The parents of the recent sextuplets born in BC are asking the provincial government for an apology for saving their children and the right to allow their children to die based on the parents ridiculous religious beliefs.

http://www.ctv.ca/...0070201?hub=Canada

How far should religious freedoms extend? Are those children J-Ws or Children of J-Ws? Discuss.

Good for the government. That's child abuse taken to the extreme.

Besides that, I really doubt they had blood transfusions in mind when they wrote the Biblical prohibition against drinking blood.

Yay, White Rabbit and I agree! Doctors have an obligation under oath to save those babies:

"I will follow that system of regimen which, according to my ability and judgment, I consider for the benefit of my patients, and abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous."

I really hope the children never find out that this event happened. Not sure how accepting towards my parents I would personally be if they would rather me die than to get a blood transfusion.

The title of this thread is misleading.

Posted by KublaKhan The title of this thread is misleading.

Read the article: they have asked the courts to prevent the medical team from giving any more blood transfusions - which the children will likely need to survive.

Posted by tekriter Read the article: they have asked the courts to prevent the medical team from giving any more blood transfusions - which the children will likely need to survive.

I'm familiar with the story.

The title does have a strong bias though. I happen to agree with that bias but still it is present. It could also be said "JW ask court's to give back their parental rights" or "JW couple's freedom of religion is challenged by local hospital."

Posted by Cabiria The title does have a strong bias though. I happen to agree with that bias but still it is present. It could also be said "JW ask court's to give back their parental rights" or "JW couple's freedom of religion is challenged by local hospital."

Or 'State seizes children endangered by parent's religious beliefs.'

http://www.ctv.ca/...0070222?hub=Health

I dunno - maybe it should say JW's kill thier own babies.

If a drunk driver kills your mom - you wouldn't say that "Car causes absent life signs in mother over drinking while operating motor vehicle beliefs."

It is absurd to use an iron age admonishment against eating blood as an excuse to let your own children die. Clearly the fool that wrote this had no way to forsee Medical Science and Blood Transfusions. When Leviti-dude told everyone not to chow down on blood did you suppose he also knew that the earth was round?

Maybe a blood transfusion would have saved that jesus guy and then we could all get along.

Those children are not JW's. They are children of JW's. This illustrates why there is no such thing as "personal" beliefs.

If they get their way - their kids die.

hmm.. maybe the parents want the children to die so they wont have the burden of having to take care of six kids and their using their religion as an excuse.

This goes right back to my argument that you need a licence to drive, why not one to breed?

... I don't think a transfusion counts as actually drinking blood. Besides, the prohibitions in Leviticus and Deuteronomy had to do with pagan worship, which infants are incapable of engaging in, not a medical treatment.

Posted by Watcher ... I don't think a transfusion counts as actually drinking blood. Besides, the prohibitions in Leviticus and Deuteronomy had to do with pagan worship, which infants are incapable of engaging in, not a medical treatment.

Alas, advanced zealotry doesn't make such fine distinctions.

Can we bleed the parents and put it in the kids? They deserve it more...

Posted by Watcher ... I don't think a transfusion counts as actually drinking blood. Besides, the prohibitions in Leviticus and Deuteronomy had to do with pagan worship, which infants are incapable of engaging in, not a medical treatment.

And unfortunately, most Jehovah's Witnesses have heard that exact argument about a thousand times before and are completely immune to it. There isn't really any talking them out of it.

This is why I never became one... well, that and the fact that Jehovah is a totally made up name for God. It's based on a mistranslation of the Hebrew Yod-He-Vau-He or Tetragrammaton. Nobody knows how to pronounce that because the only dudes that would really know never say the Name out of respect for it.

These yahoos think knowing God's name, or at least the one he used once, is some kind of world-shattering revelation. Ain't nothing in this world as entertaining as bad exegesis.

Posted by Watcher This is why I never became one... well, that and the fact that Jehovah is a totally made up name for God. It's based on a mistranslation of the Hebrew Yod-He-Vau-He or Tetragrammaton. Nobody knows how to pronounce that because the only dudes that would really know never say the Name out of respect for it. These yahoos think knowing God's name, or at least the one he used once, is some kind of world-shattering revelation. Ain't nothing in this world as entertaining as bad exegesis.

Yeah, I asked some once why they don't call him Yahweh instead of Jehovah, since that would at least be closer to the real name. They all just sort of looked me funny and said, "Well, you could, I guess..."

It's just a stupid tradition that none of them question.

JW's use four passages in the Bible which they interpret as prohibiting the consuming of blood:

Genesis 9:4 "But flesh (meat) with...blood...ye shall not eat"
Leviticus 17:12-14 "...No soul of you shall eat blood...whosoever eateth it shall be cut off"
Acts 15:29 "That ye abstain...from blood..."
Acts 21:25 "...Gentiles...keep themselves from things offered to idols and from blood..."

The current doctrine states that:

Blood is sacred to God.
Blood means life in God's eyes.
Blood must not be eaten or transfused.
Blood leaving the body of a human or animal must be disposed of, except for autologous blood transfusions considered part of a “current therapy”.
Blood was reserved for only one special use, the atonement for sins, which led up to Jesus' shed blood.
When a Christian abstains from blood, he or she is in effect expressing faith that only the shed blood of Jesus Christ can truly redeem him or her and save his or her life.
Even in the case of an emergency, it is not permissible to sustain life with transfused blood.
Conscientious violation of this doctrine is a serious offense, after which a member is subject to organized shunning

Even the JW's don't agree:

http://www.ajwrb.org/

Ohter christian bible "scholars" don't agree:

http://cnews.canoe...01/3499047-cp.html

Nor does the Canadian Medical Establishment:

http://www.nationa...007/4_pulse_5.html

It is absurd to use an iron age book as justification to let your own children die, despite 2000 years of advances in medical knowledge.

We allow this to happen as a society because we misunderstand the concept of religious freedom and have been guilt tripped into accepting special pleading based on religion.

What the parents asked to do would be no different than me allowing my child to die of a minor infection based on my belief that the flying spaghetti monster did not allow anti-biotics - except that no one would have a problem ridiculing my belief. But, put a religious label on it and suddenly the "evidence" is unquestionable.

There are no good reasons to believe BS.

I'm not exactly the greatest Biblical scholar, but I'm pretty sure I can come up with some passages where Jesus basically says: "Look, it ain't what you eat that makes you unclean. It's what comes out of your mouth. So get over it."

I fail to find any sound Biblical doctrine for refusing medical treatment. Just because Jesus healed people doesn't mean he's the only one who can.

There is all kinds of medical information in the bible. Consider the treatment for leprosy described in Leviticus 14 (14:2-52)

"This shall be the law of the leper." (I've paraphrased para 2-52 for you ADD kids)

God's law for lepers: Get two birds. Kill one. Dip the live bird in the blood of the dead one. Sprinkle the blood on the leper seven times, and then let the blood-soaked bird fly away. Next find a lamb and kill it. Wipe some of its blood on the patient's right ear, thumb, and big toe. Sprinkle seven times with oil and wipe some of the oil on his right ear, thumb and big toe. Repeat. Finally find another pair of birds. Kill one and dip the live bird in the dead bird's blood. Wipe some blood on the patient's right ear, thumb, and big toe. Sprinkle the house with blood 7 times. That's all there is to it.

However, according the Dermatology Online Journal 9 (2): 5:

http://dermatology...leprosy/ishii.html

"There are several effective chemotherapeutic agents against M. leprae. Dapsone (diaphenylsulfone, DDS), rifampicin (RFP), clofazimine (CLF, B663), ofloxacin (OFLX), and minocycline (MINO) constitute the backbone of the multidrug therapy (MDT) regimen recommended by WHO. Other chemotherapeutic agents, like Levofloxacin (LVFX), sparfloxacin (SPFX), and clarithromycin (CAM) are also effective against M. leprae [6, 7, 8]. WHO has designed very practical kits containing medication for 28 days, dispensed in blister packs, for both PB and MB leprosy. The blister pack medication kit for SLPB leprosy contains the exact dose for the one-time administration of the three components of the MDT regimen."

Would anyone care to defend the biblical view of leprosy treatment?


"Most people believe that the Creator of the universe wrote (or dictated) one of their books. Unfortunately, there are many books that pretend to divine authorship, and each makes incompatible claims about how we all must live. Despite the ecumenical efforts of many well-intentioned people, these irreconcilable religious commitments still inspire an appalling amount of human conflict.

In response to this situation, most sensible people advocate something called "religious tolerance." While religious tolerance is surely better than religious war, tolerance is not without its liabilities. Our fear of provoking religious hatred has rendered us incapable of criticizing ideas that are now patently absurd and increasingly maladaptive. It has also obliged us to lie to ourselves — repeatedly and at the highest levels — about the compatibility between religious faith and scientific rationality.

The conflict between religion and science is inherent and (very nearly) zero-sum. The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma; the maintenance of religious dogma always comes at the expense of science. It is time we conceded a basic fact of human discourse: either a person has good reasons for what he believes, or he does not. When a person has good reasons, his beliefs contribute to our growing understanding of the world. We need not distinguish between "hard" and "soft" science here, or between science and other evidence-based disciplines like history. There happen to be very good reasons to believe that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941. Consequently, the idea that the Egyptians actually did it lacks credibility. Every sane human being recognizes that to rely merely upon "faith" to decide specific questions of historical fact would be both idiotic and grotesque — that is, until the conversation turns to the origin of books like the bible and the Koran, to the resurrection of Jesus, to Muhammad's conversation with the angel Gabriel, or to any of the other hallowed travesties that still crowd the altar of human ignorance."

Sam Harris The Huffington Post
http://www.huffing...-reli_b_13153.html

Posted by tekriter Would anyone care to defend the biblical view of leprosy treatment?

Is it a treatment, or is it meant to be a big sign to the community that says "Stay away, leper here?" Remember that the Jews do not want to come in contact with lepers. They also don't want to come in contact with blood. Blood is a bit more visible than the early stages of leprosy.