Is "disfellowshipping" good or bad?

[marco]

I've just read a BBC story of a young girl who was in an abusive relationship with her partner but was refused permission to remove herself from it by her religious elders. She suffered broken ribs. Work colleagues, seeing her bruises, persuaded her to go to the police so she was "disfellowshipped." Her father woke her at 7am and threw her out; none of her family speak to her. However, work colleagues have shown her remarkable kindness and support, in true Samaritan style.

Apostasy in Islam is also harshly treated, the apostate sometimes being killed.

Are there good reasons for shunning those who do not comply with religious rules?
Are religious duties stronger than family ties?
Does the story, like Christ's parable, tell us anything about belief and behaviour?

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 2 by Kenisaw]

I would certainly not condone those actions but we JEHOVAH'S Witnesses do practice a form of disfellowshipping or shunning as outlined in the bible.

JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES : Disfellowshipping
https://www.jw.org/en/jehovahs-witnesses/faq/shunning/

Are there good reasons for shunning those who do not comply with religious rules?

Yes, I believe so; namely to protect the physical and spiritual welfare of the community and hopefully discourage destructive behaviour and encourage those that fall into it to change.

Are religious duties stronger than family ties?

Yes, they should be. A person's loyalty to God should take priority over all other relationships.

Does the story, like Christ's parable, tell us anything about belief and behaviour?

Yes to be loving generous and kind towards all.

JEHOVAH'S WITNESS

To learn more please go to other posts related to...

JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES , SHUNNING and ... ORGANISATIONAL INFALLIBILITY

[bluethread]

I fully agree there are all sorts of people in the world who feel empowered by some source to involve themselves into the affairs of others, and/or to infringe on another's rights in the name of their dogma...

What right are you referring to? The right to require people to interact with you? Where does one find that right?

What? What field did that come out of? I'm talking about the people that force others to stay in abusive relationships in this particular context, which deny's an individual their rights as a human being.

If you still feel the need to expound on whatever it is you are discussing, please let me know and I will be happy to chat with you about it...

Well, if you are talking about involuntary imprisonment, that is a crime and subject to prosecution. If you are saying that one person's refusal to associate with another is an affirmative force that violates someone's right, then please tell me what right is being violated? There is the right to freedom of association, but that is the right to control my actions, not the actions of another. There is no right to force someone else to associate with me that I know of.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 22 by bluethread]

I would agree we are all use a degree of decernment when it comes to association, membership of the Christian congregation is no different. Fellowship cannot be imposed if freedom is to be respected.


JW

[tam]

[Replying to post 23 by JehovahsWitness]

Fellowship cannot be imposed if freedom is to be respected, but dis-fellowship can be?


Or are jws free to associate with a dis-fellowshipped person; free to refuse to shun a dis-fellowshipped person, all the while remaining in good standing with the organization? No possibility of being brought before the elders or a judicial committee, or of being reprimanded, marked, dis-fellowshipped, or shunned themselves?


This is not exclusive to jws. Just happens to be a JW who made the comment that I noted.

**

In any case: regardless of what the rest of the world chooses to do and regardless of what rights the rest of the world chooses to exercise... if one is in Christ, then it is His words and His example that one should be obeying and following. Yes?

He said to the Pharisees when they would have condemned others, on more than one occasion:


"Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy, not sacrifice."


He neither shunned anyone, nor commanded that anyone BE shunned.




Peace to you,
your servant and a slave of Christ,
tammy

[Volbrigade]

All religions are false. Including the vague secular-materialist Whateverist one, which would logically allow for both offering succor to the abused woman in the OP, or submerging her in drawn butter and devouring her.

In a world in which all that exist is indifferent matter, there is no real difference between the actions.

All religions are false.

Save one.

And it isnt even a religion.

The examples of the truth and consistency and coherency of Christianity are endless.

The fellowship question is just another one.

The only people who we, as Christians, are not to have fellowship with are those that portray themselves as believers, who take on the mantle of ambassador to the King, yet who deny the doctrines of the faith. Or persist in unapologetic, unrepentant sin (lying, stealing, sexual promiscuity, etc.).

Paul is clear on this point. We must have contact " not strictly defined as fellowship, which is a type of relationship (we are fellows " peers, brothers ), with the heathen unbelievers. How else to witness to, and evangelize, them?

But not with apostates and the blatantly and brashly immoral, who call themselves followers of Christ ( usually on the basis of their affording their conditional approval of Him " e.g., He was a good, but misunderstood, teacher, with some good ideas).

And even then, whether we engage in civil discourse with " or just avoid " such quislings, in public, is an optional matter of personal volition.

We are just not supposed to fellowship with them: engage in worship with them, allow them to remain congregants with us.

No (instructed) Christian would ever take it upon themselves to administer any sort of punishment or consequence to the shunned, beyond that.

After all " every Christian was once an unrepentant sinner. Before repenting. And every Christian struggles with their own personal besetting sin(s). We are there to encourage, comfort, edify, and support one another. And are eager to accept the repentant prodigal back into our fellowship.

God. Nothing is better than being a Christian.

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 23 by JehovahsWitness]

Fellowship cannot be imposed if freedom is to be respected, but dis-fellowship can be?

Neither are imposed, everyone is free to do as they choose; they are not free however to impose how others must respond to what they choose to do.

A wife is free to sleep the postman, she is not free however to oblige her husband continues to live with her if she does. If he packs his bags and leaves she cannot argue that her freedoms have been violated because the exercise of her freedoms provoked a reaction, nor can she argue that the husband was obliged to continue to associate with her and had no right himself to disassociate himself from her.

Any Jehovah's Witness is free to commit any sin they see fit should they so choose. Every member of the congregation however is also free to react to their actions, continued fellowship cannot be imposed on them and the sinner cannot prohibit how the religious community reacts acts vis-a-vis their sin.

JW

[JehovahsWitness]

[Replying to post 24 by tam]

Jehovah's Witnesses believe the bible, including the words of Jesus, fully support scriptural shunning (disfellowshipping). Others are free to interpret scripture differently but that is the conclusion we come to and one of the principles by which our community is regulated.


[youtube][/youtube]

[liamconnor]

[Replying to post 1 by marco]

I am not entirely sure what the aim of this OP is, but...

I've just read a BBC story of a young girl who was in an abusive relationship with her partner but was refused permission to remove herself from it by her religious elders. She suffered broken ribs. Work colleagues, seeing her bruises, persuaded her to go to the police so she was "disfellowshipped." Her father woke her at 7am and threw her out; none of her family speak to her. However, work colleagues have shown her remarkable kindness and support, in true Samaritan style.

Okay? And we are positive that the colleagues were not "religious" in some way? They were all atheists? How does this episode spawn the questions below?

Apostasy in Islam is also harshly treated, the apostate sometimes being killed.

FActual. But...?

Are there good reasons for shunning those who do not comply with religious rules?

If we are being extremely vague, then I vaguely answer, "Yes?" How am supposed to know unless I am given a concrete situation?

Are religious duties stronger than family ties?

Again. What concrete example is being offered?

If my religion required that I do not offer human sacrifices, but for my family, that was what it meant to be "One of us", what would you say?

[oldbadger]

..................All religions are false.
Save one................

Hello.......... There are thousands of differing Churches, Creeds and Denominations of Christianity and most of them dismiss all the others, so it's just a question of asking about which Church or Creed you follow? For instance, last week a 'Free-Gift by Grace of God, dispensationalist Christian' told me that if other 'Christians' have not received that same truth then they will burn in Hellfire. Do I believe him, or you, or all the others?

The examples of the truth and consistency and coherency of Christianity are endless.

Sadly, the examples of invasion, looting, pillaging, raping, greed and corruption by various kinds of 'Christians' are also endless. The problem is, that every time a Christian is caught doing a bad-thing other Christians point and say, 'No... he never was a Christian'. Christianity ducks, veers and swerves its way onwards, it seems?

God. Nothing is better than being a Christian.

I'm sure that many Christians do feel that way, it's just sad that they mostly all disagree with each other. There are Christians around where I live that would not sit at food or drink with you unless you belong to them, and many of their Churches are 'closed' to converts. I hope you do not belong with those.


Out there in the big-bad World apostates and waywards get hanged in public, dangling from crane jibs. That's quite a big difference to disfellowshipping.

I have discovered many 'friends' to have cheated, stolen from and deceived me badly over the years......... and where I have felt certain that they would never change I have estranged 'em, a similar action, justt a different verb.....

And hundreds of clubs and private institutions here chuck out members who have offended the memberships.

Why, I know several clubs which use the black-ball.... still, to this day. Estranged folks do not even know who caste them out.

But it's fun to pick on JWs........

[Volbrigade]

..................All religions are false.
Save one................

Hello.......... There are thousands of differing Churches, Creeds and Denominations of Christianity and most of them dismiss all the others, so it's just a question of asking about which Church or Creed you follow? For instance, last week a 'Free-Gift by Grace of God, dispensationalist Christian' told me that if other 'Christians' have not received that same truth then they will burn in Hellfire. Do I believe him, or you, or all the others?

You believe the TRUTH, my friend.

"Test all things; hold fast what is good." (1 Thess. 5:21)

Your acquaintance, mentioned, may be be right. As I mentioned, some "Christians" are ignorant of, or outright reject, every (or many) article of the Apostles Creed, which is a clear, concise summation of the faith we share.

But it can be further reduced, for succinctness:

"Moreover, brethren, I declare to you the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received and in which you stand, 2 by which also you are saved, if you hold fast that word which I preached to you"unless you believed in vain.

3 For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures, 5 and that He was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. 6 After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain to the present, but some have fallen asleep. 7 After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. 8 Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time. " (1 Corinthians 15:1-8)

This is the Gospel that saves us. Please note the qualifying "according to the Scriptures". The entire Bible is the revelation of the message and story of Redemption.

Christianity is not about traditions, or church decor, or quibbles over secondary doctrines and issues and behaviors and rites and rituals.

It is about a fundamental change in the reality of individuals; a transformation from a physical (carnal) to a spiritual creature, a Son of God and co-heir with Jesus Christ, an entering into an eternal state, at the moment of Justification (Salvation), through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit of Christ.

Regnerate Christians may continue to squabble over secondary issues -- Predestination, Eschatology, Origins -- but that is nothing to break fellowship over.

Denying God's truth is, however. In word or deed.

I believe that is why there are still 60-70% self-identied "Christians" (it seems) in the USA, from most polls:

I believe the number of true Christians is closer to 5-10%.

And their number transcends all barriers of denomination, race, class, nationality, culture, and gender.

"In essential things, unity.
In doubtful things, liberty.
In all things, charity (love)."