theyoungone: i would say at least 75% or more are happy but most people in the world are not happy. Y?
First off, welcome. I hope you stick around. You have a LOT to learn about reality.
Secondly, you have chosen a very appropriate name. I will make some positive assertions:
(1) You are not an elder.
(2) You have been raised as a JW.
(3) If you are a male and ever become an elder, your assessment of how many JWs are happy will change dramatically. Ask the elders in your congregation and watch their faces for hesitancy in answering. That will tell you all you need to know.
(4) You do not know "most people in the world" and you are not qualified to determine their relative happiness even if you did.
(5) You do not know "75% or more" of Jehovah's Witnesses (somewhere in the neighborhood of 4 or 5 million) and you are not qualified to determine their relative happiness even if you did.
(6) You clap at conventions when they talk about Jehovah's Witnesses being the happiest people on earth, without knowing that EVERY Christian religion says that about themselves, and their adherents clap, too.
More to the point: Is happiness a determinant of whether a teaching is true or false? Is finding happiness the goal of Christians?
Allow me an analogy: If I go to the doctor complaining of chest pains and the doctor examines me and says I don't have heart trouble, that would make me happy. But if the doctor only told me that to make me happy, I would not change my diet, I would not change my exercise, I would not change anything as a result of his diagnosis. What if I did have heart trouble, and the doctor knew it? I would be happy, but would it be truth that made me happy, or a lie?
A lie. A lie is not the truth.
For instance, either the Bible teaches that persons MUST preach prior to Christian baptism, or it does not. Consider the accounts in Acts of the Ethiopian eunuch (chapter 8), Cornelius (chapter 10), the 3,000 in one day (chapter 2), Lydia and the Philippian jailer (chapter 16). Once you have done that, ask yourself whether the Bible teaches that persons MUST preach before Christian baptism.
Then consider this: Did the persons who wrote the book What Does the Bible Really Teach? research the Bible when they wrote it? Surely, they did. Where did they find any evidence in the Scriptures during their research that indicated preaching prior to baptism is a requirement for Christian baptism when writing Chapter 18 of that book?
Then ask yourself: What do you call it when someone intentionally says a thing they know to be untrue, and tries to convince people that it is true?
I call it a lie. Not a lie that will make people unhappy, unless they discover the lie. But whether or not anyone figures out that it is a lie, it remains a lie. An actively taught, current lie. That your religion asks you to teach in the name of Jehovah. I dno't expect you to be happy about that.
Why do you expect I would be happy to find out that the religion ALL of my family are in, and to which I devoted a sizable chunk of my life, teaches lies? That isn't something that would make anyone happy. Of course, I don't seek truth in order to be happy. I seek truth in order to "know the truth." It has been said that "ignorance is bliss" and I do not know whether there is merit to the statement. But I do know that the initial reactions to finding out that I have believed intentional lies is righteous indignation and pain at my own foolishness and the loss of my family. Nnoe of these make me particularly happy.
But, I believe that God is a spirit. And those worsipping him MUST worship with spirit AND TRUTH. (John 4) Do you believe that? I believe that NO ONE can take away my integrity. Do you agree?
If so, you better make very certain that you aren't teaching happifying lies to other people just because your religion tells you to teach the lies.
Respectfully,
AuldSoul
