I left the watchtower cult because the JWs could not live up to my standards.
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ammunity
by BR25 24 Replies latest jw friends
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Tuesday
Eh, whatever I'll admit I thought alot of the rules were stupid and that's why I left. I think ones regarding personal appearance are stupid. I'm in one of the largest companies in the world, but I can still have my ears pieces, tattoos, and long hair. I work with older folks who don't look at me any differently than anyone else. I still get promoted to management positions, in fact every job interview I've been on with long hair I've gotten the job. Appearances don't mean a thing.
However since getting out of the witnesses for that reason and started living my life I realized there's alot more to it than that. I can't be a witness because I don't believe in shunning. My philosophy in life comes from Abraham Lincoln "When I do good I feel good, when I do bad, I feel bad". Shunning another person because they sinned would make me feel bad, so I won't do it. If I had to argue the point now I'd say "I'd rather have a repentant sinner in my midst than an unrepentant liar".
I can't agree with the thought there should be two witnesses to disfellowship someone, somethings are just too harsh of a crime to wait for two witnesses. My main argument stems there off of child molestation, check out silent lambs for more on that.
I can't tell people that this is the last generation on Earth because of more earthquakes, pestilence, wars and all that jazz, because it's not true. There aren't more earthquakes or natural disasters. There were times on Earth where there were more wars, and food shortages. I'd be lying.
I don't believe that everyone who isn't a witness will be destroyed at armageddon. I've known too many horrible witnesses and too many good worldly people. In fact I'm a more giving and charitable person now that I'm out of the witnesses.
There's a few other issues like the idea of a faithful and discreet slave that are spirit directed. The qualifications for the FDS if I remember correctly were in one of the 1990 Watchtowers where they say in 1919 (apparently that's when Jesus was looking for an orginization to represent him, like he hadn't done that previously, just all of a sudden in 1919 he felt the need to) that the qualifications is that they needed to be free from spiritism and they needed to be neutral. Which at that time they were selling Warbonds and they were distributing a book called Angels and Women. So even according to THEIR OWN standards they're not the faithful and discreet slave.
There's alot of stuff like that which I found out that I simply can't go back now because I know I wouldn't be able to just push all that back because SOME of the principles are right. And even then, the right principles are skewed in some warped way.
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Nathan Natas
For a janitor, you have a fangrocious vocabulari, BR25.
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anewme
The Watchtower Society's invention of five weekly meetings plus field service was fine with me until my husband broke his neck and became a quadriplegic. Now you take that same lame unbiblical schedule and add such a tragic personal loss and effort to participate fully, and you have two desperate unhappy people trying for all their worth to qualify for Jehovah's blessing to make it to the paradise so their horrible troubles will be taken away from them.
Years and years of meetings and van breakdowns through wind and rain and snow storms, pushing a wheelchair to the kingdom hall, having accidents out in service, having medical emergencies while in service, contracting pneumonia while going door to door, poverty, sacrifice, tracking mud and dirt into the newly light blue carpeted kingdom hall on rainy winter nights.....
And for what? To find out at almost 50 years of age to slow down is considered a LACK OF FAITH????
This was madness!! Both of us were sick and tired, but how can you slow down? The pressure is to PRESS ON and DO MORE NOT LESS!!! My elder quad husband wanted to do MORE as his health declined and bladder cancer crept into our lives. Im sure his goal was to DIE FAITHFUL!!! (But I did not want to die with him!!!)
The lack of balance and pleasure and time together was immense in our marriage and our lives.
I dont know any other organization or religion who would place that kind of pressure on a poor handicap couple. But you see it all the time in that Watchtower Cult. The disabled are to fend for themselves and try to keep up the pace as best they can. They are left to feel guilty for not doing so because The Cult is so WORKS ORIENTED!
So to answer your question, I wish I had immunity from the meetings and field service. I wish the religion I was recruited into as a naive 17 year old had been more like other churches and just had one inspiring happy Sunday meeting and preached that salvation was the result of faith and love in your heart for God and your neighbor (which we possessed in abundance!)
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daystar
If you were allowed to grant yourself one ammunity that you could have done that abided by the rules what would be your ammunity?
First, I am having a very hard time understanding just exactly what you're asking here. How does one "do" an immunity? And how could one "do" an immunity that abided by the rules of the religion? Are you asking for JW "rules" that I would have chosen to be immune from? If so, how can that immunity abide by the rules? A little confusing.
So, if that could be clarified I think I could provide a better answer.
Though I do get the feeling, as others apparently do, that you are of the opinion that people who leave just don't like the rules, or think they're too hard to follow. This would be a mischaracterization generally, though I'm sure there are exceptions.
Self-discipline is a requirement for any person in developing their character. I have no problem with rules. But when those rules are used to the detriment of the individual, of familes, of the hearts and souls of those who are to be held to them, I have a problem with them. There are good rules and bad rules. Many, many of the doctrinal rules of the WBTS are very detrimental to the psychological well-being of its constituents.
"The name of sin is restriction." When a person is so tightly bound by "rules" which are unnatural, which so many of the WBTS' rules are, they tend to develop into very nasty psychoses, neuroses, etc. which often then explode in very unbalanced ways. And when these rules (laws) are held to in such a draconian fashion, with little regard to specifics and nuances of a case, they cannot be held to fairly.
The human soul, very naturally, desires to be free. Self-discipline should be developed and used to guide the natural power we each have, as "Children of God" if you will, towards noble goals and causes. But when any bureaucracy, which assuredly the WBTS has become, reaches a certain point, the human soul will tend to revolt. This is the way God, Jehovah, made us, and is not due to any other influence.
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journey-on
I would like to be immune from having to sit and listen to the convoluted twisting of scripture to fit a doctrine. (See "Are Cats for Christians". This little piece of writing says it all.)
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Fe2O3Girl
If I could have chosen my friends, even the person I fell in love with, with impunity, I might have stayed.
But that would not have made it the true religion.
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BR25
FIRST OF ALL SORRY FOR THE SPELLING, I DIDNT KNOW YOU HAD TO BE A GREEK SCHOLAR TO POST ON HERE. TWO I HAVE SAID ON A POST BEFORE I HAVENT BEEN TO THE MEETINGS FOR ABOUT 5 YEARS OR SO FOR THOSE WHO SAY I AM NOT ALLOWED TO POST.
3. I NEVER SAID IT WAS ALL ABOUT THE RULES. I JUST WANTED TO ASK YOUR OPINION I WASNT TRYING TO DO IT IN A JUDGEMENTAL WAY, SO I WILL GIVE YOU AN EXAMPLE. I STARTED DOING BASICALLY WHAT I WANTED AT AGE 16 AND I PLAYED SRORTS. BUT IF I DIDNT PLAY SPORTS THAT WOULD BE MY IMMUNITY.
I WAS JUST TRYING TO START A THREAD YOU WOULD THINK WAS FUN.IM ALWAYS ARGUING WITH EVERYONE HERE, SO I THOUGHT I WOULD TRY SOMETHING DIFFERENT. I DIDNT DO THIS FOR FOR JUDGEMENT REASONS I JUST THOUGHT I WOULD BE FRIENDLY FOR A DAY. SOME OF YOU ARE COOL TO TALK TO SO I DIDNT THINK I WAS GOING BLASTED FOR IT. YOU ALL KNOW THAT THIS IS A QUESTION THAT I SHOULDNT HAVE ASKED ANYWAYS AS REGARDS TO BELIEFS SO GIVE ME AN A FOR EFFORT.
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BR25
I left out the words to get before the word blasted before anyone says anything
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poppers
Easy there, BR25. Take a deep breath and relax. All that's happening are a bunch of black squiggly lines going through cyberspace. No need to let it get to you.