The following article was first published in August 2017 at medium.com/@r.m.weisgerber and was brought to our attention some time ago. We wanted to share it with our readers because it describes the experiences and feelings of growing up in a JW family from a child’s point of view – even though that child is now a mature adult.
Jeff Truesdell reported in People Magazine on January 13, 2020, that Oxygen Channel will present a new two-part documentary that examines alleged child abuse within the Jehovah’s Witnesses and covered up by the Watchtower. “The Witnesses” will premiere Saturday, February 8 and 9, 2020. Trey Bundy will appear in the documentary.
Montana court reverses $35 Million Jehovah’s Witness case. Jehovah’s Witnesses held to be non-mandatory reporters. Watchtower reverses its fine. The Supreme Court on Wednesday unanimously reversed $35 million in damages against the Jehovah’s Witnesses, ruling the church did not violate Montana’s mandatory reporting statute when it did not report child sexual abuse by a Thompson Falls congregation member to local authorities.
In a news article published by The Belfast Telegraph and reprinted by Moose Gazette on November 27, 2019, reporter Charles Henry reported that “A woman abused as a child by a fellow Jehovah’s Witness during Bible study classes bravely spoke out about her “life-wrecking experience.” Laura Waring courageously waived her right to anonymity after her attacker pleaded guilty to a string of child sex charges.
NBC NEWS in Yakima, Washington reported that “A man who pleaded guilty to raping two underage girls he met at the Jehovah’s Witness congregation they all belonged to has been sentenced to five years in prison. Elihu Rodriguez, 32, of Yakima, Washington, was given five years, the maximum sentence prosecutors had recommended after Rodriguez agreed to plead guilty to three felony counts of child rape in the third degree in September 2019.”
The limits of religious freedom: America must come to grips with when faith groups limit personal liberty — “When Pastor Robert Jeffress, a member of President Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Board and the White House Faith Initiative, recently dismissed climate activist Greta Thunberg by saying that rainbows are evidence that polar ice caps aren’t melting, my heart sank…”
It’s a rare week when a new case of child abuse or rape among Jehovah’s Witnesses isn’t reported somewhere in North America. That’s in spite of new court cases and successful convictions every few months that are destroying Watchtower’s reputation. The following report comes from a small town in Illinois (USA) where there was limited coverage about just such a case. But it includes a surprising and horrific twist that proves Watchtower leaders at all levels still refuse to take decisive action to protect children.
GETTING A CHILDREN BOOK FROM THE JUDGE, THEN ON TO BETHEL AND THE CIRCUIT WORK:
One of my earliest memories is going to the St. Louis assembly in 1941 with my mother and grandmother and getting a copy of the book, Children, from Judge Rutherford. Then on December 7, 1941, I remember being at the Kingdom Hall in Dodge City, Kansas, and listening to everyone talk about Pearl Harbor. My grandmother was one of “the anointed” and she told me I would never finish grade school as Armageddon was very near.