{"id":2860,"date":"2017-04-14T06:34:22","date_gmt":"2017-04-14T06:34:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/news\/2017\/04\/14\/former-jehovahs-witnesses-called-on-to-testify-in-russian-supreme-court-case\/"},"modified":"2021-08-18T10:25:30","modified_gmt":"2021-08-18T07:25:30","slug":"former-jehovahs-witnesses-called-on-to-testify-in-russian-supreme-court-case","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/former-jehovahs-witnesses-called-on-to-testify-in-russian-supreme-court-case\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Jehovah’s Witnesses called on to testify in Russian Supreme Court case"},"content":{"rendered":"

In\u00c2\u00a0Russia<\/span>, the trial against\u00c2\u00a0Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0continued this week into its fourth day, with the\u00c2\u00a0Ministry of Justice<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0attempting to smear the Witnesses by calling former members of the organization to testify. These previous members were all associated with Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and in some cases were once baptized in the faith \u00e2\u20ac\u201c until they were \u00e2\u20ac\u0153disfellowshipped,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d or expelled from the congregation.<\/p>\n

The\u00c2\u00a0Supreme Court<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0of the\u00c2\u00a0Russian Federation<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0has\u00c2\u00a0targeted Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses<\/a>, along with their legal holdings, properties and their right to freedom of worship, and is seeking to have the\u00c2\u00a0Administrative Center of Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s nearly 200,000 members in Russia declared \u00e2\u20ac\u0153extremist.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d A ruling in favor of the Ministry of Justice would criminalize the actions of Witnesses simply meeting together to read the Bible or engaging in their house-to-house ministry.<\/p>\n

Former members take the stand against the Witnesses<\/h2>\n

As expected, the prosecution heard testimony from former members who attempted to paint the Witnesses as anti-social.\u00c2\u00a0Russian News Agency TASS<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0reports that one former Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witness, Natalia Koretskaya, from St. Petersburg, who was part of the organization from 1995 until 2009, told the judge that the organization’s members live \u00e2\u20ac\u0153under full and total control of the Administrative Center,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and that the heads of the organization \u00e2\u20ac\u0153formally watch canonical compliance with the norms but in real fact the talk is about total control of an individual\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s personal life\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 his intimate life, education and work.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

Koretskaya was disfellowshipped from her congregation in 2009 after she started a physical relationship with a man to whom she was not legally married to, TASS reports. After being removed from the congregation, Natalia testified that she had \u00e2\u20ac\u0153forgotten how to live\u00e2\u20ac\u009d in the world because of the organization\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s strict policy of neutrality.<\/p>\n

Testimony was also heard from Pavel Zverev, who joined the organization at 16 years of age. Zverev complained that the organization deprived him of a chance to be successful in life because they prevented him for getting a higher education.<\/p>\n

Nina Petrova, a former member who was associated with the Witnesses for three decades, testified that her \u00e2\u20ac\u0153spiritual mentors\u00e2\u20ac\u009d persuaded her not to have a family. \u00e2\u20ac\u0153They convinced me that a family was not needed as the doomsday was close at hand. And when I realized that this was a delusion, it was late,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d she said.<\/p>\n

Witnesses Respond<\/h2>\n

Lawyers for the Witnesses spoke to the media, stating that the individuals called by the Ministry of Justice to testify were merely \u00e2\u20ac\u0153repeating the arguments of so-called sectological literature,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and that some of them are even named in \u00e2\u20ac\u0153public sources” as activists who seek to disparage Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses. Their testimony can hardly be considered objective or representative of the organization’s ideals. Jehovah’s Witnesses do not discourage individuals to seek a marriage mate and children if they choose. Nor do they diminish the value of a good education in order to support themselves.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

Disfellowshipping?<\/h2>\n

Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses practice a form of discipline called\u00c2\u00a0disfellowshipping<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0\u00e2\u20ac\u201c following the early Christian congregation\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s practice of removing an individual who commits a gross sin and remains unrepentant for their actions. Disfellowshipped individuals are still welcome to attend all meetings with the Witnesses and can still take part in worship, but they cannot associate and cannot engage in the public ministry.<\/p>\n

To others, the decision may seem harsh or punitive, but following the principle set out by the\u00c2\u00a0Apostle Paul<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0from the first-century congregation in\u00c2\u00a0Corinth<\/span>, anyone who is \u00e2\u20ac\u0153called a brother who is sexually immoral or a greedy person or an idolater or a reviler or a drunkard or an extortioner…\u00e2\u20ac\u009d should be \u00e2\u20ac\u0153removed from among yourselves.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d The benefits are that the congregation remains clean in God\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s eyes, and the person removed may eventually have a change of heart \u00e2\u20ac\u201c in which case they are welcomed back into the fold.<\/p>\n

Simply put \u00e2\u20ac\u201c There are\u00c2\u00a0standards that God expects people to live by<\/a>. This concept is fundamental to any so-called\u00c2\u00a0Christian<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0religion, but over the centuries it has become watered down as individuals look on their faith as a buffet-style choice of what laws and principles fit in with their own personal choices and lifestyles.<\/p>\n

That is why, within the doors of any\u00c2\u00a0Kingdom Hall<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0of Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses, you will not find a smoker, an alcohol abuser, a homosexual, an unconfessed murderer or criminal, anyone who is sexually immoral, anyone who practices fornication or adultery, or anyone practicing any form of spiritism or the occult.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In\u00c2\u00a0Russia, the trial against\u00c2\u00a0Jehovah\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Witnesses\u00c2\u00a0continued this week into its fourth day, with the\u00c2\u00a0Ministry of Justice\u00c2\u00a0attempting to smear the Witnesses by calling former members of the organization to testify. These previous members were all associated with…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2860","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-news","category-russia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2860"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2860\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5658,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2860\/revisions\/5658"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jwforum.net\/portal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}