AUSTRALIA
7 News
By Annette Blackwell
August 4, 2015
A Jehovah’s Witness official says the church’s stance to never let women hold decision-making roles compares to Muslim and Aboriginal people adhering to their own ancient beliefs.
Rodney Spinks, who advises church elders on how to handle child sex abuse cases, told the sex abuse royal commission on Tuesday women would never make decisions in the Jehovah’s Witnesses because it would mean changing a “clear scriptural arrangement”.
Commission chair Peter McClellan said the practice did not fit with current understandings of responses to child sex abuse and asked if women could become decision makers because victims often preferred to tell their intimate stories to women.
Mr Spinks said there was no possibility that would happen because the church would not adjust what it saw as “clear instructions” in the Bible.
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