fascinating Quendi thanks for sharing , I learned something there myself from you about the date of when Revelation was written.
A Real and Authentic Letter from a Jehovah's Witness Mother to Her Son
by God_Delusion 26 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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MidwichCuckoo
Very sad. And what's almost as sad is that I'm not shocked.
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Quendi
@ jookbeard: I'm starting another thread with respect to the book of Revelation. You can find it here:
http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/watchtower/beliefs/227586/1/The-WTS-and-the-Book-of-Revelation
Quendi
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Quandry
what I am about to say to you is not influenced by any other living person, but is purely directed by my conscience and a desire to regain my peaceful friendship with God. Nobody can make me do anything I don’t want to do.
If what she's about to say isn't influenced by any other person, where did she get the idea of shunning her son? She didn't dream up the doctrine, did she?
Of course nobody can make her do anything she doesn't want to do...that is the point....they hammer it into you head that it is what you want and that the decision is from your own conscience.
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Sulla
Quendi, these are really interesting posts. Thanks for sharing them.
Let me clarify my position a little: I don't think that the sort of action we are talking about is entirely free from coercion. I think what I am saying is that it is only very slightly the result of coercion, brainwashing, cult mind-control, whatever.
So, I agree that the pressure of JWs to act as they are instructed is substantially higher than the pressure put on most people for most things. The folks who make my car are attempting like hell to make me do what they say, but my choice was (mostly) free. I think that when it comes to actions of central importance, deciding to withhold blood from a wounded child or deciding never to speak to your son again, that these actions are un-coercible in any meaningful way. You would literally have to hold a gun to my head in order to get me to disown a family member; you would have to pull the trigger to get me to withhold blood from a child.
So, yeah, I can see saying were are coerced to go door-to-door or attending all those meetings because my family expects it. These are acts that can plausibly be chalked up to coercion: I would be choosing from a very poor set of alternatives that may have more-or-less equal levels of badness. But even here, I would be choosing the least bad option.
So, I agree that there are pressures to act in certain ways within the JWs. But these pressures all exist within a framework of free agents acting freely. This is a case where the JWs are actually right: you really are free to leave them at any time you decide it is the best choice. Yeah, things about that choice will be unpleasant, but the same is true for somebody who decides to leave his job. There is no lack of free choice in the only context that matters: nobody is threatening your life or livelihood.
And I think that some of your own experiences seem to re-inforce my point. You observe that some people who shunned you were " highly intelligent" and whose "judgment on other matters I could always rely upon and trust." Well, yeah. I guess I simply can't agree with you that the only possible explanation for their actions is some other "mental or emotional pathogen." They have a profound disagreement with you about the state of the universe, they don't have a disease: if it were a disease, wouldn't you expect they would be prone to all sorts of strange thoughts and actions, based on many potential influencing factors? But you don't see that.
Thats why I think what you are seeing is an informed choice. No, not entirely made in a vacuum, free from other viewpoints. But certainly not ascribable to mind control or other pathogen.
Believe me, I don't like the conclusion any more than you do. It means that, for example, my parents would genuinely have preferred to see me dead withoud blood transfusion rather than alive with one. And it means they would have formed this preference either in full awareness of the absurdity of the teaching or else without bothering to understand the absurdity of the teaching. And it means that I can't give them some reduction in the responsibility for this wicked choice: they made an informed choice, they're not weak-willed, brainwashed victims.
Not only that, it means I am also responsible for similar things I thought. There was a time when I would have applauded another teenager who fought against a blood transfusion. Some on this board have advised sick people not to take blood. I would have thought this letter was the most courageous and correct choice in the world.
So, if that's what I thought, how do you ever trust another thing I think? I believe that is why XJWs tend to like the idea that JWs are a cult or otherwise not in complete control of their will: it removes responsibility, lessens the blow to self-esteem. I understand wanting to do that, hell, I did it myself. But I don't think it is true.
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Quendi
I want to thank you once more, Sulla, for this very interesting dialogue. What I've appreciated most is the respect that all of us who have taken part in it have had for our friends' opinions. That, as we know, is something that never would have occurred in the JW culture. You have given me a lot of things to think about. One point you make is a very good one. When it comes to the shunning practiced against us by the people we love, it is very difficult to accept that they would do so deliberately, in full knowledge of the harm it is doing to us. None of us wants to believe that anyone we loved so much would then act in such a vindictive, hateful and destructive manner. We'd rather blame some other agency for this.
Perhaps we feel this way because we think it would make it easier to extend forgiveness if the relationship is to be repaired. After all, it is much easier to accept an apology from someone when they say, "I didn't mean it." than from someone who might say, "I knew full well what I was doing but did it anyway." But in either case, forgiveness should be granted even if one case is easier to absolve than some other.
Let's keep on talking because I think we aren't the only ones who are benefiting from the discussion. This thread has had more than 800 views, so clearly this issue is affecting many of us. The original post that got the ball rolling here is still relevant. One of our friends received a letter from his mother saying she was severing her tie with him. She says she arrived at this conclusion entirely on her own without being coerced or brainwashed in any way. As hard as it might be for David, his friends and the rest of us to accept, she may be entirely truthful in what she has said. While WTS religion and practice have undoubtedly played a major part, and while there may well be elements of fear also motivating her, in the end the decision to shun her son was one this mother made by herself. We can only hope that she will eventually reconsider this very bad choice and once more reach out to her son. I can only hope likewise in the cases of my California mom and Colorado brother.
Quendi
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cedars
This letter is now the subject of a YouTube video by a non-Witness.
Beware, there is some strong language.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAcRqwc23bQ
Cedars