I'm not exactly sure why I'm here...but then I doubt any of you have a better reason anyway. Christina, you sound like an honest straight-forward person that is not dealing with someone that is honest and straight forward, whether or not he is of the same religion as me or not. (incidently, i am a "cult" member apparently, aside of the fact that we are a legal organization with 6 million voluntary members worldwide...) No matter what denomination of christian a person is, he or she is no better than to the extent which they follow bible principles. This guy of yours...got himself in a sticky mess a long time ago, and compounded it and just made it all worse. but aside from your romantic troubles, i feel you should have the chance to do some true research about Jehovah's Witness from the source. Now, i'm not going to argue with any of these other people on here because for one, it is pointless, and two, it is pointless. (for emphasis) But if you want honest straight answwers, i will be happy to give them. You have expressed your religous standing, and I respect that. You came here because you had questions, and from your last comment, you have not gotten yoru answers. So feel free to email me at [email protected] A couple things I will say here though. Jehovah's Witnesses to not baptize babies. A person can only get baptized when he or she is able to make a conscious whole hearted decision as pertains his or her entire way of life. IN fact, not everyone can become one of Jehovah's Witnesses automatically. A "board" as you might say it, interviews the candidates to make sure they understand fully all that is required of them. No person can get baptized as one of Jehovah's Witnesses until they fully understand that they must follow bible principles such as those relating to relationships, and if they do not they will be removed from the congregation. This is expressly made known to the candidate. IN other words, if this guy of yours was baptized, he knew that he was not to have premarital sex, or he would be expelled. But my guess is, (i skipped a lot of hte messages so maybe I missed something) that he was raised as a Witness by his parents, but never dedicated himself and symbolized it by water baptism. I know many such people who have been associated with Jehovah's Witnesses yet not been entirely commited. The parents of such ones are completely torn. My brother and my dad were both expelled from the congregation for immorality, yet i keep in good contact with both of them, and they are making efforts to reestablish their relationship with the congregatoin. What you have to understand Christina, is that maybe we are way different from everyone, maybe you dont agree with everything, maybe a heck of a lot of people dont like us but just like any issue, you have the responsibility to find out all you can from EVERYONE, and look at the issue from all angles before you make a judgement. About the cult here...ha. I noticed one person said make no mistake it is a cult. Well, they know I certainly am not going to validate that, so they'd have to say that woudln't they? But dont take my word for it, don't take theirs. Do first hand research. Find out for yourself. And for goodness sake, this guy you are with is not qualified..he is way too mixed up to give you any good answers. So talk to the anti-Witnesses if you wish, talk to those indifferent, and talk to witnesses themselves, and see what YOU THINK is true. What I have been taught all my life as a Witness is to NEVER believe something just because someone says it. Do some fact digging. But make sure your source of facts is reliable. There are plenty of non-Witness sources which can give you statistical information. Encyclopedias. Go to your local library and see whats in the secular sources. Did you know that the first supreme court reversal came about by Jehovah's Witnesses? That was in the earlier part of the century. Could a "cult" (by definition, a relatively small group that follows a single individual) bring a case all the way to the supreme court? If you go to the library you will verify that. I will not come to this site again. You, Christina, are welcome to contact me via email.
Interfaith Relationship
by Christina77 66 Replies latest social relationships
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larc
Regina,
You must feel bad for this woman having to come here because of her pain. You must feel embarassed for this man who claims to be a Jehovah's Witness, and has fallen so far from the ideals and morality that he was taught. The two of them are in a downward spiral. I don't know the answer to their dilema.
Regina, is he just taking the easy way out? Is he just having a good time in the sack, and putting off the inevitable questions about marriage and responsibility? In short, is this man treating this woman like a live in whore? What are his motives?
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whatsthisabout
well here I am again. Suprisingly i got some honest responses. As long as I am not arguing with opposers I'll talk with reasonable inquiring minds. Ok there was question from Christina I missed: have any Witness that married an unbeliever Not been disfellowshipped? The answer is yes, many!! I know quite a few personally. Christina, the reason why most people get disfellowshipped is because they have sex outside marraige! Now if a person marries an unbeliever, but follows god's laws as far as morality, he or she will not be disfellowshipped. Christ advised his followers not to become unevenly yoked with unbelievers. A religiously divided household, as you have already experienced, is tough. Those around them are often hurt, and try to help them see why it creates difficulty, but the LAST thing family and friends want is for the person to voluntarily leave the congregatoin! (which is the option of some). And its not only witnesses who have sex with unbelievers that can get disfellowshipped. Witnesses that have sex with other witnesses outside marraige are disfellowshipped as well! In fact, that happens more often. No discrimination is shown. Now, about this disfellowshipping, it happens when a sinner is UNREPENTANT. There are many people, in fact most of us since we are all imperfect, that have sinned yet not been expelled from teh congregation, because they have shown a truly repentant attitude. But a deliberate unrepentant sinner MUST be expelled from the congregation, because we as christians must not condone activity that goes against God's laws, or we are guilty ourselves. A comment about Free Will...if you want information about the fire department, do you go to the police station? No, you go to the fire department! Free will is one of hte most important things Jehovah's Witnesses teach! People become witnesses of their own free will, and they are free to either continue following God's laws, and they are free not to. And moreover, they are aware of the rewards and consequences of both.
About this guy. Yes, it is always a great joy when people claim to be Witnesses yet to not follow their standards (sarcasm intended). Its a pain actually. This person has broken many bible standards, Christina. PLease do not think he represents Jehovah's Witnesses accurately. For one, he has unevenly yoked himself with an unbeliever, which has caused difficulty for himself, family, and the person he is involved with. Two, he has committed immorality, which he knows is against the standards of the religion he has been ascribing to. And finally and worst of all, he has been completely dishonest with the person and hidden his faith from her! God hates dishonesty. Now, if this guy is making serious efforts to reestablish his relationship with God and the congregation, his conscience is going to give him a heck of a hard time with all this, you better believe! I am sorry someone claiming to be a Witness has caused you pain, but I am not ashamed because this person has not followed God's standards, and does not represent those that do. Larc, the congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses welcomes those who sincerely want to live by God's standards, but it does not tolerate those who want the "best of both worlds". This guy cannot do one thing and say another, and be considered an official member of the congregation. It will not be allowed. Do you get my drift? I mean if he hides things..it will only be a matter of time! STuff is often hidden, and causes trouble like this...but once it comes out, disciplinary action is taken. -
whatsthisabout
Larc, he could be taking the easy way out, treating her as a "whore" as the case may be..I dont know. But anyone can do that regardless of their religion. That has nothing to do with his having been a witness. In fact, if he had been a real Jehovah's Witnesses, he would not have done it in the first place! Christina, if his parents are like most Witness parents I know...they are probably having more sympathy for you on account of their son than anything. There might be some hard feelings, they might consider you the source of their troubles. Parents have a tendency to not be logical when it comes to their children. But most likely, not, they probably realize it is their son that has caused all these problems. If you have the chance to talk to them, they might be able to shed more light on this than anyone.
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SixofNine
Whatsthisabout said:
. Do first hand research. Find out for yourself. ...do fact digging..
So, obviously, you haven't done much of that yourself; I wonder why are you recommending it for someone else? How do I know? I'm reasonably intelligent, you are reasonably intelligent, therefore, you haven't found out what I've found out. I'm sure you don't want to find out what I've found out. It will rock your small, young world. But for the good.
A starting point, rather than spouting irrelevant reasons why it just couldn't be a cult, first find out why intelligent, sincere people believe it is. Then if you disagree, you will be doing it on a logical basis, not an emotional "oh, it can't be" basis.
Of course you don't want to find out your life is based on fraud. The good news is, nothing bad automatically happens when you find that out. Some very good things do happen though.
And quit lying to people about free will & JW's, we all know better.
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whatsthisabout
You know that old saying, the more you know, the more you know nothing? Knowledge should make people humble. Not always true, but many times. I work in a library as an English tutor(very convenient) and my workmates and fellow students have learned enough to realize that they may be smart, but they're not smart enough to justify looking down their nose at anyone else. We argue religious things and yet show each other respect. We may not believe the same thing, but they have shown courtesy to me because of my beliefs, and I am glad to do likewise. Friends have explained to me the trinity, buddhism, whatever, and it didn't click with me, but I respect these people because THEY HAVE SOMETHING TO OFFER. They have their own beliefs that they can present to others and prove and defend. There are people out there though who would HAVE NO RELIGION if it weren't for other religions. If it weren't for their bashing other faiths such as mine, the jewish faith, and others, they would have nothing to say. I mean, its almost funny sometimes, people say we don't believe in Christ, we don't believe in free will, we made friends with hitler, (if we did, it didn't help us very much, we were in the camps too), we are communists... we're vampires that seek to steal your children who knows what else. Reminds me of anti-semitic propoganda. political campaigning. Some politician's commercials are like "Billy Williams is a jerk off he did this and this and a can of tomatoes, and moreover, he doesn't like Elvis Presley!" Mud-slinging. If people generally look down on mud-slinging campaigns, as most people do, why is it right for religions to do it?? You'd think they should set a better example. The worst part about mudslinging is that it attracts more attention, yet is not any more credible. And you hear people debating politics, those people who only criticize the status quo are criticized even more so in return for not having a solution to present! If I were to not become one of Jehovahs' Witnesses anymore, the religion I would look for would among other things 1)be carrying out Christ commission to make disciples 2)manifest love among themselves 3) encourage a peaceful attitude. Now, no one on this discussion board has offered anything like that. So far I've just seen a bunch of mudslinging. I have yet to see anyone present any alternative of theirs.
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Christina77
Well I finally did it, I gave him the letter that I wrote this morning. It really hurt and my heart felt like it was going to leap out of my chest, but it is done. And again he still did the "I don't know" crap. It has been 2 months and I expected him to be able to figure out what I needed to know and it just confirmed that he is too scared to look into what I need answered. I did find out that he is baptized, does go door-to-door and really does believe it as true. (Yet then why would he be with me and breaking those beliefs) He aslo said that he leaves the literature out in the open to remind himself about what he has to do, and that it is not for me. That he isn't pushing anything on me, and he isn't planning on converting me that it is a long and tedious process that can't be done quickly. He keeps saying that he thought that the problems would work itself out, but if he doesn't act upon anything... how can it. He said that I can read some of their books to explain it. That doesn't help, I told him that they are confusing and that I had already read books on the subject. He said that they weren't from the organization and wouldn't be true. So he said that we would watch videos together the next time I came over (that is just going to be weird). He also started to say that he can show me where the scriptures tell the truth and I didn't want that. I don't want to discuss scripture, for I believe what I think is true and the same with him. I don't want to argue over the matter, because that is the only thing that it will lead to. Obviously he can't explain it to me, which I want him to. I told him that he has to come clean, that it has been too long without his family knowing about me. I really don't think the letter helped the situation, but at least it got my feelings out in the open and hopefully he will do the right thing.
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Christina77
And also... What would happen if I was to get pregnant by him? Especially before we get married? He said it was bad, but how bad? We only rely upon my pills and they aren't 100% effective on preventing pregnancy.
Even though it is bad in my religion, my priest even visited me in the hospital when I had my daughter and was so happy that I didn't get an abortion. Nothing was even mentioned that I had sinned, just as long as I raised my daughter in the faith and got her baptized ASAP.
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SixofNine
Whatsthisabout,
To get away from untruth, one does not have to "replace" anything, simply reject the untruth. You can write clearly, so you're smart enough to figure that particular truth out. I suggest you learn it well.
Now then, you arrogant little girl, humble thyself. The most arrogant ex-witness I have come across, is, in a very important way, less arrogant than the most humble witness. That is because they don't go about with such a tenacious grasp on claiming "truth" for their opinions, or, worse yet, the opinions of a few meanspirited old white men in brooklyn. Sorry babe, that is not the spirit of humility, no matter how much that word is bandied about in the congregation.
And while I'm not so sure of the nature and reality of Christ anymore, I have and advocate actual Christian freedom. Someday, you will come to appreciate Christ' words more than Paul's or the gov body's interpretations and end-runs around His words, and you will see just how important Christian freedom, in fact, just plain freedom, is for humans. All humans, men & women. So yeah, I HAVE SOMETHING TO OFFER.
I mean, its almost funny sometimes, people say we don't believe in Christ, we don't believe in free will, we made friends with hitler, (if we did, it didn't help us very much, we were in the camps too), we are communists... we're vampires that seek to steal your children who knows what else. Reminds me of anti-semitic propoganda. political campaigning.
I'll tell you what is funny: that you know these accusations, and you ridicule them, but you DON'T know the facts behind them. I'd say arrogance has kept you from doing your research.Yep sista, I think we're going to have to keep working on humility for a bit before I feel comfortable signing off on that pioneer form. But don't think of this as punishment, Jah disciplines those he loves.
Christina77, may I just reiterate? What is so wrong with you that you feel the need to be in a relationship with such a weasel? And please, don't act as if I'm being unkind, you have basically told us what he is like, and you have described a weasel.
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Christina77
SixofNine -
The reason is that I fell in love with a man that I thought had no religious affiliations. He was someone that loved me back unconditionally, someone that was very careing, someone that looked at me for who I was and didn't hurt me. I had no clue that he was a witness. And believe me, if he doesn't take matters into his own hands very soon, I will leave him. And that will be very hard for me to do. I can understand why he is a weasel, and it makes me annoyed. But I did forgive him. You are just being accurate, I don't take it as being unkind. I am not here for anyone to be kind to me. I take whatever I am given (yet the "whore" comment from larc wasn't very nice).