Priests Have Problems, Too

Those who have had harsh treatment from the Exclusive Brethren in the past may find it difficult to believe and accept the impact recent developments have had.

I can remember a time when anyone wanting to be taken seriously would have to be as harsh in practise as they were loving in speech. It was a form of oneupmanship to be intolerant of small infractions, and ready with severe consequences for anything that might warrant them in case someone else proposed them first and got the credit for adhering to the principles. No doubt many on the outside would wince at similar recollections.

The easing of a few years ago has mostly worn off, as can clearly be seen. But the effects are more subtle than an observer might think.

That period had many people rattled who thought they knew how the system worked. You see a sin, you deal with it. But suddenly it became a sin to deal with a sin wrongly. Some got into serious trouble for doing what, a few years previously, had been the right and obvious thing to do. Retrospectively, it became more important to deal with the person than the sin. This was when many past actions were undone.

Now it's a lot harder. Knowing that any action they take could be examined in future, and that it would almost always be possible to think of a better action to take (hindsight being like that), people are understandably very wary. If you could equally be hammered for taking unnecessary action as for not taking action when you could, suddenly you'd better be very sure what you're doing. So it's an easier course to stand back and wait. Or, for very troubling cases, ask what to do. It's no longer enough to protect the position; you must do that AND make the offender see the error of their ways, all while offending nobody.

That's a tall order.

It may explain my position, too.

The odd thing is that now that's how things are done, all at once it's the way things have always been done whenever they were done right. History, for brethren, is very malleable like that.