still would like standing for pure worship to explain how he or she prays at night knowing that Jehovah won't listen because he or she continues to carry on conversations with those the org condemns
Since leaving the truth, do you celebrate holidays, and does your participation in such bring you happiness?
by Stand for Pure Worship 102 Replies latest jw friends
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ctrwtf
SFPW posted on my last thread that he/she was not going to post anymore. I guess that standing for the "truth" includes lying.
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confusedandalone
I guess that standing for the "truth" includes lying.
I think sfpw should turn themself in so as to have a clean conscience
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laverite
Growing up a JW, it was all about TECHNICALITIES -- getting to celebrate holidays while making a huge point about how we weren't celebrating anything at all (birthdays, Thanksgiving, Xmas, etc.). We just "HAPPENED" to be doing what everyone else was doing for that holiday but we were JWs so we weren't actually "celebrating." Such BS.
It's really quite laughable, except that it's also very sad. We were also taught it was ok to lie up a storm by saying things that were technically true. I find it very sad to have been raised that way. I am thankful to have escaped from all that as an adult. It's so much better to live with integrity and to appreciate real truth, not some made up Corporation "Truth." Calling something The Truth does not make it true.
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Berengaria
If SFPW really were, he would just shut up. Pure worship would be quiet, and without ego, never letting the left hand know what the right was doing.
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ShirleyW
Bruja- I chuckle at how you mention your children's ages but don't mention if you're near my age which I posted. Really doesn't matter and you certainly have the right to not mention your age (as if I had to tell you that) but I just find that just a bit comical. Also how the post was about bullying but you didn't mention that either, find that interesting as well
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Berengaria
I do celebrate the holidays! Enjoy them to the inth! Except Easter. Never got in to that one. Bo Ring.
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rawe
Hi Stand For Pure Worship,
"Since leaving the truth, do you celebrate holidays, and does your participation in such bring you happiness?"
I would use the word "faith" when you say "truth", however, yes and yes.
When we left in October 2007 I was determined to live my life basically just as I did when in the faith minus going to meetings and out in service. Since I am an atheist I felt no particular draw to any of the holidays. I never felt that either as a child or when raising my own children that was I was missing a great deal by not participating.
Since I had fond memories of looking through the Sears Christmas Wishbook as a kid, I did the following while in the faith... I told my girls that when the Wishbook came out, we would give each girl an amount of money to spend and they could order something. Thus getting the Christmas Wishbook was always a big event in our household. I also enjoyed going to visit my in-laws (very nice folks!) during the Christmas break, where we would enjoy time together and a meal, often including a turkey. Most of us were Witnesses so other than the turkey dinner there was nothing else that reflected Christmas.
After leaving in 2007, in 2009 I decided to go ahead and celebrate Christmas. My change of heart came about in a couple different ways. First, I had to consider if it made sense to ask my children to live as Witnesses while we did not otherwise participate in the faith.
Then I thought about what not celebrating meant. Basically it would be an outward show of respect for a faith I was no longer part of. It also inevitably means a mild form of condemnation for the majority in our neighborhood who do. In particular, could I say, I continued to have respect for the basic reasons Rutherford chose to distance himself and his followers from nominal Christianity? Although one cannot be dogmatic on the point, it seems clear to me the failure of 1925 predictions may have lead to superstitions about being tainted by "Christendom", Rutherford may have also had a lingering anomosity towards "Christendom" thinking they were behind his being put in jail. Thus, nixing this taint seems like what happened, no cross, Jesus shown as clean shaven, no Christmas all speak to this.
Then there is the boogeyman of "pagan", with "here a pagan", "there a pagan", "everywhere a pagan, pagan" So... do I really have such wonderfully moral high-ground that I can look down upon the pagan influences of Christmas and condemn them? Actually, I think it is the opposite. Surviving the cold and deprivations of winter has been a challenge to our survival for eons. Welcoming back the warmth of the sun, does, in fact, seem like a pretty good reason to celebrate!
Thus we went ahead and the rest, as they say, is history.
"Do the holidays do anything for you?"
Not only is it a general time to be together as a family and to the extent I can afford it shower my wife and children with gifts, it connects me to the community. What you're doing here is similar and I applaud you for it. Namely, you appear to be asking questions truly out of curiosity and a desire to understand. So much of our lives as Witnesses involved staging questions, only as a means to preach the Kingdom message. While the motivations may be fine, in the process we lost out on discovering what really made folks outside our faith tic.
Cheers,
-Randy
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Bruja-del-Sol
@Shirley: I've told my age on another thread and have no intention of repeating it. Let's say I'm well over forty. My not going into the 'bullying'-thing is that I really hate discussions and you've said what you had to say, as I did. Nothing more to add to it. As Forrest Gump would say "that's all I have to say about that"
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Rattigan350
Tootired2care replied "Does truth change?"
Sticking to the topic at hand, The truth about holidays and the celebrating of them hasn't changed.
The thing is that they go too far with it and that God just doesn't care about what humans do and have done with them.
I mean, how can Jehovah keep account of a person's celebrating a pagan holiday and then holds it against that person but yet allows a typhoon to destroy the Philipines? We, and what we do, just don't matter.
That is the truth that they are not telling.