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Associated Press
Religion Today
01.26.2006, 12:00 PM
Jehovah's
Witnesses are renowned for teaching that Jesus is not God and that the world as
we know it will soon end. But another unusual belief causes even more
entanglements - namely, that God forbids blood transfusions even when patients'
lives are at stake.
The doctrine's importance will be underscored next week
as elders who lead more than 98,000 congregations worldwide recite a new
five-page blood directive from headquarters.
The tightly disciplined sect believes the Bible forbids
transfusions, though specifics have gradually been eased over the years.
Raymond Franz, a defector from the all-powerful Governing Body that sets policies
for the faith, thinks leaders hesitate to go further for fear that total
elimination of the ban would expose the organization to millions of dollars in
legal liability over past medical cases.
The Witnesses have opposed transfusions of whole blood
since 1945. A later pronouncement also barred transfusions of blood's
"primary components," meaning red cells, white cells, platelets and
plasma.
An announcement in 2000 in the official Watchtower
magazine, however, said that because of ambiguity in the Bible, individuals are
free to decide about therapies using the biological compounds that make up
those four blood components, such as gamma globulin and clotting factors that
counteract hemophilia.
Next week's directive could create confusion about these
compounds, known as blood "fractions."
Without noting the 2000 change, the new directive tells
parents to consider this: "Can any doctor or hospital give complete
assurance that blood or blood fractions will not be used in treatment of a
minor?"
Aside from the new directive, a footnote in the
Witnesses' standard brochure, "How Can Blood Save Your Life
?,
" mentions the 2000 article on fractions - but then
omits its contents.
By coincidence, next week's directive follows some heavy
criticism of the blood transfusion policy from attorney Kerry
Louderback
-Wood of
Louderback
-Wood, who was raised a Witness but now has no religious
affiliation, accuses her former faith of giving "inaccurate and possibly
dishonest arguments" to believers facing crucial medical decisions.
Louderback
-Wood complains that many Witnesses and physicians aren't
given clear instruction about their faith's blood transfusion policy, particularly
on the subject of fractions.
She's no disinterested bystander. The lawyer says her
mother died from severe anemia in 2004 because local elders didn't realize
hemoglobin is permitted.
Louderback
-wood learned that hemoglobin was allowed from the Web site of
Associated Jehovah's Witnesses for Reform on Blood, which was founded in 1997
by dissenting local elders, eight of whom served on Hospital Liaison Committees
that advise Witnesses and physicians.
The founder of Associated Jehovah's Witnesses, speaking
on condition of anonymity to protect his standing in a faith that does not
tolerate dissent, says liaison committee members know about the revised
teachings, but most Witnesses automatically refuse all forms of blood without
consulting the committees. Physicians are often ill-informed about Witness
beliefs, he says.
Louderback
-Wood thinks the faith is subject to legal liability for
misinforming adherents, which to her knowledge is an untested theory in
Witnesses
headquarters refused an Associated Press request to interview
an expert on blood beliefs. Instead, General Counsel Philip
Brumley
issued a prepared statement rejecting
Louderback
-Wood's
"analysis and conclusions" in general.
"Any argument challenging the validity of this
religious belief inappropriately trespasses into profoundly theological and
doctrinal matters,"
Brumley
stated.
The Watchtower's 1945 ban said "all worshippers of
Jehovah who seek eternal life in his new world" must obey. Such edicts are
regarded as divine law, since the Governing Body uniquely directs true
believers. Violators risk ostracism by family and friends.
A subsequent Watchtower pronouncement forbade storage of
a patient's own blood for later transfusion. In all, Associated Jehovah's
Witnesses lists 20 shifts and refinements in blood-related rules over the
years.
At the core of their blood beliefs, Witnesses cite Acts
15:29, where Jesus' apostles agreed that Gentile converts should "keep
abstaining from things sacrificed to idols and from blood." The Witnesses
also cite passages in Genesis and Leviticus.
Judaism and Christianity have always understood these
scriptures to ban blood-eating for nourishment. This underlies Judaism's kosher
procedures to extract blood from meat, which Witnesses do not follow.
Christianity eventually decided the rule was temporary.
Experts assume that Raymond Franz's late uncle,
Frederick Franz, who served anonymously as the Witnesses' chief theologian,
decided those passages cover blood transfusions. But Raymond Franz raises
questions about the blood policy in his book "In Search of Christian
Freedom." Among them:
_Why forbid a patient's own stored blood yet permit
components derived from large amounts of donated and stored blood?
_Why allow organ transplants, which introduce far more
foreign white blood cells than transfusions?
_The Witnesses forbid plasma, which is mostly water, but
allow the components in it that provide therapy. So what's the point of banning
plasma?
Advances in bloodless surgery have reduced medical
dangers for Witnesses in the
Louderback
-Wood says she'll be contented if her protest saves one
child's life.
Associated Press.