I was raised by the Society with the constant drumbeat in my head: "This generation will by no means pass away ...". When I was a kid, "this generation" was defined as one who not only was alive in 1914 but was aware of the changes in the world. They were old enough to know the world before 1914, the war on earth, the war in heaven, Jesus' installation as king and so on.
I found this interesting.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor...world_war_i_vet
1 hour, 44 minutes ago Add Top Stories - AP to My Yahoo!
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Alfred Pugh, the last known combat-wounded U.S. veteran of World War I, has died. He was 108, just 10 days short of his 109th birthday, when he died Wednesday.
Pugh, who often told visitors the key to a long life is "keep breathing," joined the Army in 1917 and fought in France during World War I with the 77th Infantry Division. In 1918, he was wounded during the Meusse-Argonne offensive, one of the war's bloodiest battles.
He died at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center at Bay Pines. VA officials said he was the oldest wounded combat veteran in the United States, and one of fewer than 1,000 remaining American World War I veterans.
Friends said he loved the attention that came with being known as the oldest wounded combat veteran in the United States. "It tickled him when the classes would come by the busload to see him," said Pugh's niece Carolyn Layton.
Born Jan. 17, 1895, in Everett, Mass., Pugh raised 16 foster children, played the organ into his 100s and was an avid football and baseball fan.
He is one of 10 veterans profiled in the book, "The Price of their Blood," published last month and co-authored by Jesse Brown, former U.S. secretary of Veterans Affairs.
He spoke French and was used overseas as an interpreter until the battle in the Argonne forest, when he inhaled mustard gas that left him unconscious and with chronic laryngitis.
"It was like a fog," Pugh said in an interview in 2002. "... We didn't get any gas masks until the day after it happened."
After the war he returned to Maine and worked as a railroad telegraph operator for 12 years before delivering mail for 26 years. He came to Florida in 1971.
In 1999, he was named chevalier of the National Order of the Legion of Honor, a prestigious medal bestowed by the French government
This Generation Has Passed Away
by Big Tex 41 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
-
Big Tex
-
minimus
But Big Tex, There's still plenty of people around that were alive in 1914 (in Siberia and China).
-
undercover
There's fewer than 1,000 American veterans left alive out of how many soldiers that fought that war?
The Society has 8,000 plus or minus still partaking of the emblems out of 144,000 people that existed between 33CE and today.
Just doesn't make sense.
-
Nathan Natas
They say great minds think the same, Big Tex. I thought the same thing when I saw the headline before I logged in here.
Watchtower fantasies cannot escape the Tick-Tock, Tick-Tock of reality.
I predict that 10 years from now, in 2014, the centennial celebration of an imaginary Jesus arriving at his imaginary throne, there will still be 8,000 delusional JWs around the world who imagine that they are part of the imaginary bride of Christ.
(edited amazingly stupid arithmetic error)
-
stillajwexelder
Even the most diehard loyal WTBTS apologist
dickheadswill struggle when 2014 passes -- yes sure I know abut 2034Stillajwexelder,
I hope you don't mind but I edited your post. I added an "s" to dickhead. I thought it was looking like a personal attack on a single person. That is not acceptable. If it is plural, "dickheads" it is less likely to offend one particular person.
Dave
-
Big Tex
They say great minds think the same
Uh oh Nathan, that's a scary thought. If you start thinking like me, you're in big trouble!
But you do make a good prediction. Although I think you might mean 2014? Wow, that's only 10 years from now.
-
undercover
But the generation teaching has changed. They've already bought it. This religion survived 1914, no armageddon, 1918, no armageddon, 1925 no armageddon and 1975, no armageddon. Some will leave, others will join. Just as we probably didn't know about the early screw-ups, those that join today won't know about 1975 and the old "generation" teaching.
-
Nosferatu
Dammit! Where's that animated gif of the stickman waving? I wanna wave goodbye to the Generation!
-
ThiChi
The sad part is the "new light" on the now, ever-expanding, non-ending, ever-present "Generation" was accepted without hardly a fuss or question from the rank & file.
Thinking back, I am saddened by all the wasted and needlessly sacrificed lives to proclaim this "Good News" of the WTB&TS
In the near future, the WT wizards will probably dangle a new urgency "date" before us, one that is just far enough away to claim we must do exactly what they say to avoid destruction......this can go on a very long time.......
-
garybuss
The generation of 1914 has not passed away because it was only a generation in a sense and since a sense is relevant the generation that saw 1914 will also live to see the end since that generation is the generation that will live to see the end. The Society has always said a prophecy is best understood after it is fulfilled in part and the parts of the 1914 generation have been subject of many articles published first in individual magazines and then slightly changed and printed in bound volume form for generations of faithful Witnesses to enjoy and be quoted from for years to come. The error has been with those who put too much weight on the writings of the Faithful and Discreet Slave channel that Jehovah is using as his only channel to communicate with all the people on earth today. The Slave has always admitted they are fallible and they have never denied that their past writings have contained error except they don't really like to call the error , , , error. So it's easy to see that the generation of 1914 has not passed away because there could be some real old person in China or somewhere that has not passed away and Jesus might have been talking about that person.