I wish you would stop referring to this as "hammering home". Your mom is not a block of wood.
Trying to talk to my mom - really discouraged, need help.
by rather be in hades 61 Replies latest jw friends
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rather be in hades
king solomon: if you hammered me with adam and eve back then, i think you'd crack me lol. i just think that's too easy for her to sweep under the magical mat. that just seems like a route that will put up her defenses. it's like...i don't have an on paper way to show mathematically that the garden of eden is erroneous. the philosophical questions are starting to seem too easy to refte if you're stuck way up in the jehovah's witness mindset. everything i don't understand or can't come up with something for becomes a matter to wait on jehovah. it becomes magic and then i no longer have to listen.
i think that might have been my mistake with the blood issue and the organ transplants. those both become, god understands better than me, it's his will so what the fuck ever. and then i close my ear holes and shut my brain off. and i'm saying that as someone who loves mind games and debates. yet if i had no answer back when i was in middle school or whatever, when i was in it, that was my answer.
the free will always got me too and i think that was the first thing i really grasped onto when i started gaining the strength to leave. either make me a robot, or give me free will, but the only reason why i'm a jehovah's witness is because if i'm not...i'm gonna die. that's NOT free will. do it or die is not a death sentence, but again, i think if i can't prove it on paper....she closes that avenue off. those are both things i think would be perfect for the bible study. not to start breaking her shell and i think when it comes to that, your blows have to be blunt. philosophical questions seem more like scalpels.
i don't think i'll ever explicitly say it. not ntil i feel she's ready. not ntil after she asks me. i do think i can sneak by with a:
something doesn't seem right with this organization. can you help me understand? or what do you think? or i think if we both did de diligence, i don't think we'd have become jehovah's witnesses. can you help me figure this out because it's been tearing me up inside and i want to know the truth?
i think from there i can ask her if we go bit by bit in the bible to see what's right or not. genesis gives me the opportunity to question her on free will, the account of creation, the biblical timeline, adam and eve being born in 4026 bc and evoltion. oh god and noah's ark lol. and didn't someone get his daughters pregnant? there's some nutty shit in genesis. i wouldn't mind throwing a "you know i always thought the society's stance on rape was rather unloving..." when we get to dinah.
as far as me going too fast, i really thikn i have a legitimate shot if i can appeal to my mom in the right way. it's just my circumstances, bt if other people have similar circmstances, maybe this experiment will help
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rather be in hades
lol i will try. it's just the idea i'm trying to get across. not to let up until there's no where else to retreat. part of this is to find the right topics to do that with and thankfully you all have helped me see i was going for way too much.
i don't mean to sond insensitive with my mother. i'm not trying to beat her over the head with reality, more like trying to find something undeniable that will give me an opening to work with for the next...however long it takes. that and something that will finally give me closure. i have to have that
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rather be in hades
this is basically what i have so far. the bold and italicized parts are things i have questions about...whether it's good to include or in a good sequence. all input is helpfl, though i'd like to remind you all that my puurpose is not to get her to leave today, it's simply to vent my frustrations with the side hope that i'll at least plant a seed of doubt. so i know it's not in my best interests to lay this stuff out in one row (which i'm NOT, i'm only really talking about 1914/607 and the governing body's odd we are, but are not inspired routine), bt the primary prpose is to vent to her and have her hear the words before she gets too comfortable having me back in her life again.
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mom, i'm curious, have you ever wondered how xxxxxxxx, yyyyyyyy and myself could all leave? xxxxxxx was well known and highly thought of by so many people all over the district. remember how he was invited to the dominican republic to pioneer for a few months? or how he was giving great pblic talks, was constantly out in field service, etc? heck he even got ME into early morning witnessing seemingly every day of the week. now he's gone, and as you say...an apostate. why? what about yyyyyy, an elder's son, also highly thought of, was making all sorts of advancement, etc...yet now look at him. have you ever wondered why he left? mind you, that year yyyyyy and i both pioneered, i dropped out most of the way through the year, yet he didn't. he went on to pioneer school and now...he's an apostate. why? then there's me. i might not have liked it, but i put my head down and i did the work. think of all those times i woke up early when i didn't have to, in irder to drop you off at work so i could use the car to go early morning witnessing. or all those times that i'd leave you at home on the weekends when i'd take out the car to go out in field service? i sacrificed a lot, i never complained, have you ever wondered why i left? you cannot say i didn't believe. if i didn't believe, i would have left ages ago. if i didn't believe, i would have pt up a huge stinker over after school sports, after school activities, hanging out with the worldly kids and all that. the only reason i stayed so long is because i truly believe and yet i left. for a believer to leave, that is tantamount to saying that everlasting nothingness is better than staying. does that make sense to you that the three of us wold go this route?
this is really important to me because what happened when i decided to leave was traumatic. i hated the way the other people treated me and that was big for me. when it came time for me to decide whether i'd leave for school or stay here, aside from the pressures i was experiencing not to leave, i thoght that i would be happy not going away and staying spiritually strong with good people around me. not long after, everyone around me REALLY started treating me awful and it got me so depressed. i moved congregations and that wasn't any better. the one time they invited me somewhere was so that iwould end up being the chaperone. no joke. i'd make plans for field service, get ditched. by the time that brother set up that ice cream thing for me, i was brned by then. i could tell i wasn't wanted. you might slide that off as me being sensitive, btu i really wanted to make it work.
so all of that led to me snowballing downhil to the point i needed to see the therapist and eventally the psychologist. we tried everything from pills to therapy to pills and therapy. i took them. everytime i was spposed to ntil i finally refsed. i had enough and it wasn't helping me at all. i was fading away and it scared me. i think i've told you about what i was thinking before i got baptized right? how i always thought about the parable of the house on the sand and on the rock mass? that i had to explain my faith in a way that made sense to me from the bare basics? with all of the therapy and my fading, i realized i needed to do it again. pretend i knew nothing, and explore everything about my faith in order to determine if i was on solid footing. i had all kinds of questions and no where to go with them and the more i learned, the more i started to feel like it was all in vain and i can't even begin to describe how dark a place that was mentally. to wonder and worry that your entire life to that point was a lie or a mistake? that you lost so many valuable opportunities and experiences for nothing? i had nowhere to go and i didn't want to be labeled as an apostate. the few times i asked questions didn't go over well at all.
it kills me to this day that it could have all been for nothing so for the sake of closure, try to help me to nderstand this. no matter how we look at it, whether we care if we believe the same thing is irrelevant. you believe you have the truth and that there will be an everlasting life after a potential ressurection if you need it. if that's the case, i want to be there too. i mean, that's why i stdied, it's why i went out in field service etc. if it's the truth then i want to know but there's a couple things that don't make sense to me.
1. go over what the good news is (christ's heavenly kingship. - http://www.watchtower.org/e/jt/article_04.htm)
-then talk abot how 1914 is calculated
-the explain that it's not 607 bt 587 that 1914 then becomes irrelevant, or at least the wrong date...and i say questionable because i don't want to say outright? like it's too much? i dunno.
-maybe talk about the pyramids?
2. go over de 13: 1-5 and 18:20 talking about false prophets. then go over 1 john 4 and 1 co 2:12
- go over 11/8/94 pg 10 about 1914 and the reasoning book pg. 96
-show how the governing body isn't inspired
-show how the elders and ministerial servants are appointed by holy spirit
-question how that is possible how one can be imporefect yet dispense perfect food. clearly 1914 has no relevance.
i think i'll go over 1914 until she has no answer or starts getting frstrated. all the while i plan on asking her questions about the stff in the literature, not quite stating how i felt.hopefully she's gonna start questioning everything by then. i figure as a back up plan i can talk about matt 24 as i'm sure that's gonna be proof that christ came in 1914 i'll be prepared with statistics to back myself up.
from there i can say:
i can't tell you what it felt like to start having all these doubts, especially with the choices i made in regards to being a jehovah's witness. I'm not talking about bad decisions such as a crime spree knocking off liquor stores. I'm not even talking about getting someone pregnant. I'm talking bad decisions like...not going to one of the best engineering schools in the world. That's not just a "bad decision", but a life altering one. I've beaten myself up for years about that. The effects of missing out on my dreams because of false prophecies and ludicrous teachings kills me every single day. The way I had to turn inward to protect myself from the teasing world around me, when my true nature is to be outgoing and adventurous...the lasting effects of that are incredible. I hurt in so many ways, and 99% of it can be traced back to the Watchtower Society.
- The loneliness from not being allowed to form friendships with the worldly kids at school
- The lost social development from not being able to socialize with the worldly kids in after school programs. I LOVE sports and wanted to do everything, from baseball to karate. How different wold I have been had I done those things? What would I have learned about myself? What character development would have taken place?
- The loss of a potential athletic scholarship - hey you never know...and I was a highly regarded student with some athletic ability, even if it's D3 it's still a scholarship.
- The implosion of my relationship with my father. Now I'll be the first to admit, my father ended up not being a good dad, but in the beginning, he was an amazing father. I visited him during my smmer breaks and he was in the military, special forces in fact. He was literally gone all day, from roughly 4am to sometime around 6. Now for all of you familiar with Southern USA summers, it's hot and miserable, even at 6pm after a day of literally jmping out of helicopters and god knows what else. Yet every day, I'd be right by the front door with our baseball gloves and a ball and he NEVER said no. Not once. I wonder how mch his first born son's descent into a cult that deprived him of baseball games, football games, seeing his son develop into a man trying to get dates, go out with friends etc...how much did that change him from what he was, to what he became?
- I lost a lot of my connection with my family on both sides, but on my mom's side, that's particlarly harsh. What can I say other than, 'I was afraid of missing them all in the New System and couldn't imagine them not being there with me.'
eventally mom, i came to see an organization that has made false prophecies about the end coming in 1874, 1878, 1914, 1925 and 1975...twice as many false prophecies as harold camping regarding the end of the world in 2012. i see an organization that dring the great depression, erroneously bought a mansion in san diego for, in today's prices, would 1.1 million dollars, though considering the san diego home market, would almost certainly be considerably more. how burdensome was that for the brothers and sisters in the congregations? was that wise of jehovah's organization? why would his holy spirit ask for that? i see an organization that has been covering up and keeping silent for child molestors. there was the case in fremont, the case jst recently in san diego, don't we know someone who moved to the la jolla congregation? how can the holy spirit appoint someone to ministerial servant when they are molesting kids in the congregation? how can the holy spirit then appoint that child molestor to elder??? the court documents prove that happened, i have them. the what if that was our congregation? what if that was me? i always thought brother eeeeeeeeeee seemed a little strange. you remember him? perhaps he was one. it wouldn't srprise me. but the elders never said anything. what if he was alone in the bathroom with a young child for cleaning after the meeting? what if that was me?
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not sure where to go with that
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rather be in hades
lol thanks. seems like doctrine allows for the magical miracle clause in the jehovah's witness handbook
wold you consider 1914 and 607 bce in the same vein? i think with actual dates...i can logically work with that.
me: 'what's the good news of the kingdom?'
or me: 'what's the good news of the kingdom? i always nderstood it to be that jesus christ became king in 1914 and that signified the end of the wicked system of things and the begining of the thousand year reign. isn't that right?'
this article on the jw official site spells it out...thank you google. - http://www.watchtower.org/e/jt/article_04.htm
so whether if she says yes, i can continue, if she wants to squabble, i can point her to that link.
me: "so 1914 is a critical date, it's the thing that really seperates jehovah's witnesses from the rest. now i remember that 1914 was calclated from daniel 7. i don't remember how the 2520 years was calculated, bt if we look in the daniel book, we can see that the prophecy dictates we apply this to the date of jerusalem's destrction in 607 bce. that brings us to 1914 when you compensate for no year 0."
me: "but that's wrong. jersalem was destroyed in 587 bce. judah was destroyed in 609 bce. this is undisputable fact. every encyclopedia in the world says jerusalem was destroyed in 587 and the way they figured that out was from well kept historical tablets from that exact time period. the astorlogical markings for the dates proves it was not 607 bce and that it was without a dobt 587."
me: "so doesn't that make 1914 wrong? applying daniel ch. 7 to 587 puts us at 1934 and nothing significant happened then. wouldn't that mean christ didn't come back then? doesn't that nullify the good news? or at least alter it?"
i think this is something i can use because when i talked to my mom about it before...she had no answer and seemed confused. plus i have those awesome pics from that library trip someone made. a god send.
what do you think?
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00DAD
The point about "never discuss doctrines" is that when we debate doctrines with fully in-doctrinated JWs their programmed "thought stopping" processes often go into effect. You run the risk of being labelled an apostate and then the shields go up and NOTHING you say will be heard. You will likely be shunned if you keep it up.
Besides, people to not remain in a cult because of doctrines, they stay because they are controlled through fear and manipulation.
I suggest you read Steven Hassan's "Releasing the Bonds: Empowering People to Think for Themselves". It has some great tips on trying to reach family members authentic self. When we discuss doctrine, if they are even listening, we are more than likely just talking to a cult drone.
00DAD
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King Solomon
king solomon: if you hammered me with adam and eve back then, i think you'd crack me lol. i just think that's too easy for her to sweep under the magical mat. that just seems like a route that will put up her defenses. it's like...i don't have an on paper way to show mathematically that the garden of eden is erroneous. the philosophical questions are starting to seem too easy to refte if you're stuck way up in the jehovah's witness mindset. everything i don't understand or can't come up with something for becomes a matter to wait on jehovah. it becomes magic and then i no longer have to listen.
Well, that's one of the things about really learning the first 3 chapters of Genesis inside out, really thinking about it and understanding the implications. You really don't need anything else, and unlike the account of Noah where "God Did It!" magic greets you when you raise every scientific impossibility, you don't need to discount the scientific issues (talking serpents, magic fruit, etc) because you can simply focus on the (im)morality of God's behavior. I've written plenty on that in the past few days, so check those threads.
the free will always got me too and i think that was the first thing i really grasped onto when i started gaining the strength to leave. either make me a robot, or give me free will, but the only reason why i'm a jehovah's witness is because if i'm not...i'm gonna die. that's NOT free will. do it or die is not a death sentence, but again, i think if i can't prove it on paper....she closes that avenue off. those are both things i think would be perfect for the bible study. not to start breaking her shell and i think when it comes to that, your blows have to be blunt. philosophical questions seem more like scalpels.
Yup. The threat to follow Divine Will over-rides the option to use man's free will: it's not in man's domain when the threat of punishment is assured.
Same with the flood: I focus on God's irrational reason for carrying it out (plus it's failure to accomplish it's goal: elimination of evil), and NOT the sheer impossibility of what's depicted. Gotta appeal to her sense of right and wrong: God's actions are unjustifiable, as you say, and most people see it but are deathly afraid to even consider it (as a thought sin).
Don't get into the "dates" nonsense: that's a topic only of interest to theologians and experts (i.e. "was the Temple destroyed in 587BC or 607BC?"). That's WAY above her need.... It's like trying to explain calculus, when someone hasn't even learned arithmetic. It's pointless for her. Only date you need is "1975": the date they said Armageddon would occur, and it didn't happen. Doesn't matter what excuse they dream up.
"Pyramids"? Again, you're getting WAY too esoteric, complicated. Most women don't respond to that stuff, but to feelings and sense their of fairness and love.
Focus on the fundamentals like above, and the evils depicted in the OT, and ask, where's God's "fruitages of his spirit"? There's plenty out there: the Dinah story, Job, slavery laws, women treated as dirt/property, killing of heathens, Prophet Elijah praying to God who sent bears to eat the 40 children who teased him, etc. Problem is, some people see that stuff, and it truly doesn't offend them.... Ask her to empathize with the mothers of those children who died at God's hand, simply becuase they were associating with the only other small children within 200 miles of them, and the group picked on the wrong guy. Grieving mothers.... How fair is THAT? You have GOT to humanize the account from a perspective that most don't stop to consider.....
Good luck!
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rather be in hades
00dad - i think i can, and i feel dirty saying this, but i think i can manipulate my mom by sounding sincere about the TRUTH of it all. the people i was thinking of mentioning, they're real. i'm real. she doesn't know all the pain and my mom has a heart. she's a damn good mom and she's smart to boot, just misguided as all hell. i think that if the governing body can essentially lie through their teeth and say we're perfect but we're not perfect, then i can lie to my mom and say that if it's the truth i want to come back. i never want to go back, bt it sre as hell would be weird if it was the trth wouldn't it? lol.
what i'm saying is true...from a certain point of view. i bet the governing body is filled with star wars fans.
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rather be in hades
the genesis stff still seems too...easy to deflect for jehovah's witnesses. all fundamentalist christians really, bt especially them.
when i was in it, i'd have said miracles and faith and left it at that. now, the science part of me would be screaming it's total bullshit, but the faith part of me was too scared for everlasting nothingness to really listen until the therapy. i jst don't think i can focus on god's irrationality. i think i'd end up going in circles with her. if she can dismiss a fucking house of the princes who never came that's literally a 15 minute drive from her house...actually maybe more like 10 minutes...i just don't think i can wrestle that stuff with her.
anytime i point out how mch of an ass god is...she can point to ten that has paradise and all that.
if i point out god's a dick...she can say that the people shouldn't have been wicked and there's no concrete proof that it's bullshit. i mean, there is, but it's not proof to someone who discredits science when it inconveniences them. same as logic.
that's why i'm homing in on the 607/1914 thing. it's concrete. it's easy to explain, and fck it...there's two threads with like..40 pictures someone took of all these encyclopedias saying jerusalem was destroyed in 587, or that zedekiah was i dnno...dethroned or something in 587. contrast that with 607 from...only the witnesses. i thinkit's an easy deconstruction and not even my old witness ignorance couuld ignore straight up false prophecy like that.
what do jehovah's witnesses do? preach the good news
why? matt 28: 19-20
what is it? watchtower article tells me it's jesus becoming chief pimp in heaven in 1914 with the end drawing close and a paradise with hot chicks not far behind.
how do we know it's 1914? daniel 7 prophecy and 607 bce +2520 from the prophecy +1 because there's no year 0
what's 607 bce? day jersalem was destroyed
say what now? jersalem was destroyed in 587...so 1914 isn't biblical in the least bit. if you use 609 then you get 1912...nothing. if you use 587 you get 1934...nothing. soooo?
if i can get that far, and i'm sure i can. i can feel it. then i think i get free reign to question everything...or at least the governing body.
the pyramids thing might be a later revelation, unless she asks me where 1914 comes from. maybe i'll sneak it into the conversation that dan 7 wasn't how they originally calclated it.
my mom would cut you for what you said about women...she was in the army reserves and did rotc all through high school and anytime i'd start acting up, she'd remind me she was a crack shot with a rifle. she can be quite gangsta when she wants to be lol