Jehovah's Witnesses News

For Immediate Release
January 29, 2010

Puerto Rico—In a landmark decision reached on January 27, 2010, the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico upheld an adult patient’s right to refuse certain medical treatment. The Court also recognized a patient’s right to use advance directives and appoint a health-care agent to represent his interests when unconscious.

Victor Hernandez, one of Jehovah’s Witnesses, executed an advance directive prior to his hospitalization. The Supreme Court overturned the trial court’s refusal to enforce Mr. Hernandez’s medical decision as expressed in his directive and by his health-care agent. In so doing, the Supreme Court recognized “the fundamental right that makes the inviolability of the human body an inalienable right of the people.” Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 29%

For Immediate Release
January 28, 2010

NEW YORK—In the two weeks following the devastating earthquake that paralyzed the small island nation of Haiti, Jehovah’s Witnesses have been maintaining the intensity of their efforts to render assistance.

Victims were still reeling from the magnitude 7.0 quake that occurred on January 12 when they were further traumatized by a powerful aftershock with a magnitude of 6.1 that struck a village west of Port-au-Prince on Wednesday, January 20. That evening, a group of 12 Witness volunteers from France—including four general practitioners, two surgeons, four nurses, and a midwife—arrived at the Haiti branch office via the Dominican Republic to join the relief effort. Another group of 12 French-speaking Witnesses from Guadeloupe also arrived, adding eight nurses and four other medical professionals. These groups brought 5,000 pounds of medicine and equipment, enabling them to begin assisting victims immediately.

The Witnesses’ branch office in the Dominican Republic continues to send truck shipments of food and medicine. Every two days, 30,000 pounds of supplies are provided in caravans of three or four trucks. As of January 25, the Dominican Republic branch has sent 70 tons of food and medical equipment to Haiti. Another 15 tons (including a shipment of tents) were sent in the early morning hours of January 26. All the volunteers are focusing on the still urgent need to care for the wounded.

Jehovah’s Witnesses in Haiti are comforted and strengthened by the loving concern shown by their fellow worshippers around the world. The Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses is coordinating these international relief efforts from the Witnesses’ world headquarters in Brooklyn.

Media contact: J. R. Brown, telephone: +1 (718) 560-5600

Source: JW Media

Popularity: 34%

For Immediate Release
January 27, 2010

GORNO-ALTAYSK, Russia—A disconcerting trend continued in Russia on Wednesday when the Supreme Court of the Altay Republic upheld the ruling of the lower city court to pronounce 18 religious publications of Jehovah’s Witnesses extremist. This mirrors the ruling of a similar case last month in the Russian Federation Supreme Court in Moscow. These developments have caught the attention of human rights activists and others, leaving many international observers concerned about where this will end.

Horst Henschel is a member of the board of directors of Wachtturm Bibel- und Traktat-Gesellschaft, the corporation that prints the Christian publications in question. Henschel was himself persecuted in Eastern Germany for his faith and so voiced his concern about this decision: “To label our publications as ‘extremist’ does not make sense to us, especially since our literature promotes strong family values, respect for authority and a love of neighbor. What country would not want citizens who reflect these principles? We know that millions will be voicing their concern that this decision reflects a Russia that is intensifying its restriction of freedom of thought and peaceful freedom of expression.” Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 27%

By Geraldine Fagan, Forum 18 News Service

Following an 11 December raid on a Makhachkala flat by “a whole busload” of armed and masked rapid reaction police led by a Dagestani FSB security service investigator, some 30 readers of the works of the late Turkish Islamic theologian Said Nursi were taken for questioning. Six homes of other Nursi readers in Dagestan were raided. Ziyautdin Dapayev, one of two of those held who could face criminal charges of participating in a banned religious extremist organisation, lamented to Forum 18 News Service that Nursi readers are becoming “victims to the incompetence of some employees of the law enforcement agencies”. Dagestan FSB told Forum 18 no one could answer questions about the investigation. Nursi’s works have been banned in Russia, despite a 2007 Turkish government statement that they “contain no statements whatsoever aimed at inciting religious hatred”. Moscow Public Prosecutor’s Office confirmed to Forum 18 that it had issued an extremism warning to Ravil Gainutdin, chair of the Russia-wide Council of Muftis, for inviting a Turkish Nursi follower to a Moscow conference. Meanwhile, Jehovah’s Witnesses have lost their latest appeal against an extremism ban on more of their publications. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 19%

For Immediate Release
January 26, 2010

GORNO-ALTAYSK, Russia—On January 27, 2010, the Supreme Court of the Altay Republic, located in south-central Russia, will consider the appeal of Jehovah’s Witnesses against the Gorno-Altaysk City Court’s decision to declare a number of religious publications “extremist.”

The Witnesses and their Bible literature are well-known throughout the republic. For example, two residents of the Altay Republic, Andrey and Aygul Lobanov, said the following regarding the benefit of these publications: “The Watchtower and Awake! magazines are a source of refreshment for us. They have helped us to build a strong and happy family. They encourage us to love all people regardless of their nationality, religion, skin color, income or social status.” Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 25%

Lacey Burley

THIEVES raided two churches in Spring Street overnight Sunday, stealing thousands of dollars of electrical equipment.

The offenders used a jemmy to force open a sliding door at the Spring Street Christian Church and rummaged through offices.

Toowoomba Police sergeant Vern Holcombe said the thieves stole a number of expensive items including a computer, two digital cameras, a video recorder, and an iPhone.

They brought a trolley with them and broke into an office which contained a large safe.

However, the weight of the safe broke the trolley and they abandoned it in the office. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 29%

By NATALIYA VASILYEVA

MOSCOW — Religious freedoms are being rapidly curtailed throughout Russia as the Orthodox Church seeks to boost its dominance, human rights activists warned Monday.

In its annual report on religions freedoms, the independent Moscow-based Liberty of Conscience Institute expressed concern that growing state support for the Russian Orthodox Church is coming at the expense of minority denominations.

President Dmitry Medvedev’s inititiative to permanently assign Orthodox priests to army units and introduce religious education classes at state schools could prove detrimental to the idea of Russia as a secular state, the report said.

Those moves breach the constitution and are aimed at “fostering loyalty to the regime,” Sergei Mozgovoi, co-chair of the institute’s board, told reporters.

Attaching chaiplans to army units in particular could incite abuse toward non-Christian conscripts, he said. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 17%

BY CHARLIE MATHEWS
MANITOWOC — [...]

The kick-off speakers of the series Sunday were Keith Burnett and William Kaczmarowski, elders in the Jehovah’s Witnesses Kingdom Hall in Manitowoc.

“We are Christian Jehovah’s Witnesses … we are disciples of Jesus who died for our sins that he could redeem us,” Burnett said.

However, Jehovah’s Witnesses are not “Trinitarian” Christians believing God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit as three in one.

They believe Jesus was created by Jehovah (the name they believe is the biblically correct one to use when referring to the creator/Supreme Being of the universe) and subordinate to him. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 31%

Laws in Puerto Rico Restricting Access to Public Streets Violate First Amendment

NEW YORK – January 21 – The American Civil Liberties Union, its national chapter in Puerto Rico and its affiliates in New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts and Rhode Island filed a friend-of-the-court brief late Wednesday opposing unconstitutional laws that effectively ban Jehovah’s Witnesses from freely expressing their faith in the streets of Puerto Rico.

The brief, filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit, supports a constitutional challenge to Puerto Rico laws, enacted in 1987, that authorize neighborhoods to deny citizens access to public residential streets by erecting walls and gates around them. The laws effectively prohibit Jehovah’s Witnesses from engaging in the door-to-door public ministry for which they are well known worldwide. The federal lawsuit was filed by the approximately 25,000 Jehovah’s Witnesses in 318 congregations in Puerto Rico, as well as the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc., the publisher of religious material that is often distributed by Jehovah’s Witnesses. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 28%

By Bill O’Boyle

W-B zoning hearing board approval needed because site is in residential zone.

WILKES-BARRE – The city zoning hearing board on Wednesday approved a special exception that would allow the Jehovah’s Witnesses to build a new, larger church.

The Jehovah’s Witnesses want to build a new structure at Scott and Laird streets to replace the Kingdom Hall on North Street that has been home to the congregation since the early 1950s.

Eugene Gostinski of Luzerne, an elder in the congregation, said increased attendance and future expansion are the main reasons for the move. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 31%