by GiveMeAnAspirin 20 Replies latest jw friends
HI, I am a Catholic. I've never been a JW nor ever tried to become one but I know a number of former JWs and one or two current/active JWs.
I've been wondering why active JWs are so anti-catholic; is it part of the teaching they receive in the Watchtower?
Cheers
PS: I am from Australia.
GIVEMEANASPIRIN- Welcome to the board ! Nice to have you here. Jehovah's Witnesses are told to not approve ANYTHING outside of the JW religion - so don't take it personally. The WT society teaches them that ALL other religions outside of Jehovah's Witnesses are " false " religions- Catholics included. They feel they are the ONLY approved religion by God. It's pretty self absorbed of them
GiveMeAnAspirin, Welcome!
Catholocism is being used to validate the JW/Watchtower agenda. It's all about pointing out others' shortcomings to prop up their qualities (?) to prove they are God's Chosen and The Truth. JWs are not self-aware. They look outward instead of inward. They have many problems.
My maternal grandfather was Catholic and converted to JW because of the sexual misconduct of the nuns and priests and subsequent discovery of the bodies of aborted babies from the nuns at Nun's Island in Montreal, Quebec back in the 1950s (maybe earlier?). Many Catholics left and converted to JWs at that time.
Give me an Aspirin: I am not a witness either, and I was a devout Catholic.
After a while, you'll find that the Watchtower really despises the Catholic Church. My guess is that it is the largest church yet, and so it is their biggest competitor, but I also think that there are many similarities in the way the Watchtower works that make it perhaps easier for a witness to dupe a Catholic into the society. Both are vertical organizations. If you read about the Watchtower for a while, you will find that "je ne se quoi" that sort of makes you feel at home.
Hi GiveMeAnAspirin
Welcome to the forum.
My parent's favourite pastime is Catholic bashing.
If they ever leave, I'm sure their favourite pastime will still be Catholic bashing.
I know where they get it from. The WT material back when they joined was loaded with just that.
The WT has done a very good job of 'poisoning the well' over the past decades. E.g., leaving JWs often still bash Cathoilics because they are Trinitarian, but very few even know what the doctrine is, and they are so confused by the WTs definition of the Trinity that it is extremely difficult for them to understand it, no matter how simply you explain it.
Cheers
Chris
Welcome, GiveMeAnAspirin!
I am a Catholic.
So am I, again. I was away from the faith for about 35 years, and was the "unbelieving mate" of a JW for about half that time. I returned to the faith after she divorced me.
I've been wondering why active JWs are so anti-catholic; is it part of the teaching they receive in the Watchtower?
Yes, it is part of the teachings. Their anti-Catholic stance (anti-mainstream-religion in general, as Flipper points out) became entrenched under their third president(*), lawyer J. F. Rutherford. He was anti-almost-everything but reserved particular vitriol for Catholicism. He was the one who stopped calling the followers "Bible Students" and introduced the name "Jehovah's Witnesses".
Recommended reading: A Catholic Critique of Jehovah's Witnesses. This details their beliefs, and confirms what most people on this forum say about them.
It used to be the Catholic Church by the JW organization was the most despised religion, maybe even more than Muslim, etc. Now more despised are ex-JW (us) or what they name as "apostates."
I've been wondering why active JWs are so anti-catholic; is it part of the teaching they receive in the Watchtower?
Four main reasons:
All those beliefs are abhorred and tabooed by Jehovah's Witnesses.
-Sab
Hello and welcome,
I'm from Australia too (NSW). I was a born-in JW and looking back, it was unbelievable how much the JW religion bashed the Catholics.
My feeling is that it's because the Catholics view themselves as being the "only true religion", yet the JWs feel they are the "only true religion" so maybe it's due to a feeling of competitiveness?
Hi GiveMeAnAspirin,
Welcome to the forum.
The Watchtower's 2nd (official) President, Joseph Rutherford, really had a thing against Catholics (aounrd Late 1910's to mid 1940's)
These days though, the Watchtower does not really single out one religion over another, considering every other religion false. JW's (at least the ones I know) do not personally hate any religions in particular. They mainly feely that all other religions mislead people from "the truth".
I have been reading Eusebius: A Church History, and it is interesting to see how the Catholic religion developed in the early centuries.
