This Year's Memorial

by TD 33 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  TD

  Perhaps I'm just getting older and crankier, but it really seems to me that the JW faith is deteriorating at an accelerated rate.

  Case in point: This year's Memorial talk. It was one of the most incoherent messes I've ever heard. (And I've heard a lot of Memorial talks over the last 50 years....)

  Here are a few things that stood out:

  The speaker did not use the term, 'Great Crowd' even once. He even misquoted a Watchtower to avoid using the term.
  

  He used the term, 'Other Sheep' in apposition to 'Little Flock' but did not bother to explain where the term comes from or why it means what he thinks it means.

  The term, 'New Covenant' was heard only once when a scripture was read. No explanation was given.
  

  The concept of an 'Earthly Hope' was justified using only the restoration of prophecies of Isaiah, which is (gasp) TYPOLOGY. (i.e. Prophecies given to ancient peoples are made relevant to a modern audience via the vehicle of anti-typical fulfillment.)

  Nisan was consistently pronounced as, "Niacin." (i.e. Vitamin B3)

  The speaker had no clue how the Jewish calendar works and his only explanation for the date was the lame remark that, "..the governing body watches the moon."

  This was not merely a local yokel either. This was a speaker from Patterson.
  
• 

  freemindfade

  Wow. Awful

  the Isaiah thing was beat to death for us too. All I could think about was how lions aren't designed to eat grass. Lol
• 

  sir82

  Ooh, a "Bethel speaker".
  

  Don't you know that a "Bethel speaker" is, by definition, the best of the best? Consider yourself blessed.
  

  On a more serious note, they used to vet their outgoing speakers pretty carefully. I seem to recall they even had a special school to train Bethelites to be better speakers, for those who would be invited out as "Bethel speakers".

  If they are sending out guys like the one you describe, it seems that they may be running out of quality speakers.

  On the other hand, probably 80+% of the audience also don't know (nor much care) how to pronounce "Nisan", don't know how the Jewish calendar works, nor even the difference between the "great crowd" and the "other sheep". I'd venture to say their primary concerns were, in order:

  1) What are other people wearing

  2) Who are the people here whom I haven't seen since last Memorial

  3) Where are we going to eat afterward

  4) I hope I don't spill the wine on my clothes
  
• 

  TD

  On the other hand, probably 80+% of the audience also don't know (nor much care) how to pronounce "Nisan", don't know how the Jewish calendar works, nor even the difference between the "great crowd" and the "other sheep."

  I think you're probably right about that. I'm starting to think that nobody would bat an eyelash if a speaker openly taught the trinity.
  

  Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the outline for Memorial talks prepared in advance by writers at JW headquarters?

  If that's true, I think it does say something about how muddled their thinking has become if on one hand, they're trying to phase typology out, while on the other, they can't manage to justify the 'Earthly Hope' on anything else...
  
• 

  cofty

  .the governing body watches the moon

  Priceless!

  I am sure there are very few JWs who can still explain their own beliefs confidently. I think the dumbing down began with the release of the "Reasoning" book in the '80s.
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  Oubliette

  "..the governing body watches the moon."

  How astute of them. That makes sense because they're all lunatics!

  
  
  
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  Island Man

  The only good thing I noticed in this year's memorial is that the speaker did not opportunistically use the memorial of Jesus' death as a recruitment tool by inviting audience members to study the bible with JWs.
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  OUTLAW

  The speaker had no clue how the Jewish calendar works and his only explanation for the date was the lame remark that, "..the governing body watches the moon."

  This was not merely a local yokel either. This was a speaker from Patterson.

  LOL!!..That`s Hillarious!..

  I`ll bet most of the JW`s ate that up..

  They`ll use it in the "field service" then wonder why people think their nuts..LOL!!
  
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  ivanatahan

  It was quite lame. Our speaker said we'd do "exactly what the Bible tells us to do", read a scripture saying that we should eat the bread and drink the wine, but didn't. In fact, the only similarity I was able to notice was the presence of bread and wine and that we "prayed" before... well, before passing it around.
• 

  rip van winkle

  Maybe the brother has awakened.