During the week following our April 20 e-mail, discussion spread rapidly on the Internet, with hundreds or perhaps thousands of web surfers receiving the information. On April 27 the Watchtower Society finally responded with an official press release emphasizing the concessions made by the Bulgarian government:

It says:

Bulgaria has agreed to grant the Christian Association of Jehovah's Witnesses recognition as a religion. Bulgaria also agreed to create without delay a bill that will allow alternative civilian service for those whose conscience will not allow them to engage in military service. The agreement also includes an acknowledgment that each individual has the freedom to choose the type of medical treatment he receives. With the amicable settlement, the Witnesses agreed to withdraw their complaint against Bulgaria.

Jehovah's Witnesses are pleased that, through open communication, an amicable settlement was made between the Christian Association of Jehovah's Witnesses and the Government of Bulgaria. The terms of the agreement do not reflect a change in the doctrine of Jehovah's Witnesses. Rather, the agreement reflects an increased understanding of the concerns and actions of both parties.

When Jehovah's Witness spokesmen speak of "free choice" in connection with blood transfusions, military service, celebrating Christmas, or any other prohibited activity, they use the term with their fingers crossed, intending a hidden meaning different from what non-Witness listeners are hearing. They really mean that JWs can choose to do those things and accept the consequences of a judicial committee trial and disfellowshipping. It is like a robber with his gun to your head saying, "It's your free choice whether to hand me your wallet, but if you don't, I'm going to pull the trigger."

However, the agreement before the European Commission goes beyond the expression "free choice." It also adds, "without any control or sanction on the part of the association." This means that the JW leadership agreed to stop bringing violators before judicial committees — to stop disfellowshipping JWs who take blood.

Did the Watchtower Society view this agreement as "theocratic war strategy" (permissible lying to the enemy)? Or, did the Society believe that it could be confined to tiny Bulgaria, that news of the agreement would never 'leak' out to the rest of the world?

Or is their announcement implementing the agreement merely slow in coming?

Former JW Governing Body member Raymond Franz reports in his book that the Governing Body on June 11, 1975, lifted its ban on repeated use of Factor VIII (blood clotting fraction) by hemophiliacs, but did not publish the new policy until three years later in the June 15, 1978 issue of The Watchtower. (See Crisis of Conscience, pages 106-107.) Presumably an unknown number of JW hemophiliacs bled to death in the meantime. A similar delay in communicating the lifting of the sect's general ban on the medical use of blood would result in countless deaths, since even conservative estimates point to hundreds annually. (See Blood on the Altar pages 26-27 and Worse Than Waco: Jehovah's Witnesses Hide a Tragedy pages 10-11.)

Some observers believe the JW Governing Body will resort to trickery in Bulgaria—no longer disfellowshipping violators, but instead having the judicial committee declare that they "disassociated themselves" (as in the case of military service)—while throughout the rest of the world pretending that no such agreement was ever made.

Will the JW leadership add to their false testimony the additional offense of being "false to agreements" (Romans 1:31 NWT)? Time will tell.

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