Jehovah's Witness and Catholic Priest Fight

In Fort Worth, Texas, a Jehovah’s Witness accused a Catholic Priest of assaulting him after he knocked on his door, but the priest says it was the other way around.

Father John Parnell, a priest at the St. Augustine Mexican Catholic Church says he was attacked by Jehovah’s Witnesses, whom he said dragged him out of his house and down the street where they beat him.

According to Father Parnell Jehovah’s Witnesses have been frequenting his church passing out religious literature. The priest said that a group of Jehovah’s Witnesses entered the St. Augustine Mexican Catholic church during Mass on Easter and started handing out literature to people attending the Mass.

When Jehovah’s Witnesses visited his home recently, Father Parnell said a man entered his home and began to tell his daughter that she was going to be burned into the eternal fires of Gahanna if she didn’t listen to what he had to say. Father Parnell said when he attempted to escort the men out of his house, one of the men knocked his Bible to the floor, telling the priest, “This place is teaching lies and I am here to bring you the truth.”

The priest said he was tired of Jehovah’s Witnesses coming into his church, and said the incident at his home was the match that lit the fuse. Father Parnell said that during his encounter at home the two men pulled him out of his home and dragged him down the street where they beat him.

But according to a neighbor who claims he saw the whole incident, it was the other way around. The witness, whose name is Harry Dwinell, says he saw the Catholic Priest hit the Jehovah’s Witness. “The next thing you know, there was a haymaker that came out of left field there and went down the side of his face.”

The priest was taken to the hospital in an ambulance and says he has witnesses that would agree with his story.

Almost everyone who lives in a city in America has had at least one encounter with a Jehovah’s Witness. I am neither Catholic nor Jehovah’s Witness but I will say that in my personal experiences with Jehovah’s Witnesses this story does not depict the character of a Jehovah’s Witness. Although they will defend their faith with scriptures from their own Bible, and can sometimes be on the offensive, I have never had a Jehovah’s Witness tell me that I would burn in hell because I disagreed with their doctrine or argue with me to the point of physical blows concerning what they believe or do not believe.

It is a disgrace that anyone who professes to believe in a supreme being, like an almighty god, would form the opinion that such a being is unable to be in control. Such behavior is the result of an individual’s personal agenda and not that of the god whom they profess to serve.

This is America people, and according to the law of the land, which is the Constitution of the United States, everyone is entitled to their own opinion and are granted the freedom to worship as they please. In case we forgot, that is why the Pilgrims came to America.

We should understand that this freedom of speech will not protect us when we provoke violence. I believe it would be offensive for any Christian to enter a Mosque, disrupting a Muslim worship procedure and pass out Christian literature. Likewise I believe it to be offensive for a Jehovah’s Witness or any other religious group to disrupt a Catholic Mass.

By the same token, the Catholic Priest, being provoked by the Jehovah’s Witness had no right to punch the Jehovah’s Witness, or if it were the other way around, the Jehovah’s Witness had no right to punch the priest.

I certainly would not be a part of any religion that teaches violence. We are already violent within ourselves and our religion is supposed to make us all the better. One who practices such action is worthy of being called a ‘Religious Taliban’.

When are we going to learn that we cannot terrorize or force another to take on our personal beliefs? Will we become Bible carrying suicide bombers in the name of our faith? The false wisdom of religion says to an individual, ‘My way is the right way.’

But here is true wisdom: ‘When it is all said and done, only the God of gods will judge and rule.’