Was there one family that ruled your congro?
Was it referred to as brother so and so congro?
If you married into that family were you automatically made an m's or Elder?
Did you have a dominant family in your congro??
by karter 22 Replies latest jw experiences
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R.Crusoe
This is an interesting notion IMO.
For converts -me aged 20ish - it can seem as though everyone is equal which forces someone like me who is an empath and INFP to feel everyone else feels the same as I do and falsely leads me to consider a reality which later proves to be a complete load of crock ( a perfectly cast circle of light which is in fact a complete illusion). Little did I know how all the smiles and non criticism hid such a plathora of complex opinion and underhand activities like Pandoras box and a can of worms were being hidden behind the curtain by the BOE from Oz as I walked up their yellow brick road.
Only later do you see how families of elders and one thing and another are all silently interconnected in ways noone ever speaks openly about!
All their claims about other organisations and religions being governed by greed money sex etc and that theirs is absent these is a complete hoax and the hidden will of everyone still simmers and expresses itself in more secret ways.
And the dominant family/lies have their social gatherings restricted and of to a finely honed routine just like all those they condemn who fequent bars in search of a social life. Rarely was I included in any social aspects - it's as if they control even that part of your life - to aspire to gey in their respectable social invitations in spite of the fact that you are now 'GODLOCKED'
Yes - the dominant families do enjoy their elevated status and no they do not include everyone as equals or help enable such an outcome! Again IMHO!
So even when I am effectively isolated from society it is a better place than being amongst them - how strange to hear myself say that - I can hardly believe it's how I feel about their deceptive shroud of an all consuming faith in dictatorial spiel!
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dinah
Those families that go back 3 and 4 generations are always put on a pedastal.
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momzcrazy
We had one in Utah that was very prominent when I was growning up . Two sons had gone to Bethel and their daughter pioneered. When their dad did Watchtower it was a joke with us because he only called on family.
When we moved from UT to TN there was a big family in our new hall. The four daughters were pioneers and their husbands elders, no kids. Nieces from another sister were pioneers also married to elders. The one niece's husband cheated and left her. Our good friend in his 30's moved from UT and they fell in love. All the time he was in UT he was never even an MS, but moved up the ranks quickly in TN. They are both pioneers and have gone to several international conventions.
momz
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MissingLink
Oh heck yes. When I was growing up it seemed every congregation in our area had a ruling family. They would make up at least half of the elders, and nobody would think of crossing them. Witness mafia.
One of my associates when I was a teen was a "prince" of one of these families. He basically had an arranged marriage (because nobody else was good enough) with a pioneer "princess" of a nearby congregation. Everyone called this the "royal wedding". It really was the most extravigant event I've been to. These families were also the ones with loads of money.
Both of these families got their money by employing half of the witnesses in their halls to do manual labor while they just sat back and collected the cash. Then they would use this power to control the congregation. I was working for one of them for a while and aux-pioneering. We were constantly asked how many hours we had in the misery. If it wasn't good enough - our work assignments would be cut (to lovingly give us more time for the ministry) and given to a more "spiritual" borther who was making his time. Also - your pay was based on your pioneer status. Regular pioneers earned more per hour than aux-pioneers, and in that congregation publishers were just bad association and not even in the mix.
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freeme
yeah, i had! a big one (around 30% of the cong was part of that family). and my sister married into it what gave me a bonus in becoming a ms. but i moved away before i was appointed.
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fokyc
In my wife's Congo. there is a dominant family which has several marriages into another dominant family!
Many of them are elders amd ms's, the wives are elderette's and wield some clout!
fokyc
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WTWizard
It wasn't quite that dramatic in our congregation, but there was one family that was heavily into it. When I went in, they were prominent. One was a regular hounder, and his wife would auxiliary pioneer once a year in October (occasionally, also in April). It seems that most of his brothers were witlesses as well (he did have one that remained worldly, though.) The mother was born in, with a mother that was also born in. The father was a recruit.
Then the 1990s happened. Soon into the 1990s, the mother started continually aux pioneering. Then, the children started home schooling. They also started cutting back on material things like cable (sure sounds like they like to stay on top of worldly things). During the 1990s, the father cut back to part time work, all the children (all two of them) grew up and started regular pioneering, and first the mother and then the father also regular pioneered. The father became the lead hounder about the time I started blowing off boasting sessions. And, they have been having a book study at their house as long as I can remember.
This family seems to have deeper roots than the Mafia. Originally in a European country (which one, I will not tell so they cannot identify who I am talking about or who's talking about them), some of them immigrated into the US. Of the ones I have seen, they must have at least 20 cousins that are in the cult. Notably, they have stayed in the same house (not rental) for more than 20 years. One of their brothers moved to a Western state. Another has a hard time staying in one spot more than about a year at a time (and has been in and out of the lie repeatedly, getting disfellowshipped but always working his way back to the lie). Notably, all of them have tried repeatedly to get me entangled in their family (one of them is the one that led me into the scam).
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R.Crusoe
Yeah missing link there was a similar set up I knew of where the guy with the business had family married to the overseer and another business run by one of the anointed!
Never did I get to know any of them at a social level due to my working long hours in a much harsher environment full of JW haters just to provide for my young family!
What a load of brown tongues these people of Jehovah were! No wonder I couldn't get my head around why my best was never good enough to earn their respect which they kept on about! Not enough hours street walking!
Total control of drip fed happiness!