The Watchtower Society's "Spiritual Paradise"

by Honesty 13 Replies latest jw friends

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  ozziepost

  In retrospect, I can't believe I didn't question this nonsense when I was an active Witness. Spiritual paradise? What on Earth gives the GB the idea that there is any scriptural support for the notion that "God's people" live in a spiritual paradise. What a bunch of horsesh*t!

  I fell into the trap of false logic. They convinced me that I could use a process of elimination to determine that JWs were the one true religion. JW don't go to war. All other religions condone war (not true, by the way). Therefore, JW are the true religion. They played the same game by comparing their stance on the Trinity, hellfire, immortal soul, etc. What I never stopped to realize is that, by using other criteria, I could eliminate the JW religion from being the one true religion as well. False predictions, never-ending doctrinal flip flops, changing policies and doctrines to gain favor from the world's governments and avoid potential lawsuits, the Pharisaic written and unwritten rule book governing virtually every aspect of a person's life that the Bible sets no rules for, the prohibition on reading anything critical of the religion, all of these criteria and more eliminate the JWs from being the one true religion as they claim to be. They're willing to apply that test to "Christendom," but not to themselves. Hypocrites!

  Oh, how I agree! In fact I had an example of this 'false logic' just the other day. It was my very elderly mother's birthday and her wedding anniversary. (Mum is a devout JW for the past almost 60 years.) Since Dad died in recent years, I knew she'd be feeling particularly sad, so I rang her, despite knowing I'd probably be abused once again for being a follower of Satan! Anyway, she didn't hang up on me as she's supposed to (I wonder why??) but proceeded to tell me how I needed to "come back to Jehovah" (did I ever leave him?) before it's too late, that the Anglican Church is clearly (to her) part of false religion and since I'm Anglican (huh? Am I? I thought I was a christian who attends an Anglican Church), then I should come back to the dubs. She went on to tell me examples of wrongs by people of the Anglican church and so the Anglcan Church (as an organisation) clearly was part of "Satan's organisation™". I stopped her momentum when I replied that the same logic could be applied to the Watch Tower organisation and that in my view she was part of Satan's organisation and needed to come out of it!! Asking her her thoughts on the new changed doctrine about the calling of the 144,000 drew a blank - she'd no knowledge of it! I suspect that many dubs are oblivious to the significance of what is being taught them.
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  Mum

  Someone once said, "The mind is its own place. lt can make a hell out of heaven, a heaven out of hell," or words to that effect.

  About 12-15 years ago, there was a cult leader named Vernon Hawley aka David Koresh, near Waco, Texas who had his followers in a compound where they were ruled with an iron hand. Men and women were not allowed to have sex with their spouses. When little girls turned 13 or so, they were given a plastic star of David to wear which signified they were ripe for Koresh to have sex with them.

  Many of you remember the tragic outcome of the cult's standoff with the FBI. Most orf the members were burned up, including Koresh himself, despite the fact that he had underground tunnels dug to escape just in case of such an eventuality.

  Later, I read that the children who survived were asked to draw pictures of the compound. Most of them drew pictures that looked like heaven or paradise. Brainwashing is effective. Make no mistake about it. It takes a couple of years for most people to recover after leaving or escaping. There are many "spiritual paradises" popping up every day. The best thing we can do is educate ourselves and those we care about so they will not be taken in by any of them.

  Regards,

  SandraC
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  stapler99

  I remember feeling guilty because I wasn't happy enough. `Start living forever now!' is one phrase I remember from a convention. I thought that if only if I had spent more time in `personal study' then this `spiritual paradise' could become a reality.

  However this sort of talk did make the promised future paradise seem less attractive, by equating to the miserable now.

  That said, I do believe that there was something of a friendly atmosphere within the JWs. I.e., they have a strong group identity, causing each to view the other much more favourably than a worldly person. I liked the fact that if you visited another congregation then persons would be friendly to you just because of this.

  Of course this was balanced by antipathy towards the masses of humanity (personally, my field service was never motivated by `love'), and the fact that non-Witnesses can be friendly, too.
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  Robert222

  I was at a disadvantage because I had no choice. I was raised in the truth and the spiritual paradise. When you grow up and actually break out of the cult you realize they are selfish people, only counting time door to door to save themselves. I never understood if they cared so much about their neighbor, why they had to count time and mags and brag in the KH how spiritual they are because of their magazine distribution? They also love to trot off to mtgs all week showing up their neighbor as if they are something special. If you actually go to a meeting it is mindless, no substance, and normally a sales mtg on how to convince outsiders to join up. The spiritual paradise is fake.

  Ask any one of the hypnotized JWs to face reality, face today, face that they are slaving for a billion dollar corporation, and see what answers you get. They either panic and run calling you apostate, or they have a mental breakdown and have to be hospitalized.