Ray was given the task of collaboratively writing the ‘Aid to Bible Understanding’ – the first religious encyclopedia published by Jehovah’s Witnesses. “We continued in traveling work until 1961 and then were transferred to the neighboring Dominican Republic… During our nearly five years there, we saw the fall of four separate governments and in April of 1965 experienced a war that centered around the capital where we were located” – Crisis of Conscience,, paragraphs 3 & 4.Įventually, Franz was assigned to the writing department at the Watch Tower headquarters in Brooklyn, New York. Together they continued their missionary work from 1959 to 1965, in Puerto Rico, the British Virgin Islands, and the Dominican Republic. A wave of violent persecution resulted in many local Witnesses being brutally beaten and imprisoned.įinally in 1959, when Franz was 37 years of age, the Watch Tower lightened its’ stance on marriage, and Raymond married Cynthia Marie Badame, a graduate from the 28th class of Gilead. ![]() In 1957, the Society asked Franz to check on the native Witnesses in the Dominican Republic, since all the American missionaries of the Witnesses had been expelled. The policy was: Loss of singleness meant loss of assignment. Before leaving, the third president of the Society, Nathan Knorr, warned that if Franz and the other young men serving as branch overseers wished to remain in their missionary assignments they were to avoid anything that might lead to courtship and marriage. ![]() ![]() Judge Rutherford, who had had some lung problems, spent the winters there during his life.įranz was eventually assigned to Puerto Rico as a branch overseer. This was a large home built by the Society and said to be ‘held in trust’ for the faithful men of old, from Abel onward, to be used by them upon their resurrection. While in San Diego, California, Franz spent five nights at ‘Beth Sarim’ (meaning ‘House of Princes’). He attended Gilead, graduating from the 3rd class in 1945 served as a special pioneer and traveled in the circuit work. Fred Franz had promoted 1975 as the end of a system of things, and that he had been instrumental in driving his nephew out of the Watch Tower.įrom 1944 to 1965, Raymond served on many assignments in the US and South America. Fred Franz was influential in the religion’s development, practices and doctrines and later became the fourth president of the Watchtower Society. His uncle, Frederick Franz, was a member of the Watch Tower headquarters staff and was a close associate of the Watchtower’s second president, Judge Rutherford. He was a member of the Governing Body from Octoto May 22, 1980. He served at the organization’s world headquarters for fifteen years, from 1965 until 1980. He entered the full-time service in 1940, upon graduating from high school and becoming a special pioneer in 1942. ![]() His frankness, honesty and integrity have proven to be a vital link in helping tens of thousands of people come to know the real truth about the Watch Tower organization and Jehovah’s Witnesses.īorn on May 8, 1922, Raymond Franz spent his early years in association with Jehovah’s Witnesses, becoming a baptized member in 1939. Grace, integrity and willingness to help others – all qualities used to describe Raymond Victor Franz. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.” – John F. “The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie - deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic.
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