Part of the reason I mentioned that one is acting like a JW had nothing to do with debating or asking questions. It was in demanding definitive answers to questions that neither science nor religion claim to have, and simplifying either or both approaches to life as if to say: “If one doesn’t have the answer then, logically speaking the other must.”
The original question to begin with presupposes a concept of God with attributes that aren’t easily defined theologically, let alone in scientific terms. Neither a dogmatic nor scientific definition was attached to any of the terms, and as pointed out by others, created the paradox of not being able to be answered on this very ground.
One of the reasons many of us may have ended up as Jehovah’s Witnesses involved the fact that it is quite empowering to believe that one has the answers to questions most others admit they do not have. The philosophy of the JW views not having a definitive answer to an important question as a failing and in some cases an evil. Their ideology abhors the vacuum of mystery. Therefore the Watchtower approach comes across very vacant and dry in comparison to other traditions in Christianity because it offers study in place of spiritual experience.
In reality, it is illogical to believe that complex questions support either one approach or the other, as if there were only two options. There are a myriad of options and ways of viewing questions like these. It is not just limited to science and religion. Neither are panaceas. But the ideology of the JW and people who are attracted to such a religious structure often oversimplify the problems in limiting what would qualify as a answer or solution. The “either prove God via science or God does not exist” is to say that only the scientific method can provide valid answers to anything and everything. Such a philosophy in itself is not the result of the scientific method.
Religion is about embracing the fact of mystery, not about finding answers to life’s questions (like the religion of the Watchtower is concerned with). Non-JW religion is about transcendence, not mere academic exercise. Self-discipline, meditation, contemplation, and mysticism are also fundamental facets of religious life, Christianity included. One doesn’t come to believe in God because of faith or mere belief. One comes to believe in God because of theophany.
Religion is not about self-fulfillment, it’s about letting go of a self-centered way of thinking and living. It is isn’t supposed to be about judging the non-believer or the believer of another faith. It’s about becoming part of the mystery of life. It’s about reaching and learning that which cannot be reached or learned by mere reason.
This is not to imply that any religious approach is true at the cost of the views of the atheist. On the contrary, the point I am concerning myself with is that Watchtower “brain-washing,” if you prefer that term, goes far beyond mere indoctrination. It goes to the point of limiting how one reasons, teaching people that one must have conclusive and exhaustive answers, and that adopting one approach requires the total rejection and demonizing of the other (not to mention that possibilities are simplified to “truth” and “un-truth,” right or wrong, black or white, with nothing in between and nothing beyond two choices possible). That mindset needs to be “cured” before one attempts at “finding answers” or getting involved in debates—these things DO have their place. But until one sees that the personality can be infected to this point, the questions and debates will be faulty, even moot, because they are based on a demand taught and inculcated by the Watchtower.
