by ozziepost 31 Replies latest jw friends
I-ching: Good point about the DF'd anointed.
I believe the position is that the re-instated person would still be of the anointed. They wouldn't be downgraded. If you think of it, a person in the 1st century (say as described in 1 Corinthians) who was DF'd, then later re-instated, was still one of Christ's brothers. The situation would be the same today.
(Regarding my meeting attendance: What do you think?)
Ozzie
Iching:
I think that the situation you're talking about is happening now in countries that are wired i.e. North America, Western Europe, Japan.
The figures for baptism in those countries have gone into the toilet over the past 3 or 4 years.
Futures on the WT stockmarket look bleak (for them). I can't wait for the next few annual reports!
My opinion is that there will be a slow decline in WT numbers as the internet becomes more and more pervasive. Most of those who are already in will probably stay in, but new recruits will dry up.
On the subject of restrictions: it made, and still makes, me sick how the society destroys people with public humiliation. They keep the "sin" secret, but make the punishment public, knowing that gossip and social isolation will crush the person emotionally. What's that scripture about treading down a broken reed?
Expatbrit.
expat ozzie zev - thanks - iching
We certainly learned the good use of illustrations from the borg, didn't we. And that's what finally brought me to the point of posting my first comment here...appreciation of illustrations:
IChing, #1 for: "i thought these guys were manning the watchtower - staying alert - keeping on guard - they must of been getting a very long manicure when the internet poked it's head over the horizon and then rode in at breakneck speed to completely surround them"
This paints a picture that I will long remember....and chuckle over.
Libby (of the liberated class)
Ozzie, this is the first time I read this thread!
You are so right about how private reproof is not really private at all. I remember when my ex was on reproof and 3 sisters had the gaul to ask me why he was not commenting at the meetings anymore! I said, "Well, that would be his business. Maybe he has nothing to say?"
What you have outlined shows that 'private reproof' does not really exist. Goodness, even before the elders meet with you word gets around. I mean, if the "friends" see 2 or 3 brothers going with you into that dreaded conference room, how long before people talk about you? 15 seconds or so?
What about the all knowing elders wife? I doubt that my hall was the only one where they had all the dirt on the "reproved" ones. I remember, as a teenager, hearing private information from an elders son! So much for confidentiality.
yes and private reproof can be misleading. Case in point, a wife commited adultry and admitted it. Her husband left her. Nothing was ever announced to cong. as it was private reproof. The husband remarried before her, and people thought he was the one guilty of adultry. After he remarried, she did also. Now i now this happens every day other places. But in a KH if a marriage breaks up and the couple remarries, usually they explain to the cong. marriages are not supposed to just end like that in Jehovah's clean org.As usual, this sis got away with it b/c she was among the "in" crowd. jehovah's witness are all a bunch of liars, their org. is no more clean than any other org.
I think that if the brothers want to have reproof be kept private......they should meet with the individuals in the privacy of someone's home, either the elders or the person's. Everyone watches to see who is going in and out of the back room. Or they should have a back door to go in so the person is not seen entering the room....... Actually, its all foolish......who wants to tell 3 men that they are having sex?? and how it happened?? Some things really should be private...... really private.
They also impose restrictions that they not only won't tell you about, but lie about it when questioned. If they feel a sister is not "behaving in a humble or submissive manner" in some way, they will not tell her, but will keep her from receiving assignments in the School. This happened to me repeatedly, and when I went to a mature brother ( in the true sense of the word mature) about it, he had a meeting with the lying School Overseer and I was immediately given a talk! How did he explain away his deviousness? He said "Oh, well, it wasn't intentional; her name is on my master list, it just doesn't show up on my assistant's list for some reason...." The dirty dog. I was in these 2 men's Book Study - so even if their lie was the truth, why didn't they "know positively the appearance of the flock" in their charge, and NOTICE that one sister in their little Book Study group never seemed to have a talk for about 18 months?
Same thing happened in the next congregation, except when a fill-in School Conductor needed an impromptu speaker in the back school, and I got the assignment, apparently by mistake! You bet I grabbed the opportunity and my daughter and I gave the talk. Never got another assignment. When I asked about it twice, the PO said he was sure it was just a mistake, just human error...but I never got a talk.
When I went to the next congregation, the School Overseer kept saying from the platform every week, "Now if you're not SURE you're enrolled in the school, be sure to see me and I will enroll you." Over and over he said this. But I wasn't biting anymore. Never "enrolled" again. There's no enrollment form. Who are they kidding???
Once I had a talk in a congregation I was pretty comfortable in but the householder assigned was pretty flaky. I kept calling her to be sure I was faithful in using who they assigned, and finally got roommate on the morning of the talk. She said the girl had a job interview that day and might not be at the meeting. So I arranged for another sister in my building to be my householder and we practiced the talk several times. She was very happy for the opportunity.
WELL! Just minutes before the meeting began, one of the elders comes over and tells me SHE can't be your householder! Sorry, get someone else. So I run over and get one of the elders' wives; I hand her her script. They tell the other sister she is not allowed to be on the school, which shocks and hurts and upsets her; then a few minutes before my talk, the imbeciles decide she CAN be on the school, so I get the script back during the meeting, give it to the first sister, and we go up. Well, she was all rattled, could barely do it, and finally we got through it.
And why??? Because the sister is separated from her husband, though they are trying to work things out, and he sits with the family at the meetings. Oh - my- God!!!
Such Christians!
I recall a conversation I had with a C.O. in which he agreed that a private reproof was worse than a public one. We'd had an elder's wife privately reproved and she'd been a pioneer. The level of speculation that arose was incredible, whereas a public one usually left it cut-and-dry for the r&f and didn't lead to gossip.
I so don't miss that JW chatter.
