How might one convince a Jehovah's Witness to read "Crisis of Conscience?" (page 2)

Nickolas

Haha! Yeah right. From what I can tell , you wouldn't spend 33 years in any endeavor to have it end with white towel from your end of the ring.

Not thinking of throwing in the towel, sab, not on just letting it keep going on. My mind tries on the thought of ending my marriage almost on a daily basis. I love this woman more than life itself, but I'm just about done being #2 in her life.

Satanus is right. There are affairs of the heart and affairs of the head. Her faith in the Watchtower is not logical, and I think she realises that. Ding, that's brilliant.

added: I have the book in pdf, sab. If I got her to agree to read a small part of it she might do so but refuse to read any other parts on the basis that the first part did not strike her as truth, for whatever reason. No, this needs to be overwhelming. Her sensibilities need to be bludgened, shaken to their core, so that she finally opens up her eyes and sees clearly. If I could convince her to read it, I would seek a commitment from her that she would finish it all.

sabastious

It's a mystery Charlie Brown.

What is the right combination to her real self? The one that has been growing along side her every step of the way. I wonder how long ago she decided to stop listening.

-Sab

sabastious

Nick: you're not thinking about throwing in the towel? Even though you think about ending your marriage every day?

-Sab

sabastious

"Ending a marriage" and "Love renewed" could be interchangeable terms depending on choice. It's a rock and a hard place I would assume (since I have never been presented with such a choice).

-Sab

InterestedOne

Nick, for what it's worth, below is a response from my female JW friend when I suggested CoC. From what I can gather from her response, she doesn't put any stock in the "used car salesman" reasoning. It's not important to her. There is something that binds her to the org. Here is what she said:

Do these ex-Witnesses converge on their scriptural disagreements? or are they at odds with each other? have they formed their own church, or have they joined a church? surely, if they consider themselves truth-seekers in line with the scriptures, then they must have some special insight that the society does not have....are they doing the work that Jesus commissioned as outlined in the Bible? Are they preparing for Jehovah's day?
To me, its not about people's opinions, its about learning Bible Truth. Jesus said about Jehovah's word: "Your Word is Truth" (John 17:17)....also, that Truth will set us free from human opinions and disagreements and just general bad energy, which is what i consider the apostate propaganda. Apostates have been at it since the beginning...its all over the scriptures. Jehovah gives us Insight on how to spot them. its those weeds that Jesus was talking about. you will know them by their actions...

i can understand your reasoning for wanting to get a "well rounded view" of the organization. its logical. i guess you have to sort out what is most important to you...

Perhaps your wife has similar mental processes that keep her bound to the org. I am still bewildered by it and am at a loss.

Nickolas

The towel analogy depends entirely on the context, sab. I took you to mean giving in and accepting things as they are, which is what my wife really wants but what I cannot bring myself to do. Otherwise, yes, I suppose walking away is giving up. I have even pondered Witness My Fury's advice - threaten divorce - but it won't come to that. I subscribe to the philosophy of Sun Tzu who said "a threat is not a threat unless it is real". I will not threaten. I will just do. Nothing more real than that.

Nickolas

It seems to me, InterestedOne, that your friend is missing the point. This book was not written by some anonymous ex-Witness who has spiritual insights into things the Society does not have. He was the Society and his insights are not so much spiritual as they are historical. It was written by one of the very men who crafted what she holds to be Truth. If she dismisses what he has to say on this basis, she should dismiss what he had to say for the nine years he was a member of the Governing Body. She has sorted out what is important to her, but it is apparently not an examination of truth so much as a blind acceptance of what she is told to believe.

moshe

The Plan---Crisis of Conscience/ books on tape- boom box- on a boat in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico= she will have to listen to it at least once or swim to shore.

or- accept that some people will never leave the WT religion. My JW wife made it plain to me that she was choosing the KH and I was being discarded. Little did she know that she would decide to quit the KH herself in another 7 years or so- when it was convienent for her to leave on her terms and I wasn't standing over her saying- " I told you so". Had she not divorced me I am pretty certain she would still be in the KH- just for spite.

InterestedOne

Nick - I agree that truth is not her first priority. I think her first priority is the idea of unity and loyalty to the group. When I told her that the book was written by a man who was not only a GB member but also played a key role in developing the JW encyclopedia "Aid to Bible Understanding" that became the two-volume set that she looks things up in, "Insight on the Scriptures," she said there were teachers in the 1st Century who taught the "truth" at first but strayed from the organization. She said Paul warns to stay away from them, and do not pay attention to what they say. She assumes the book is just muckraking, stirring up trouble, bad energy, and causing divisions, even if it is written by someone who used to be at the top level of the hierarchy. As you pointed out, at the end of the day, she wants to blindly accept what she is told to believe because she feels loyalty to this particular group is her first priority. They did something to gain her trust, and I don't know what it is.

She even said, "even if they're wrong, I would still want to be part of this organization." I wonder if your wife feels this way. When I point out that she is being loyal to an organization, she says no, not really, because her loyalty is really to the Bible. She feels that the org is following the Bible more closely than any other org, even if they are wrong in some aspects. If I point out problems with their Bible interpretation, she says she will trust their interpretation and wait for them to clear it up. She has somehow become convinced that this group is more sincere in their efforts to understand and follow the Bible than anyone else. Maybe it's their supposed "sincerity" that binds her to them.

My study conductor's wife illustrated it like a marriage. She said if you are a loyal wife, you are going to remain tied to your husband even if he has made and still makes mistakes. You are also not going to read disparaging material about him, even if it is true. She said the relationship between a baptized JW and the org is kind of like that.

dissed

In one of your discussions ask her. "Do this for me. Read COC. And after reading it, you don't agree with me, I will never bring this stuff up again. I will put it too rest forever."

I don't know of anyone who would not view the WT the same again after reading COC, except for a GB member. And they don't count, because they already know how dishonest they are.

How might one convince a Jehovah's Witness to read "Crisis of Conscience?"

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