by boa 17 Replies latest jw friends
If you aren't ready to be enlightened, you won't. You can justify things in your head and reason that the book is full of lies (even though I do not believe it is so)..
I think about having my mom read it, but I am sure even brining it up will cut the few threads left between us..
Haven't read the book yet--I will someday. My own personal "crisis of conscience" is enough to keep me from severing my link to the Org.
I think anyone who will agree to reading this book is already going through their own personal "crisis". If it is presented to anyone who is still loyal to the Org they will view it a poisonous apostate reading material and won't even take a peek at it. Better yourself to learn from it and bring out points from it at certain opportune times when trying to present this type of info to any active JWs.
I tried to get my father to read it. He promised me he would read it after I promised to let him try to witness to me. I endured a few days debate while he visited then presented him with the book. Later he told me he read part of it, but very little in it was new and information he didn't already know. He threw the book out.
I don't think he could handle reading it, it is too specific and uses the watchtowers own literature to prove their miserable failings. So I sent him another copy, he says he won't read it and reasons he doesn't need to. I tell him he is afraid, afraid to lose the social bonds he has built up for 30 years at this point in his life, afraid to lose his friends and the only people he knows, afraid that all the pain he has put our immediate and exteneded family through because of this insane cult was totally unneccesary and his own doing. In short, he would have to admit they were wrong and he was wrong to follow them so blindly. That is a big step. A step, I think, you have to make before you can read crisis of conscience and not somehow raionalize the whole thing as apostate slander. They are brainwashed and undoing that usually takes more than one book. Even if the book only presents the facts, they have to be ready to accept reality.
Hope my experience helps.
thanks for all the posts so far
sally
By putting their head back in the sand. Some people just don't want to rock the boat or aren't ready for change at this point. Either they have family and friends holding them back or prominent positions. At some point, they may change their mind when they can't stand it anymore.
This explains why many who could read part of it or scan it lightly won't go any deeper and 'get it'.
Shera - it is a good read imo. And so is his other book In Search of Christian Freedom...
Rescripting
It is difficult to comprehend how one read c of c and remain a JW from the heart. One can of course remain in the org for other reasons such as family but in their heart not be a JW which I find understable. Such a person would just be going through the motions devoid of conviction and dedication until such a time as they can comfortably cut links with wbts.I think there are many jws who feel and act this way whether having read this book or not and you make a great point here, one that I would never have known in my younger jw years. Gumby I've been surprised to see how more than one person so quickly goes from the 'It's Da Troof' mantra to after a little education against that stance to 'Its a really good way to live no matter what blah blah blah'. Which is fine, but certainly not in line with any of the claims of the org. bikerchic It's taken me a while longer to read ISOFC but i'm getting there....and its a very good read as well. sphere
Uncle said that everyone who read that book, went apostate.lol sphere....probly SO true for many.....it was a significant part of my exit course. 'Apostate' as used by jws is of course silly and childish, but as for the dictionary definition of basically 'leaving one's religion', yup, I guess its true. And sphere, I go through the 'what an idiot I was feeling' quite regularly when looking back - sheesh that book is currently in my top 5 books i've ever read! The only path I am not ready to follow at this time is the clear message of Ray's to be a Christian. Any more stories out there about this or even other kinds of 'those books'? boa...
Well, Boa, I've been putting it off and putting it off. But your thread, has promted me to finally give in and order the book from Amazon.
I'll be back with a review in a few weeks
I'll tell you something; if anyone can remain in or go back to the organization of Jehovah's Witnesses after seeing first hand the documentation presented in that book, Crisis of Conscience, there is something terribly wrong with that person's "love of the truth".
I was so darn angry after reading it, that I spent my entire youth, no, WASTED my entire youth in that religion. But the understanding and insight the book gives about the organization is priceless.
I don't know of anyone who has read it that has stayed in or has gone back.
Corvin
chevy (i'm a ford man, wanna get together - it would be great! jk)
I read the library copy and being 'out' of the org was a sealed deal...I had been mentally leaving for a long time (although didn't see it for that) and so the straw that broke the proverbial camels back was this jwd site and that book......
A few days later I ordered COC, ISOCF, Jonsson's 2 books - Gentile Times and Last days, the 'great crowd' brochure, the F Franz tape on the governing body, and recently Pentons 'other' book about jws all from www.commentarypress.com which I beleive is cheaper than amazon (from what I remember). (Also, not soliciting for the above....just where I got my stuff from )
now i'm sloggin through it all, probly about 60% done the whole lot....
Any others who have a COC or other 'book' story?
bttt
