General Chat

Roxanne

It is an interesting question you have raised and I will do my best to answer it for you. Please bear in mind that I am not a medical expert so this is my explanation of my understanding of the situation.

As was said in an earlier post when someone asked about JWs eating meat that has blood in, as long as the animal has been bled correctly there is no issue with JWs eating meat if they chose to do so. With regard to JWs accepting organ transplants again if a JW choses to do so they have the right to choose. Neither of the above situations are a direct ingestion of blood from either animals or another human being. Using cochineal would be a direct ingestion of blood and eating black pudding would be the same. The main ingredients of both these products is blood and JWs therefore do not eat either of them.

When an organ is transplanted, it is the patients own blood via a cell saver machine which transports the patients own blood around an extended circulatory system back to the patient. It is this patients own blood that once recycled feeds the transplanted organ. It is not the donors blood that feeds the organ. Some JWs have no problem with this and would happily accept an organ transplant while there are others whose conscience couldn't permit them to do so. None of these procedures involve the use of another persons blood. Only once all the arteries are attached etc are the organs fed by the blood of the patient. I hope that makes sense Roxanne.

Another thing that many people don't know is that JWs raise funds to purchase cell saver machines and place them in our hospitals both here in the UK and across the world.

A fuller description of how cell savers work etc can be found here: http://www.noblood.org/wiki/Intraoperative_blood_salvage

Donation of cell saver machine:
http://www.ruh.nhs.uk/documents/press_statements/05.09.09%20Cell%20Saver.pdf

Hope this is helpful, as I said I am not a medical expert but this is the situation as I understand it. I'm sure if I'm wrong somebody will let me know!

Regards,
Lyn x

hi janet, yes well no matter ur belief if anybody is a thinker and believe in a god of some-sort wouldnt they question why we are here in the first place?............................ god = a creator so why would people want to die, she obviously wouldnt want to die or see her children without a mother, but like you said made a strong stand for her faith and what she believes in and her belief in god = the creator of life

Dear Budgie,
You are quite right, her husband has been quoted as saying she would have had her own blood......... this was by means of the 'cell saver' which lyn has just explained.
When they eventually found the machine they did not know how to use it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Like I said earlier, there are two sides to this tragic affair.
She had agreed to the use of this machine. weeks before. !!!!

hi, im lindas daughter up at home tonight and although my mum isnt a jehovahs witness i am and ive found the thread interesting, my thoughts and prayers are with the family and brothers and sisters in the congregation, also facing ones out in the ministry we had a call today who we go to with the magazines who couldnt understand this when read of the case in the newspaper- the media print what they like and dont state all the facts sadly - they want to catch peoples attention and make "stories" point is its not "known" how she died in the media and they dont even now if blood transfusion would have saved her !!!!!!!! sad thing is that ive learned reading this is that she has died and filled in the advance medical directive and probably stated her wishes to not have blood according to her conscience and wishes and wantec the machine used but they didnt use it properly which u said........... that is SO sad :( im so sorry to hear of this and so are my family, i have just explained to them

alison - from glasgow

Regarding the cell saver machines. They require skilled practitioners to operate them. It's a bit like needing a skilled radiographer to operate x-ray machines and mammograms etc. It is a tragedy that Emma may have lost her life because there was nobody available to operate the cell saver machine when there was one present in the hospital. The link I put up earlier - http://www.noblood.org/wiki/Intraoperative_blood_salvage - explains how these machines work. As was said Emma hemorrhaged after the babies or during the birth of her babies. If the machine was on standby and there was someone available trained to use it Emma would have not lost her life.

Everything is not as cut and dry as the papers make things out to be! The media have a lot to answer for, they ought to be demonstrating responsible journalism and not sensationalising stories to sell a paper.

Lyn x

I've just spent some time reading articles and websites about cell savers.
They do sound an excellent idea and appear to have a valuable role to play.

However it would appear possibly wrong to make it sound as if the hospital in this case was at fault. It doesn't seem as if Cell savers are routinely used in obstetrics. I found this citation.

British Journal of Hospital Medicine, Vol. 66, Iss. 11, 01 Nov 2005, pp 652 - 652

The most recent Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths cited haemorrhage as the second most common cause of death, killing 17 parturients, two of whom refused donated blood (Lewis, 2005). Cell-saved blood is used routinely in other specialities where massive haemorrhage is common, yet this is not the case in obstetrics, mostly because of the concern over possible iatrogenic amniotic fluid embolism.

It looks as if the use of a cell saver in surgery can have benefits for many patients but it would not be of the same use in emergency surgery and it could not help the sort of people who perhaps need the most blood ie patients suffering from certain forms of cancer.

My husband was for several years receiving 5 units of blood a time and that was either once a week or once a fortnight. We lost count of how much he'd had and that doesn't include the platelets and plasma he was given. He was just one of many "regulars" in the haematology department of our hospital and the same scene is probably true all over the country.

If you have never watched a loved one getting paler and weaker daily until they can hardly breathe and cannot walk far or climb the stairs, yet after a transfusion you see them almost return to normal for a few days, then you cannot understand how grateful we are to donors.
To be low in blood also means being at risk of serious infections, and dangerously low platelets mean the risk of bleeding to death or a brain haemorrhage.

I have sat at the bedside of my husband 3 times and been told he would not last the night, Twice was due to an infection and once a bleed on his brain.
Each time the skills of the hospital and the generosity of blood donors saved him until a drug was found which managed to get his bone marrow working again. Friends all over the world and of many religions also prayed for him and even his doctors find his recovery extraordinary. I truly think it was not yet his time to leave me.

Having been faced with the very real chance of losing the father of my own children I'm afraid I am still incredulous that anyone would choose to die rather than fight to survive and be there for their family.

I suppose that reading this thread I've been hoping to understand, but this particular piece of dogma still seems a very wrong interpretation to me. If any writings upon which a faith is based are open to a variety of interpretations then I cannot really see how any one group can claim their particular way of reading it is right. Eventually it all comes down to a rather circular argument........ie "it's in the Bible so it must be true", then how do we know the Bible is true .......well "it must be because the Bible says so and a particular group has the true version".

Don't get me wrong I'm not an atheist but I can't accept literal interpretations but then with a paleoanthropologist and a geologist in the family I was never going to be a creationist/literal believer anyway.

Sue

Sue,
What may be wrong to you, may be right to others,
These people know they have a higher authority to answer to, than earthling man.
You believe in blood transfusions, others may not, ( not always JWs) some will argue that a blood transfusion have saved their lives,your experience tells you that, others will have had experience to the opposite, a blood transfusion has killed them. or left them with a death sentance over their head.

Some people think its heroic to join the army, and be trained to kill... others find it an aboration.

Some people think its a womens right to end the life of a unborn baby. Some that its the biggest injustice known to man...........

Thats what makes us human, the ability to think and reason for ourselves, however some people are happy to live their lives within the boundaries of what they know their own God accepts.... some prefer to live their lives Godless. Thats their ..choice.

As for the hospital, as you were not there, and do not know what happened, how can you say, perhaps there were other contributing factors that will have to be taken into consideration....thats why there is going to be an inquest...........

regards viv.

I think these people "Think" they have a higher authority to answer to.
You believe,you dont know,A huge difference,I think!
Sue was putting her own opinions forward,she is entitled to!!
Sue,Im so glad your husbands responding to treatment.
Blood is not dirty,its life!!

I have read the whole of this thread with interest. I will keep my opinions to myself, but I am never bothered by JWs at my door, once I explain my background they beat a hasty retreat

A few Bible Contradictions for you;-))
The one with 3 astrix is the contradiction.
It makes Interesting reading!!

Think not that I come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a
sword.
- Matthew 10:28

... all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.
- Matthew 26:52
***
For wrath killeth the foolish man...
- Job 5:2

... let not the sun go down on your wrath.
- Ephesians 4:26
***
And no man hath ascended up to heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven.
- John 3:13

... and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.
- 2 Kings 2:11
***
If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true.
- John 5:31

I am one that bear witness of myself...
- John 8:18
[Jesus Christ was the speaker in both of these quotes]
***
A good man leaveth an inheritance to his children's children...
- Proverbs 13:22

Sell that ye have and give alms...
- Luke 12:33
***
Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord... Wealth and riches shall be in his
house...
- Psalms 112:1-3

It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich
man to enter the kingdom of God.
- Matthew 19:24
***
I and my father are one.
- John 10:30

... I go unto the Father: for my Father is greater than I.
- John 14:28
[Jesus Christ was the speaker in both of these quotes]
***
Thou shalt not kill
- Exodus 20:13

Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side... and
slay every man his brother...
- Exodus 32:27
***
Remember the sabbath day to keep it holy.
- Exodus 20:8

The new moons and sabbaths, the calling of assemblies, I cannot away with: it
is iniquity.
- Isaih 3:22
***
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything
that is in heaven... earth... [or] water.
- Leviticus 26:11

And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make
them.
- Exodus 25:18
***
For by grace are ye saved through faith... not of works.
- Ephesians 2:8-9

Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.
- James 2:24
***
God is not a man, that he should lie: neither the son of man, that he should
repent.
- Numbers 23:19

And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto his people.
- Exodus 32:14
***
... the hour is coming, in which all that are in the graves shall hear his
voice, and come forth...
- John 5:28-29

As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away: so he that goeth down to the
grave shall come up no more.
- Job 7:9
***
... thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for
hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
- Exodus 21:23-25
... resist not evil; but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn
to him the other also.
- Matthew 5:39
***
Honor thy father and mother.
- Exodus 20:12

If any man come to me, and hate not his father and mother, and wife, and
children, and bretheren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be
my disciple.
- Luke 14:26
***

Dear roxanne,
Very good, but, I dont speaketh like that, do thou?.
No wonder thee do not understandeth, whateth thou readeth......... ha ha
You could get your local vicar to explain what they mean. as he gets paid (by our taxes) to do so!!


The point I made earlier..........
we make our own mind up......... whatever anyone else believes, its their belief................
One mans meat is another mans poision, etc
as that booketh says.
''Who are we? to judge another mans servants''

And the truth is ..we dont know the full account of what happened in that hospital...so how can we judge...
regards
viv

Going round the doors is hard enough for Jehovahs Witnesses , (I have to admire you's as i could never do that in this days society) without the media leaving good christians of this faith wide open to unnecessary abuse from people who know very little about it and use the blood issue as an excuse to take them down, It's always the same, I have had people who sit and get drunk,smoke and get up to all sorts of scams judge my daughters faith and take it down and when they take her faith down, to me they are taking the person i love and adore down too,this really hurts me, I think some people should get their own house in order before they judge others, I would also hate to think that any Jehovah's Witnesses going to someones door could possibly be assaulted or worse due to the way they are portrayed.
Take Care Linda xxx

I think this discussion has become more than about this one particular case. We have tried hard not to judge this young mother (although her actions seem so wrong to many of us).

It is very true that we don't know what happened in the hospital and I expect everyone involved will have their own version of events anyway depending on whether they feel the refusal to receive blood was justified or not.

My late father-in-law was a vicar and any JWs or Mormons who innocently accepted his offer of a chat probably rather regretted it! He was polite enough but he knew his Bible inside out and backwards so could easily out quote anyone. He could also read parts in the original Greek of the New Testament so knew which bits were open to misinterpretation due to English not being an exact translation.

Knowing and believing are not the same thing. You can fervently wish a thing to be true as much as you like and you can believe with all your heart but having faith in something doesn't necessarily make it so. If it were, then every religion would be true and we all know that cannot be so. I'm inclined to think many of them have partial truths but little more.

I am always very suspicious of anyone who thinks they have a hotline to God. I've met a few in my time.

Each of us must make our own minds up based on all the evidence we can find. What worries me is if young people grow up within a strict community and never come into contact with ideas beyond those their elders hold. Young adults are especially inclined to see the world idealistically and have not got the perspective of age to enable them to realise that often there are no easy answers.

When I was 22 I still had much to learn about the world. I feel sad not only for the babies deprived of their mother but also that this young woman will not be able to be the useful member of society she might otherwise have been. Her life might have been one of caring and giving.

It seems such a waste. A gesture made in the name of a God (whom I believe does not expect it and would not have wished it).

I have found this debate very interesting and would not want to upset anyone but ultimately I think most of us are going to end up on one side of the fence or another.

Sue

Sue,
I take on board what you have said, and as I have pointed out,you are entitled to say it. however I do wish to comment, on the comment, that you make about
''not being a useful member of society''.....
perhaps you did not mean to make that sound hurtful, I am sure that in the 22years she lived, her family and friends found her a useful part of their society,
Just as the family, of the lad who killed himself with heroin down the road from me, a couple of weeks ago must have done...(he was 22)
If there is one thing I have learned...

LOVE your nearest and dearest cuz you dont know what tommorrow brings............
peace be with everyone
v.

Viv,No we dont speak like that, just my point:-))
The Bible can be taken any way we want it too!!!
and actually,I do read the bible, I was brought up christian and I attended church on a regular basis.
So do not mock me,how very rude thou art;-)))
I now practice a faith that makes far more sense to me:-))

Wow,
Roxanne, I didnt mean to mock you!!, I was only joking........... (its just that it seems so odd to hear people quote the king james version)

What does ;-)) mean? excuse my ignorance...?

You did say you found those verses, contradictory. which led me to believe you did not understand them... I fully understand why they sound as if they are, but of course they are not... as some were wrote before jesus,(old test.,) and some after.(new test.,)

I did not mean to upset you, please accept my apology.. sorry.
v

Viv,I was joking too;-))) About the mocking part. that is a wink!
Sorry,I was being sarcastic,One of my faults Im afraid:-))

I think you misread my last comment.

No way was I suggesting this young lady had not been a valuable member of her society in her short life.

However being dead there can be no doubt that that is an end to it and she certainly isn't going to be fulfilling any potential she might have had.

Sue

Roxanne,
I am so THICK, did'nt know that was a wink....

Sue,
I am 52 and still looking to fulfill my potential, any ideas where I can find some? where do they sell that?
v

Some musings on that Vivienne,

You've lived 30 years longer than 22 already and all being well you ought to live into your 80s. So you could perhaps have a life some 60 years longer than this girl Emma.

You sound like an interesting, thoughtful person who has presumably not been sitting at home doing nothing for the past 30 years. How many people's lives has yours affected in that time? Plenty I am sure. Have other lives been changed by your linking in some way with them?

I emphasise that I believe the quality of a life should be judged on its content not its length, but having a longer time does give more opportunity for good works and the chance to make a difference in the world.

Some people's lives are tragically cut short and we are especially sad when a young person dies for whatever reason. When an old person dies we feel it is easier to celebrate a life of achievements (and I don't mean simply material achievements).

As for looking for potential.....I think we can all try to make the best we can of our lives and if we have a dream we can at least go someway towards fulfilling it.

Sue