The pinnacle question is....."is it possible to leave the WT for legitimate concerns or doctrinal issues?" You will never hear them say yes, they will snake around the answer. He is basically saying the problem with apostates is... They don't believe what we believe about Jesus's teachings and they are therefore dangerous, wrong, lost, hopeless, mentally diseased etc etc, etc....of course this is a dangerous, illogical and wrong approach to any question. It is equivelant to a flat earth believer saying that "the problem with round-earthers is they don't believe what we believe about a flat earth." They never ask WHY we no longer believe what they believe, they never deal with the ISSUES regarding our different opinion and view. They are simply not allowed to have anything but the WT intepretation and discussion outside of those constraints is frowned upon.
In no other realm of society does someone disregard concerns or questions because the person has concerns and questions. Especially if they are supported by evidence and logic, but you won't even get as far as evidence and logic as questioning itself is well beyond the permitted line. Questioning and doubting and trusting your own mind are all seen as weaknesses. However, back in the real world questions, doubts an trusting your thoughts leads to mobile phones, computers, cars, medicine, problem solving, science, new knowledge etc etc etc
Ironically, if the governing body themselves are allowed to doubt themselves, obvious by their constant alterations etc, then why can't everyone else? After all, they make it clear that they are just human too and not spirit inspired (to cover their asses on mistakes and false/old teachings). If Ray Franz was able to become a gov body member and become so much of a doubter so as to leave, then there is an issue in thinking these me are infallible. Even if you think ray was apostate, you are admitting that an apostate can be on the gov body and therefore..... One should question everything they teach.
I am sure the email receiver would admit that alterations have been made in WT and that doctrines are constantly altered, if the WT society can examine itself and see fault and false teachings, so can other humans!!!! Hence people CAN leave for legitimate issues. Unless he wants to claim that there will never again be a doctrinal alteration from HQ.
Just to round off my reply, as a non jw, you should know how wrong he is aout WHO I am. this made me very, very angry. I will happily allow you to mention me to him if you wish. I will even give you my details if he doubts me. I was a bethelite, a pioneer. I left because the WT has lied and continues to lie about the bible, about science and about its dealings as a charity/religion. When I asked my elders about these issues, I was not given answers I was asked to stay away from meetings whilst I had these questions. The elders told my friends i had dangerous questions and my best pal told me "while you question our beliefs we can't be in the same social circle." Note that I have done no more of a crime than question, mostly issues to do with hebrew translation, science and evolution and owning shares in a military company (Rand Cam).Despite 20 years service I wasn't offered answers, just the door. I left, I did my own research and ended up a non believer. I was never DF'dor DA'd. Some 7 years on I am now an atheist. I went back to school and then university, I have a science degree and I am now 1 year away from being a doctor... Why? Because the person that cared about others and so went knocking doors is still here, I still care about people and I would argue I care about them now more than ever! The man i am now would never want a paradise if even one person had to die for me to have it. i also feel brave enough to admit I have distain for the actions of the god of the bible, I abhor the genocides. the wars, the ethnic cleansing, the infanticides, the racism, the homophobia, the sexism,the kidnapping and rapes.... All condoned and commanded by god. Finally, i do good for neither divine or congregational reward or fear of punishment, but I simply do good because it benefits society.
As for persecution and personal attacks from the believers, It takes COURAGE to face doubts, questions and their answers. It is COWARDLY and ignorant, not to memtion an indicator of being controlled to attack people you have never met, for simply daring to ask, put effort into research and being open minded to answers they dare to Seek.
Accepting all your data on science, world history, theology and life from one source is dangerous and outright stupid. Want to know the OT's meaning about blood, ask a Hebrew scholar not an ex window cleaner who was 'privelaged' to become a staff writer in a Brooklyn factory! Want to know the dangers of blood? Ask a haematologist not an ex shop clerk. Who on earth is even writing the material at WT? As a medic I was appalled to see the new JW website quoting HIV figures from 30 years ago before blood screening etc was available, yet presenting that data in 2013.That is misleading, dangerous and immoral. This could mean your life, or the life of a child. If a doctor did that they would be sacked and struck off immediatly. So why use such poor sources for info on such important issues? the WT track record is appalling! The reasoning book quotes christian science books from the 1800's !! Their latest brochure on evolution quotes references about the amount of evidence we have for evolution 'this century'.... but its a quote from the 1800's! They are that deceitful and this is the danger of never doubting the WT literature! One only needs to look at its past to see how off the mark it was and remains, of course the people back in the early days were told to believe it unquestionably too.. A small few examples being how they once vilified vaccines, the Internet, TV, organ transplants, antibiotics, even odd things like aluminium, once claiming it to be a source of cancer and a devilish metal. Then there was the 'miracle wheat' sold from the pages of the WT under Russell, it turned out not to be so miraculous. Government tests found it to be sub-standard and the Brooklyn Eagle won a liable case after calling Pastor Russell a conman. Anyone who bought the miracle wheat doubtless wished they had an ounce more doubt and questioning in them.
These governing body men today are against higher education and none are qualified on the topics they dictate or discuss. The writing department itself remains anonymous, not as a shining example of humility as they claim, (trust me I have met some and they let you know what they do!) but a dangerous example of unknown and unprofessional writing in that there is never a known line of sourcing re: Plausible deniability by design!! Who is responsible if there is no name attached to a dangerous sentence? In a recent austarlian court case, the JW lawyer claimed that the FDS was a doctrinal idea, not a real body or group, they are protecting their asses not "all the belongings".
If I had a dollar for every time the writers said "some scientists claim....." Who? Where! When? And what EXACTLY did they say? In every occurrence of the WT using such techniques including 'quote mining' I have found them to be wholly deceitful. There are documents online with nothing but the original quote v the Watchtower quote so one can see the dishonesty employed by its writers. What excuse is there in existence good enough to explain away this deception? There are hundreds of these examples for anyone to see. Does the elder you emailed believe anyone seeing this to be 'misled' or disagreeing with 'teachings of jesus' or no longer 'caring' about people? How ignorant!
The second you examine any 'facts' or 'evidence' the house of cards soon falls down. By chance the last thing I looked at this evening was a public talk on creation and evolution, it quoted a scientist denying evolution, a Dr Denet.....Thirty seconds of research online however and in reality he is a self proclaimed evolutionist, but a Christian, he even denies biblical creation. Scrape the surface and it all tumbles down so quickly, for lies are easy to extinguish in an age of information.
The worst crime of all is WT making belief that truth needs defending and that one can be deceived from truth with questions, doubts and research. Of course, in reality truth does not need fencing off, it will see itself standing firm against all questions, doubts and critisism as it is by its nature true. Deception however requires significant fencing off from information as its nature can be made evident with EVERY doubt, question and critisism.
Snare & Racket
P.s. I am on call, on a labor ward. Every baby born is a beautiful empty vessel, all born atheist and unbiased. It is up to us to teach them to appraise, to encourage questioning, doubting and seeking. It is nothing less than child abuse in my mind, to kill of that sense of searching with threats of shunning, abandonment, the spiritual crime of apostasy and labels of mentally diseased or 'infected'. In my current circumstances those old beliefs I was forced to accept as a child, seem so foreign, immoral and and cultish now....... thankfully!
The irony is, the bible students all started with a few people with doubts and questions concerning their beliefs, now group bible discussion outside of an arranged meeting is forbidden by WT. Alarm bells really should go off at tha point....