co article “Watchtower Caught in a Lie”
- Jehovah’s Witness Report article
- JWsurvey articles on child abuse
Related video…
The fact that they addressed the “pedophile issue” is a great sign, b/c they felt “under attack”, the absolute need to address it – since public media has made the truth widespread. The “apostates” who are revealing truth are no match for such shameful allegations, their paid legal “professionals” cannot absolve. So it is a very positive sign, i.e., the obvious – “grasping at straws” methodolgy. Of course, we should be angry at their denials – but at the same time, they are desperate to defend their criminals – since the legal team failed in doing so.
He reminds me of an nasty little snake-oil salesman. There is something about him that comes across to me as terribly insincere.
That is precisely my thoughts when I see this guy.
Honestly I’ve always enjoyed Lett’s dimeanor, a sort of old-school overtone like the 1950’s, atomic age. Its easy to picture him explaining what to do during a nuclear attack.
Unfortunately they are not fully aware of the things transpiring in their congregations. There is SO much transpiring like this, often not spoken of, sometimes not believed.
Its in stark contrast to how Peter dealt with liars–the spirit did not allow anyone to hide. They don’t have access to this spirit, and attempting to change truth, they really are left to reap what they sew. If only they fully comprehended their roots and what the mess they are caught up in.
It would be nice to show Lett’s video in a court hearing.
The video shows how arrogant he is. Insulting people because have a different idea. They demand respect from no JWs and he refers to people as apostates. What a cultish mentality.
Lying to the witnesses who are so honestly naive and being deceived, are going to never believe anything that I have to say about Stephen Lett or the Elders book. I know so many people who would never dare to figure it out for themselves. They just take him at his word. It’s so hard to break down the wall to get someone to take you seriously or believe you when you say Stephen Lett is lying. Especially about pedophilia, the only way is if someone makes the records public. Who knows if they would even believe it then. Probably not.
Sexual abuse is most common in closed communities.
e,g., care homes, religions, schools, etc. When its discovered
the main concern is always the “Reputation” of the particular
Org, not the victim.
The W,T. claiming God,s exclusive direction, should be different,
but it is not. Excuses such as, evil men have crept into the
cong are used. But in many cases, the evil men are elders ,
who are said to be appointed by Holy Spirit . No less!
If God’s spirit is flawed at cong, level in the selection of elders
could this not also apply higher up the chain? Right up to the
gov, body.?
Lip service, a lack of positive help for victims, face saving
responses. Are not the actions of spiritual men. But purely
secular, worldly, fleshly.
Perfectly stated.
For some reason this burns me up inside. Making this blanket allegation that it’s “apostates” making up these lies. Is PBS an apostate? What is he even talking about? It’s so misleading, and sickening, when you know the loaded-ness of the “A” word makes any Witness reject whatever comes afterward without even daring to think about it. PBS! It was PBS!!!! Reportage!!
My GF was abused when she was a child by a JW in good standing…she did not tell me till some time after we started dating. I would not say the Watchtower is permissive in per-se but the policies do allow people like this go unnoticed, I mean they don’t tell people this bro or sis is a child molester cuz they believe in respecting a person’s privacy but I think that there must be a way to warn the friends when there is someone like this to just be wary of such person. It does piss me off though how they keep calling people liars…I am sure there has been a case or two where people were maybe pissed off and making stuff up but out of all the cases against the watchtower I’m sure at least 99.99% are true.
C M
Mud slinging word attacks at a desperate attempt to see if it sticks.
These are dilousiinal human beings following a cult.
Time is ticking and soon the pedophile bomb is going to fully explode and they will have no way of stopping it.
The time for their reaping what they sowed is upon then. More and more victims are coming forward and are not settling out of court with a gag order clause.
They are speaking out and are succeeding against them why? Because they are dead wrong.
“…investigative journalists like Trey Bundy (who has blown wide open the story of Watchtower’s mishandling of child abuse in recent weeks) are not “apostates” at all, and would not be foolish enough to put their careers on the line by reporting stories that cannot be substantiated.” This is such a great ‘reasoning point’, Cedars! And-it will be used!!! I so was knocked out by the Reveal piece I wrote a grateful note to Trey thanking him for giving us a legit well-researched article for us to show JW friends and family when explaining why we are not promoting the Watchtower side by side with them. I got an answer promising that there will be more to come. Good news.
That’s great news, that there is more to come.
This is just weird. I shouldn’t think that flat-out weirdness is beyond the WTS, but this remarkably weird.
It’s been almost 13 years since the Dateline NBC report. The WTS hasn’t addressed it with their followers once that entire time. Now that the domino-falling’s in first gear, all they have to tell their flock is that “apostates” (like PBS?) are fueling rumors that they’re “permissive to pedophiles.” That’s the extent of their statement. Thirty seconds later, Letts changes the subject.
Even if the allegations were untrue, any organization in this position would strive to be proactive about presenting as comprehensive a response to this situation as possible. It’s not just that people are calling them “permissive to pedophiles.” It’s (a) that child molestation is happening amongst Jehovah’s Witnesses; (b) the Watchtower’s policies for dealing with it have been developed within their own echo chamber with no concern to the legal process because it’s “worldly”; (c) their policies focus on the rehabilitation of the predator rather than the support of the victim; (d) they might have a SharePoint document with a list of known pedophiles in their ranks; (e) they claim they have “the truth” yet are too wobbly about it to proclaim it to judges asking for it; and (f) the “2-witness” rule is a joke, predicated on the remarkably idiotic notion that a Jehovah’s Witness pedophile is just going to be totally honest if the elders ask him if he’s a pedophile.
They need to address this issue, publicly, from the root cause on up, apologize profusely for the rest of their existence, do exactly what their celestial figurehead would do and express utter humility and sorrow about what they’ve done to exacerbate the problem and damage thousands of people who never asked for it, never understood it and never deserved it. The chances of such supplication happening with the Governing Body? Nil, zero. But what Letts did with this bizarre, hilariously ineffective move is crank up the volume on the questions that are coming his way — and they’re not all going to come from “apostates.”
Does anyone have the list of the cases lost by jw’s ? If possible some court transcript… I think that’s pretty much the only thing jw’s would consider as proof
I am so relieved and excited to see their downfall in my lifetime. As someone who had their childhood robbed and has suffered great damages at the hands of the JW through their extreme control over our lives, I always thought they would get away with their crimes forever. I thought I’d have to keep their dirty secrets forever in order to get on with my life. But now that there are so many people who have come out to tell the it stories, I feel free to tell my story. I will spend the rest of my life exposing this very dangerous cult. And the support I have received through different groups has lifted me higher than anything else. I finally feel free to pursue anything and everything with an open mind. I no longer have an identity crisis.
So, for the sake of “oneness” a JW is expected to forego their personal right (not “so called” as Stephen Lett says) to have the police investigate an allegation of child abuse?
Too bad the rank and file cannot ascertain for themselves whether or not these are “apostate-driven lies” because of their being prohibited to peruse information critical of the organization.
Telling Witnesses that said information is a lie + forbidding them to review the said information for themselves=weakened credibility and heightened suspicion.
This should raise the eyebrows of thinking Witnesses.
“The fact that they addressed the “pedophile issue” is a great sign ……”
You’re right, Janine. Retaliation and being defensive is often a sign of guilt. But then why would anyone give credence to someone who said that there is more evidence that Jesus’ kingdom began ruling in 1914 than there is for gravity, electricity, and wind? The guy is clearly deluded!
I can’t believe he actually explained what the number 1 means
“…there is more evidence that Jesus’ kingdom began ruling in 1914 than there is for gravity”
This from people who are not grounded.
Thanks again to make this public to all still are in bible study or think about to get baptist as a JW by this Watchtower Organisation.
Let people first pray to God and do their own research about this Watchtower organisation before stepping in!
@Ted. Your Line of Reasoning is EXCELLENT in your comment above about Holy Spirit!! A Stunning Logic which is a Million times better than what Stephen Letts Logic!! Mr ‘ILLOGICAL LETTS ‘ in the same 10 minute Moronic Lecture on TV.JW.ORG talking about ‘oneness of spirit’ says Corpses ??are Peaceable but not Peacemakers ???
Then in the same talk WAFFLES on about We should not view ourselves as below anyone else as it is SUBTERRANEAN ‘ !!! Ohh PLEASE carry on Talking Mr Letts & Mr MORRIS the Third & David Splane & Geoffrey Jackson & friends!! All INTELLIGENT JWs will see through this SCAM of a Pyramid Scheme!! If these men are appointed by Holy Spirit then I am the Queen of England!!!
When I served as an elder in California, we were regularly reminded that the state law only indicated we were not under obligation to report such matters as long as victims or predators came to us “seeking spiritual help”. So we were directed to regularly ask immediately when such information was brought to light, “are you coming to me for assistance in a spiritual sense?” With that out of the way, we could thus investigate and form committees if necessary, all the while keeping everything hidden from the congregation and authorities.
On one occasion our COBE forgot to ask the standard question when an accused non witness father phoned to complain about his witness wife, who was the one who accused him. Because the elder forgot to ask the all important question, we were instructed to report the matter, and then he was severely reprimanded over the phone by the legal dept.
May 2015 Awake top of page 3 states ‘CHILDREN are at an increased Risk of ABUSE at an early age if their Parents don’t educate them about sex a recent study in China shows!! I think it should be Reworded as ‘Children are at Risk of Abuse if the Watchtower & Elders hide the Identity of PEDOPHILES in their congregation & doesn’t warn the Parents. !!
Backed into a corner and desperate. The trickle of cases is becoming a flood. The image of JWs on national news is no longer happy faces of pretty girls and respectable earnest gents in smart cheap suits at sunny conventions.
It is of a monstrous, money grabbing, self serving bunch of control freaks, grasping at anything, including, as here, outright lies, in a vain attempt to re create (not preserve, for the old image has now been flushed down history’s toilet) the clean cut image of yesteryear.
Gandhi said, “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win”. He was referring to large bullies who are oppressing their seemingly week victims. The bullies feel that they are strong enough to ignore their victims at first but as they feel they must take action it becomes clear that they will eventually lose.
The first commenter, Janine Garcia, made a very astute observation; just by having the Watchtower Organization talk about these issues is a huge victory. Jehovah’s Witnesses did not want to even acknowledge that they have this problem much less do anything about it. But by ignoring the child molesters and allowing them to continue their evil ways, it has severely weakened the righteous image they were trying hard to project. This will become a complete “backfire” and they really should have looked after this huge and horrible problem a long time ago. Any short term gains that they made by sweeping things under the rug and denying that there is/was a pedophile problem will be overshadowed by the justly deserved bad publicity they will now receive. Also, the money they will lose from court cases will be a heavy burden for the JW’s to bear.
It’s funny, but I believe most ex-JW’s really wanted to simply see some good changes in this organization. Maybe that was the reason this site was started? A survey that could be presented to the Governing Body so that all of our voices could finally be heard. Probably it was like the first request Moses made to Pharaoh? Just to let the people go for three days. But when the simple requests wouldn’t even be heard, let alone granted, then the demands grew larger and more violent.
Personally, I know that even my elderly mother, who is a true believer, desires to see fresh, young Governing Body members who will make long hoped for changes.
Slowly a rebellion will grow and the old, “1950’s, Atomic Age” mentality will have to give way to a modern approach to running a religion.
“He reminds me of an nasty little snake-oil salesman. There is something about him that comes across to me as terribly insincere.”
Roger, the first thing I noticed as I was watching the video was that he kept licking his lips as though he’d just finished having lunch and was making sure that there were no remnants of it still stuck there. Now, it is possible that could be the case, but it could also mean that he is lying, according to this website:
http://readingbodylanguagenow.com/lickinglips/
I wonder if he would give up his ‘right’ to ware his pinky ring if some brothers and sisters objected saying that it is effeminate. Great post Lloyd. I hope you get a chance to coment on the ‘report fom Malawi’ on the JW Broadcasting. Remember the inconsistencies between Mexico and Malawi which resulted in rape torture homelessness and death
Everyone’s comments were great..thnks..
Its so upsetting to see how the Governing body is so cold toward the ones who have suffered.. for YEARS! And to hear Lett/Governing body call them apostates!! How wrong.. They are apostates against Jehovah and Jesus.(Jer.23:11-15; Matt ch 23)… but those who vioce out because of the elders and Gv bodies corruption are like Jesus who clearly made the corruption of the pharasies known.
Its obviously a power high they’re on.Riding on a high dark horse. It doesnt take a rocket scientists with powers to know this.
They may try real hard to do good at some things but as the bible says to men like them
” Your boasting is not good. Do you not know a little leaven ferments the whole batch Of dough?”- (1 Cor 5:6,8)
I am real glad to come on Jw survey it makes me see im not the only one as I used to cry and think …I just really cant wait to see what Jehovah does ..I do know he warns in Revelation of their sort of conduct..
True apologies..acknowledgement of the problems and crimes… and ways to fix the wrong are what God Would want and Require them to do which they refuse to do.
Like quite a few other people here, my initial response at such a lazy and feeble response from Lett was utter disgust and contempt. No details, no substantive rebuttal, no attempt to address the facts of the issue. Just lazy ad hominem and smear tactics. How dare they treat such an important issue so dismissively!
Then I realised that the fact the GB feel compelled to directly address this issue at all for their followers means that they are genuinely worried about how this whole thing is playing out, and must be getting increasingly awkward questions from the Rank and File. Otherwise they’d never even acknowledge that this issue exists.
In many ways, Lett’s feeble tirade should actually give us hope. The GB, I think, are really starting to sweat over this issue, and hopefully the R&F (many of whom I have seen first hand are genuinely ignorant of their organisations own policies on this matter and are genuinely horrified when they find out, even if they end up trying to somehow rationalise it) will keep asking awkward questions.
I think what makes people stay in this religion now is absolute fear of whats outside from the phobia inducing propaganda thats been pumped.
It took some time for me to come to terms with the reality of this cult as I had to let go of the fear & superstition attached to it. Everything was blamed on satan or apostates.
It probably took about 12 months maybe 2 years for my brain snap to eventually happen. It all started with the Candace Conti news on the original jw website before they quickly whisked it away when they updated the site but that little seed was planted which was enough for me to go searching. The rest lead me to here. So I do think that this particular story will open up a lot of peoples minds & it looks like its not going to go away in a hurry.
Hi Grace,
I only came across this two months ago, not being in the USA probably had something to do with it. Up until that point I was loyal to the Organization. Since then I have done a lot of research, not just from so called apostate sites. The emotional pain I feel is immense, and I would probably lose control of myself if I came face-to-face with a member of the GB. It is so reprehensible of them. Concerning the millions of JWs, they are all victims, but some of JWs (some Elders) like the power they have, and abuse it.
Any JW with an ounce of a brain would start to think after viewing this video, morals they have none, the lies are so sickening, and just like all liars they try to pass the blame on those that show up their lies.
Lett I thought was one GB member that may have had some sort of decency, I stand corrected after viewing his blatant lies.
More will come out and JW will have to face their crisis of conscience and make a choice.
There is so much to say about this little 40 second tirade, that it’s hard to know where to begin:
Like others have said here, the fact that he brought it up, says that it’s a really important issue and he is forced to talk about it to all of Jehovah’s Witnesses who have a computer. This means that it’s affecting the organization in a big way.
It must be because of the PBS show that was on television last week. The Governing Body is forced to confront it because they can’t pass it off as coming from “apostates” like they have always done in the past.
It must mean then, that they are getting a lot of phone calls from people wanting to know what it is all about and it is clearly upsetting the rank and file.
I believe that probably 99.9% of all Witnesses had no idea that there was a problem with child abuse world wide before this story broke on PBS but if they didn’t see it on television themselves are hearing about it now, either from friends and family or at the door and they are wanting answers.
So, this thing that Stephen Lett did was to let the rank and file know about a problem that almost 100% knew nothing about before. It has to be something that is really concerning for the Governing Body for them to bring it up at all and they had to take all that into consideration before making the comment like Stephen Lett did.
The Governing Body have to realize that before he made the statement that almost all JW’s knew nothing about what he was talking about but they will now and hopefully, they will want to know what in the world he is talking about and start googling it.
If they start googling it, they will have their eyes opened, like they never had their eyes opened before and one web site will lead to another web site and hopefully, the eyes of the rank and file will be opened to see that the Governing Body are nothing but a bunch of counterfeit Christians who are not only not worthy of any respect but actually standing in the way of the government’s trying to uncover child abuse within the organization; in other words, breaking the law and should be thrown in prison, one and all for the obstruction of justice.
When you watch Stephen Lett’s face during that little rant, he is squinting his eyes and it’s like there’s little balls of fire behind those eyeballs of his and then the way he purses up his lips, he is clearly trying to show his anger. But to whom is he showing anger too? Is it to the elders for not protecting the children? Is it to those who are calling up headquarters, demanding answers? Is it to the rank and file, trying to intimidate them into submission? Or is it anger, trying to cover up his lies, when he’s been found out? Is it anger because he really believes that the Society actually has policies in place to protect the children, so in his heart, he is either pretending to be ignorant of the abuse cases or is he really ignorant of the abuse cases and is now finally being told of them? It can’t be because he is ignorant of all the child abuse cases, can it? How could he be so out of touch with what is going on? Is he coming to grips that he has been misled or is he misleading on purpose, knowing full what he is doing?
Either this man has a conscience or he doesn’t have a conscience. If he actually has a conscience, then it behooves him to find out if all these allegations accusing the Organization of protecting of pedophiles is really true or not.
But no, he tries to fool the viewer by using a smoke screen by saying that “lying apostates” are accusing the Society of permitting pedophiles to abuse the children.
Either he didn’t see that piece on PBS or he is lying about it or he is believing what somebody else told him that piece on PBS was all about. It wasn’t about the Society’s “permitting” abuse but it was all about the covering up of abuse. If he doesn’t have a conscience, then he, along with all the rest of the Governing Body belong in jail for protecting the abusers rather than the abused.
This is the phone number for the FBI in New York: 212-384-1000. To keep those files from being exposed is a crime against all those abuse victims who did report the abuse to the elders and they were coerced into not reporting the crime to the police because they were told that it would bring reproach on Jehovah’s name. Those elders were told to tell the abuse victims that it would bring reproach on Jehovah from the Governing Body.
The German people who followed Hitler’s orders were held to account for their crimes anyway, even though they were only following orders.
The Society has never cared as much about the welfare of the children in it’s fold as it cares about it’s own reputation.
The Society must be getting a lot of phone calls from the rank and file, wanting to know what that story on PBS was all about.
The Governing Body has to know that almost 100% of the rank and file knew nothing about all those allegations of child abuse before the show aired but now are just first finding out about it. The look of desperation shows on Stephen Lett’s face in that little tirade of his and his little rant must have been carefully thought out to intimidate the rank and file to just take his word for it that it was from “lying apostates” and look no further into it.
What that little rant did though was to alert people to the accusations while before they knew nothing about it.
Thank goodness it was Trey Bundy and PBS who don’t have anything to do with ex-Witnesses,who are bringing the Governing Body to account, publicly.
How the Governing Body can pass off a story on PBS as coming from “apostates” is just a smoke screen and they can’t be that stupid to figure out that they are in deep dog do do now, but of course they are hoping that the rank and file are so stupid that they will all believe the lies coming out of their mouths and not question their integrity in what they say in defense of themselves. And they are probably right about most of the rank and file being just that naive’ and trusting.
So for a while, they will continue but hopefully, the tide will start turning soon and the house of cards that they have built upon lies will crumble and fall.
This is the number for the FBI in New york: 1-212-384-1000. I can’t see what would be wrong to call the FBI and ask them to look into the allegations against the Watchtower concerning their protecting of pedophiles in their organization from the show that we saw on PBS last week. It is a crime to intimidate victims into not reporting abuse to the authorities and that is what the Society has always done and will continue to do.
Just a point to go along with this excellent article. It comes from jw.org “How can we protect our children?” and says: “Tragically, adult society often unwittingly collaborates with child abusers. How so? By refusing to be aware of this danger, by fostering a hush-hush attitude about it, by believing oft-repeated myths. Ignorance, misinformation, and silence give safe haven to abusers, not their victims.” by their own definition they do not protect children.mSorry to repeat myself on something I’ve said in the past in other posts but I served as an elder in two different congregations with a total of six pedophiles in them. As an elder if you were to warn parents directly of the danger you would be stripped of your privileges and possibly exposed to judicial action. Did we monitor the pedophile’s activities? In a very limited way, it could only really be done at the meetings or in the field service when there was an elder present. There are many social events, private invitations and times in the ministry that elders simply cannot monitor. For example, in one hall the meeting for field service was conducted by sisters three days midweek. If a pedophile were to show up, no one would know of his problem. If he did follow the direction of the elders he wouldn’t conduct the meeting, make the car groups or offer the prayer because he is not permitted to have these privileges. That would mean that he could be assigned to a group with children and he would now have to speak up on his own accord to get out of the situation- fat chance! On the other hand, if he didn’t follow the directions of the elders, the sisters would look to him to conduct assign groups and offer the prayer. This would mean if he is having a moment of weakness he could offer to take a carful of children with him (we often had many homeschooled, school vacation children dropped off by parents midweek for “field service daycare”) to go door to door, get ice cream and ….. Scary stuff! How do the elders monitor every situation? They can’t! The children are left unprotected by silence and confidentiality on many,many occasions.
@MrFair .You indeed are So Accurate in your comment how pedophiles can so easily abuse children in the congregation because Elders are not trained to monitor & handle these PERVERTS!! You have shown good insight & Analysis of the stupidity of the way the Governing Body over the years has ATROCIOUSLY handled the issue of child abuse within the congregation!!
Stephen Lett has no morals or decency whatsoever, when he is willing to show his face on JW broadcasting promoting outright lies. How can he stand in front of the camera with a straight face and say that his organization loves and cares for the young ones, doing eveverything it can to protect the them. How about starting with your outdated policies that are in place not to protect the young ones, but to protect the pedephiles. If he and the organization really cared, they would abolish the two witness rule along with the procedures they have in place to divert others from speaking to the authorities when a crime is committed, especially when a child is sexually abused. The only oneness he’s trying to maintain is his own mentally deranged nonsense coming out of his mouth. But thank goodness for websites like this one they’re being exposed to their falsehood and devilish ajendas. I want to thank you Cedar’s for your timely information you continue to provide for all who are interested in keeping up with the tricks and falsehood of the governing body.
Of Governing Body and True Believers
True Believer JW’s will not even watch the PBS report, they saw it in 2000’s with NBC Dateline, and most labelled it “apostate lies”. One, there is this sense that if you’re JW, you live an upstanding life and are purged otherwise, so pedophiles would not be among this group and any accusations of such molestation or rape are rooted in vindictive, apostate strategies. Two, there is always that ‘this too shall pass’ mentality that this is just another missile from Devil and “God’s chosen people” will persevere through it and emerge on the other side. And, if history repeats, the group does emerge on the other side of murky accusations as memories fade and new persons “wanting something to believe in” flock to the group and hear a slightly different ‘gospel’ than the preceding crowd.
But to put forth something that I haven’t seen posted here, what if one of these most maligned Governing Body members defected, or was cast out, would they find forgiveness and acceptance among the current ex-JW community? To be honest, many ex-JW’s still cling to the pecking order that existed among JW’s. “Well, that former JW was disfellowshipped for misconduct, while I turned in a letter of disassociation and wasn’t disfellowshipped.” “I was an elder at Bethel” or “I was a congregation elder”. Well, now you’re not, you’re one of us. The same disdain blankets you from JW’s as it does someone who slept with a two-bit harlot. You may have better insights into the group workings and incidents, but the JW status and rankings should be left behind with that group.
JBob, I appreciate it when somebody comments on here and they tell us that were a Bethelite or an elder or a pioneer and I don’t look at that as arrogant. I don’t believe they are telling us that because they think of themselves as higher than anybody else. I think they are saying that to tell us that no matter who we are or were in the organization, that they too were taken in and were misled too and it gives other elders or pioneers the courage to walk away too with their heads held high once they realize that the Society is a fraud religion. Once elders start walking away, there is much more hope that the whole thing will crumble and fall. It’s the elders who are what holds the whole thing together. If you look at the example of James Penton, when they disfellowshiped him, there were over 80 that left too because they believed Mr. Penton over the Society’s rendition of events.
I can’t believe that anybody who has the courage to disassociate themselves is arrogant in any way because of the suffering they will have to go through in order to stick to their convictions no matter what position they had before they walked away. Once a person disassociates themselves, they are disfellowshiped too. It’s all the same in the eyes of the brothers and sisters.
Actually for somebody to be disfellowshiped for apostasy or disassociating themselves, is worse in the eyes of the rank and file than somebody who got disfellowshiped for fornication or whatever.
For the person who got disfellowshiped for other reasons than apostasy or disassociating themselves, the congregation holds out the hope that that person will come back and get reinstated but for the disassociated or disfellowshiped for apostasy, they are considered lost forever and siding with the Devil and deserving of certain death.
@anonymous – Yes, I’m aware of Mr. Penton’s fine benefits and many others too, which I noted, they used their status to reveal many of the intricate details showing how hypocritical and twisted this group. But, from statements I’ve heard from some former JWs the pecking order is if you were disfellowshipped for misconduct, then you’re less-than someone who “walked out”, especially true for individuals who may be gay or transgendered. I’m stating that there needs to be an awareness and embracing of individuals regardless of their former stature in JW’s. Even if it comes to the point, that one of the maligned Governing Body members is cast out (it has happened).
So the point you missed in my statement, since we’re all equals. Do we blame an individual for the evils of the Watchtower group, or do we realize that said person(s) were as misled as the rest of us and trapped by a system of guidelines and rules they enforced out of a sense of obligation or fear? Keeping in mind, when you were convinced being JW was “the right thing,” your views of “apostates” and dissenters was the same.