my first post! (long read sorry in advance) (page 2)

daringhart13

Great story and similar to most of ours!

Very wise to take it easy on the wife....people need different amounts of time to digest they've been part of a fairytale ....... love her and be open for discussions.....

smiddy

Welcome aboard Letts Party , great read.

smiddy

Thank you everyone so far for your wonderful replies. I wish it was easy to just meet all of you in person. Its like the "international brotherhood" but only twice as better (no irrational dogma, and I doubt you'd ever consider disfelloshiping me).

Freddo, thank you so much! it's really great to be here! Greetings from the US!

Brainfloss, thank you!

Apognophos, that's really interesting. I might be totally wrong, but I think that a possible explanation for that might be that even just 10, 15, or 20 years ago, information wasn't nearly as readily available as it is today (again, thank goodness for the internet). So maybe back then, it really took a certain type of person to be able to sift through hours upon hours of books in the library, and hours and hours of research. Now with a click, you can see a scan of a watchtower page from 1916 and see all the crazy things they used to say, believe, and print. I know for a fact, were I this age 20 years ago and sans internet and readily available information, I might of never seen TTATT.

Humbled, thank you very much! Yes, she does. I can only hope for the best.

Londo111, thank you!

LisaRose, I thought about that. It's true, I realized at the beggining I was really loud (not angry yelling but speaking really passionately) about it with her. I saw that I needed to pump the brakes, because yes, as you mentioned, it took ME forever to even visit a site. How could I expect her to accept everything immediately??? Live and learn I guess, but thankfully I didn't burn any bridges. I pumped the brakes early enough and have been taking it easy ever since.

SuavoJr, thanks so much for the reading suggestions. Interestingly, I recently finished God Is Not Great by Hitchens and that furthered my openess to the very rational possibility that I DONT HAVE THE TRUTH. I promise to check out The God Delusion next. I hear many great things about Dawkins. Hitchens' writing is so incredibly spot-on and amazing. I love that guy. If I may, another book that I found really informative was Zealot: the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan. It paints a great secular picture of who Jesus really was, and how his teachings became the brand of Christianity that we know today.

Comatose, thank you thank you! that's exactly what I'll try to do. I can easily prove that I don't need organizational doctrine and rules to be a fantastic husband! I feel great just thinking about it!

JamieBowers, thank you! I'll try my very best. For now, I feel great about the fact that I can at least talk about it openly with her. I hope that its the first of many steps!

Giordano

I am actually an apostate from the Catholic Church since I left that one first isn't that how it works?

Anyhow the 3rd largest group in a Pew survey of religions are 'Nons' at 1.3 billion worldwide. For the most part these are people who do not affiliate with any organized religion. Nondenominational...........And it is growing quickly.

Look up human secularist and see if that works for you. Didn't realize I was one until the internet.

The thing that is disturbing to me is the way JW's are so casual about the billions who would die if Armageddon was actually real considering how casual they take field service and how the WTBTS has seldom embraced modern communication methods.

FFtruther144

Welcom Lets Party.

I look forward to future posts as you update us about pulling the curtain back for your wife.

I will be curious to read your descriptions of what information you present her with has an effect.

I wish you the best.

galaxie

Welcome letts party ;..great first post, hope you have have a successful journey as you break the bonds of jw deception.

Best wishes to you and your family.

berrygerry

Ditto the remarks about going S - L - O - W with your wife, esp. if she is pioneer-minded.

We have been so conditioned that any stress in life can be cared for best by going in service. That does not dissipate readily.

I was an idiot as I became fully aware, because I've been floating for 20 years. But when I became fully aware, I thought others should be able to grasp that it's all BS in a short period of time.

I wish I would have read Steven Hassan's book first to realize how messed up the mind of a person in a control group becomes.

berrygerry

You should also read Billy the ex-Bethelite's posts about questions to ask others in the hall wthout arousing suspicion.

I wish I could have taken advantage of that opportunity.

Letts Party

DaringHart13, thank you! I cant wait to see how it goes!

Smiddy, thanks! I'm glad you think so.

Giordano, I just look up human secularism, and although I just started, I already love what I see! Afterall, we're human. what better attitude to have than loving other humans for what they are and not causing physical nor emotional harm to them regardless of their beliefs? The way we casually think of billions upon billions of people dying as a result of armaggedon is something I brought up to my wife recently. She has extended family outside the truth that are wonderful people. Truly brilliant, wonderful people: aunts, uncles, cousins. She cares about them very much. They would die in armaggedon. We never think about it! The usual response again from a believing witness is that god sees people's hearts and he'll decide who's worhty of salvation, but that's not what our literature says!

If this were true, we'd be EVERYWHERE! on television, the airwaves, radio, newspapers, EVERYWHERE... god wouldn't relegate it to a relatively small army of people that take it so casually and that pretty much behvaes like any other religion. This message would be literally in every corner of the earth, and in EVERY SINGLE LANGUAGE... not the fraction of the languages we do have and that we're so proud of. It seems that our tracts are translated into more languages than the bible itself. rant over.

FFTruther144, thanks, i hope to post often and soon. one of the first things I think I needed to prove is that the GB is NOT god's mouthpiece on earth. Several failed predictions prove this. The god we know from the Old and New testaments would NEVER use an organization who's predictions fail. Especially a god who's so self conscious about protecting his image as it seems (we can't wear beards, our hair needs to be proper, we can't dress "innapropriately"). How does using an ass crazy organization to preach his message make him look??? An organization that got started with pyramidology. Rutherford building a house for the returning prophets. The god we claim to worship is WAY above that. The GB being imperfect humans is NOT an excuse. Yes we make mistakes, but not mistakes that would set up the true god for ridicule. I pointed this out to her, and it was her first "a-ha" moment. She saw how serious I was (I was very passionate).

galaxie, thank you very much!

Oubliette

Welcome, you have your work cut out for you, to be sure.

Hopefully you can get your wife to come to the same place you do, but you must proceed slowly and with caution. Even then, it's an iffy proposition, but it has been done, just not often.

Keep us posted!

my first post! (long read sorry in advance)

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