so if you cant even check up on someone, then this is now the same as scientology's "disconnection" policy. wow.
Yet another "Shunning is good for you, honest!" quote in the June 15th 2013 Watchtower
by cedars 104 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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cofty
They are motivated by fear. We know TTATT. We are dangerous.
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00DAD
I think Cofty is right. They are afraid of us.
If someone wants to come back, then I guess they'll let 'em, or at least that's what they say in the mags.
But they're sure not going to let any of the R&F that haven't woken up go out looking for them. They might get an earful of Truth and that'd be the end of that!
I'm guessing the release at this year's DC will be a new Bible without these two particular passages:
Matthew 18:12–14 and Luke 15:3–7 - Parable of the Lost Sheep:
According to the Gospels of Matthew (18:12–14) and Luke (15:3–7), a shepherd leaves his flock of 99 sheep in order to find the one sheep who is lost. It is the first member of a trilogy about redemption that Jesus tells after the Pharisees and religious leaders accuse him of welcoming and eating with "sinners." The two parables which follow (in Luke's Gospel) are those of the Lost Coin and the Prodigal Son.
How dare Jesus welcome and eat with sinners! I'm sure he would have emailed and texted them too if they had the technology at the time.
That Jesus was really a bad example.
Let's review: It's a cult!
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Suraj Khan
This makes me violently ill.
I am sure they can pull one or two success stories about the disfellowshipping practice, even if they might have to recycle the same one. This is akin to lauding Dr. Josef Mengele for his advances in the studies of hypothermia.* The slim benefit - and I would not call being repatriated with the cult a benefit - is outweighed exponentially by the suffering of persons cut off from their family and from what they may have been taught from birth as their only means to eternal salvation. As noted above, there are many examples of disassociated and disfellowshipped individuals taking their own life in response to Witness shunning.
As I've recently shared on this site, I was shunned by my Witness family for nearly 25 years because I had the audacity to present a political opinion in a small college newspaper. The resulting dysfunction in my family will last for generations. I place the blame for this squarely on the Governing Body's shoulders for shamelessly advocating this brutal, un-Christian practice on its adherents and former adherents. And I imagine they do so, not out of a genuine desire to protect the Witness 'flock', but to shield that flock from the ever-growing body of evidence outside the Organization that damns nearly everything they have said and done for over a hundred years. It is left to us, the rejected, to bear true witness. Let us never fail or flag in doing so. ___ * Thread is now Godwinned. Sorry about that, but it's the best example I can come up with.
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Quandry
So, the family was willing to not know for years if he was even alive or in dire circumstances needing help....yet went out in service to talk about Jehovah's loving organization?
Oh, I am sooooooo glad to be rid of them!!!
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Finkelstein
With the advent of the inter-net and this new attainably freedom of information, a new enemy has appeared which the
WTS. is finding quite a challenge to contend with. The GB of this organization is obvious worried and concerned about this exposing information
so much that a couple of years ago they produced their own video proclaiming how much bible truths their organization had been involved in
since its beginning inception, including C T Russell days.
Since this organization is Head Quartered in the United States, where the inter-net is prominent throughout most of the population,
One can assume that the leaders of this organization are aware what they are confronted with and that is ironically "The Truth"
about the is organization in all its entailing expressed doctrines. You might say they are in a information war now, which includes among
others things pressing harder onto people who pose any hint of opposition and perhaps ever more so toward once devoted members.
They are so intent in maintaining this acquired self created power, they are more than willing to let families break apart, marriages fall apart
close friendships. etc. Done so self servingly and with total apathy and disinterest toward individuals.
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QueenWitch
DF has had the opposite effect. I now have no desire to go back because my mother loves me conditionally.
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00DAD
Nothing says, "I love you!" quite like complete and total shunning!
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DesirousOfChange
But as AnnOMaly said: They're talking about the same guy!
Ya wanna know why?
Because they can't find any other experience to use where JWs are really shunning their family. Everyone I know uses the "family business" loophole anytime it's convenient for them. Including elders.
Even friends of ours who have resolutely shunned their son and daughter recently invited them into their home for a special occasion (family business). They're all feeling the system drag on and on. And if the WTS is wrong about that, maybe they're wrong about lots of other things -- incl shunning your family who are the only ones you have to take care of you in your age (that you were never supposed to see). Yep, I bet lots of old folks who never expected to get old are thinking they ought to repair things with their kids.
Doc
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problemaddict
Ann I caught that too. If they even gave me the slightest hint of human compassion say.....to make sure I am not splattered all over the walls, I may not have become so depressed to as to return.
When was the last time a comprehensive paper was written about disfellowshipping and communal shunning, as a response to the societies proof texts in this regard. In all reality there are only maybe 3 recycled scriptures for the entire policy.
"Remove the wicked man from among yourselves", would make it seem there is a t least some level of excommunication explained in scripture. Perhaps it comes down to the definition of wicked in the verse? Any thoughts?
This might be a good project to revisit because of the fact it is the enforcement mechanism for belief and thought control.