I let a friend know I was having problems......

by nemo 19 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  hooberus

  I will never doubt your love for Jehovah. Remember that illustration from a few assemblies ago about the diamond? If you look too closely you will see all the flaws, but to the naked eye it's beautiful. I'm not saying you should ignore what you found, but you may want to take a step back and look at the big picture. Jehovah's organization is imperfect and constantly being refined. Do you believe that Jehovah is using earthly organization? Do believe that the new system is coming? Do you believe that Jehovah has requirements for those that will survive? Do you think that there is any other organization that adheres to them better? I'm sorry if I'm making it sound to simple, but, really, what will you do if you find the answers that you don't want to hear? Where will you go?

  Questions for your friend:

  1. Is serving an organization that claims to represent Jehovah the same as serving Jehovah himself?

  2. Does the fact that a religious organization uses the name "Jehovah" necessarily mean that the organization is "Jehovah's Organization?

  (many religious organizations use the name "Jehovah" or other forms such as Yahweh for example: "The Assemblies of Yahweh" organization.)

  3. Is doubting an organization that claims to represnt God the same as doubting God himself?

  4. Is faith in a religious organization that claims to represent Jehovah the same as faith in Jehovah himself.

  5. If you were to loose faith in the Watchtower Society would you also loose faith in Jehovah at the same time?

  7.Is loyalty to a religious organizaion that claims to represent God the same as loyalty to God?

  8. Is John 6:68 talking about not leaving a religious organization or about not leaving a person (Jesus Christ)? The January 15, 1970 Watchtower p. 37-40 contains arcticle titled:

  "Which Comes First- Your Church or God?"

  "The "first man" represents the believers who remain faithful to their church out of loyalty to the religion they were brought to believe in. Thier attitude is: Right or wrong, it is my religion! Is that the way you feel? If so, you are certainly a loyal person. But to whom do you owe the greater loyalty-to your church, or to God? With so much disbelief rife throughout the earth, you are to be commended for maintaining your faith, but where should your faith be placed-in a religious organization, or in God?" p.37

  "The "second man" mentioned in the Nouvel Observateur represents those Catholics and Protestants who stay with their church because they do not know where else to go. They havebeen taught that their church represents God, and they do not want to turn away from him. They disapprove of many church practices or doctrines, but they hope to reform their church from within. Typical of these are the 744 French Catholics who, in November 1968, sent a long open letter to the pope. In it they stated: "Today the Christian needs to live in a 'true' Church . . . Therefore all that is false, contrary to the Gospel and scandalous within the Church today wounds the Christian." Then followed a long list of grievances against the Catholic Church and it current teachings and practices. Yet, toward the end, these catholics expressed their unconditional adherence to their church by alluding to John 6:68 and stating: "Who could we go to? In her [the Roman Catholic Church] we find the One who has words of eternal life." p.39

  I beileve that this Watchtower arcticle can with a few simple questions (see above) be used effectively to separate the witnesses "Loyalty to God" from "Loyalty to the Organization". The Issue of faith in a religious organization being separte from faith in God is addressed nicely. Also issues of "where else to go" and the misappication of John 6:68 from Christ to a "church" or "organization" can be very effectively brought up using this arcticle.

  In an earlier post the follwing was given by a former witness as some of the reasons for staying in the Watchtower Organization.

  "Obstacles/hinderances: Loyalty. Thinking that there was no where else to go. Fear of the unknown. Believing God and the Watchtower were inseperable. Believing we would lose Gods protective barrier and bring death on our family (Like Job) if we left."

  I believe that the above article can be used effectively and non-offensively to deal with these common issues.
• 

  myauntfanny

  Hi nemo
• 

  myauntfanny

  Oops, the rest of my message got lost. Let's try that again.

  Hi nemo

  If I were in your position I would try not to think about these questions for a while. I think they are designed to get you back into a sort of automatic trance state ruled by anxiety and mental confusion. I'm sure your friend isn't deliberately trying to manipulate you, it's just the JW drill. This seems like a good time to step back and just try to listen to your own inner voice. JWs don't listen to their inner voices much, everything about their activities is IMO designed to drown it out. JWs tend to have a tape running in their heads all the time about these things, the new system and god's organisation and all the other stuff. Maybe it's time to shut the tape off and just listen to what's going on inside yourself.
• 

  zev

  when i was where you are over 2.5 years ago, i stumbled on this site.

  take a look at each thought.

  i found i could apply nearly 95% of these to the jw's/wtbts.

  it helped me see what a high control group (read+cult) they really are!
• 

  HoChiMin

  Remember that illustration from a few assemblies ago about the diamond?

  This is based on their assumption that the org. is of high quality.

  I'm not saying you should ignore what you found, but you may want to take a step back and look at the big picture. Jehovah's organization is imperfect and constantly being refined.

  Bring up some flip flops i.e.;

  HCM

  sorry I had more it just wont paste.
• 

  cameo

  Jehovah's organization is imperfect and constantly being refined.

  A couple thoughts:

  Why would Jehovah choose an organization that just can't get it right (false prophesies, flip-flop teachings, scandals, etc. etc.)?? The answer is.......He's not.

  People don't need an ORGANIZATION to serve God. He works through individual hearts.
• 

  codeblue

  You could always say that you are going thru a bit of depression, end of story.

  If she keeps asking questions reply with: I am fully dedicated to Jehovah. I am concerned with pure worship of Jehovah. So why are you asking me those questions? If you don't know those answers, maybe you need to get another Bible Study (lol---sorry...couldn't resist that one).

  Codeblue
• 

  SixofNine

  Good points here nemo. I just want to underline one word from the poster TD above, for emphasis. Platitudes.
  
  Platitudes aren't for thinking people in the real world, they are for children and frightened adults who don't want to take responsibility for not giving hard thought to complex questions.
• 

  peacefulpete

  Study Resources Characteristics of a Destructive Cults psychological manipulation, cult groups, sects, and new religious movements Cultic Studies Cult general Characteristics of a Destructive Cult reFOCUS

  What is a Cult?

  A cult is a group or movement exhibiting a great or excessive devotion or dedication to some person, idea, or thing and employing unethically manipulative techniques of persuasion and control (e.g., isolation from former friends and family, debilitation, use of special methods to heighten suggestibility and subservience, powerful group pressures, information management, suspension of individuality or critical judgment, promotion of total dependency on the group and fear of leaving it, etc.) designed to advance the goals of the group?s leaders to the actual or possible detriment of members, their families, or the community. (West & Langone, 1986)

  Characteristics of a Destructive Cult

  1. Authoritarian pyramid structure with authority at the top
  2. Charismatic or messianic leader(s) (Messianic meaning they either say they are God OR that they alone can interpret the scriptures the way God intended.....the leaders are self-appointed.
  3. Deception in recruitment and/or fund raising
  4. Isolation from society -- not necessarily physical isolation like on some compound in Waco , but this can be psychological isolation -- the rest of the world is not saved, not Christian, not transformed (whatever) -- the only valid source of feedback and information is the group
  5. Use of mind control techniques (we use Dr. Robert Jay Lifton's criteria from chapter 22 of his book Thought Reform & the Psychology of Totalism to compare whether the eight psychological and social methods he lists are present in the group at question)

  	Mileu Control: Control of the environment and communication within the environment
  	Mystical Manipulation: Seeks to promote specific patterns of behavior and emotion in such a way that it appears to have arisen spontaneously from within the environment, while it actually has been orchestrated totalist leaders claim to be agents chosen by God, history, or some supernatural force, to carry out the mystical imperative the "principles" (God-centered or otherwise) can be put forcibly and claimed exclusively, so that the cult and its beliefs become the only true path to salvation (or enlightenment)
  	Demand for Purity: The world becomes sharply divided into the pure and the impure, the absolutely good (the group/ideology) and the absolutely evil (everything outside the group) one must continually change or conform to the group "norm"; tendencies towards guilt and shame are used as emotional levers for the group's controlling and manipulative influences
  	Confession: Cultic confession is carried beyond its ordinary religious, legal and therapeutic expressions to the point of becoming a cult in itself sessions in which one confesses to one's sin are accompanied by patterns of criticism and self-criticism, generally transpiring within small groups with an active and dynamic thrust toward personal change
  	Sacred Science: The totalist milieu maintains an aura of sacredness around its basic doctrine or ideology, holding it as an ultimate moral vision for the ordering of human existence questioning or criticizing those basic assumptions is prohibited a reverence is demanded for the ideology/doctrine, the originators of the ideology/doctrine, the present bearers of the ideology/doctrine offers considerable security to young people because it greatly simplifies the world and answers a contemporary need to combine a sacred set of dogmatic principles with a claim to a science embodying the truth about human behavior and human psychology
  	Loading the Language: Words are given new meanings -- the outside world does not use the words or phrases in the same way -- it becomes a "group" word or phrase
  	Doctrine Over Person: If one questions the beliefs of the group or the leaders of the group, one is made to feel that there is something inherently wrong with them to even question -- it is always "turned around" on them and the questioner/criticizer is questioned rather than the questions answered directly the underlying assumption is that doctrine/ideology is ultimately more valid, true and real than any aspect of actual human character or human experience and one must subject one's experience to that "truth" the experience of contradiction can be immediately associated with guilt one is made to feel that doubts are reflections of one's own evil when doubt arises, conflicts become intense
  	Dispensing of Existence: Since the group has an absolute or totalist vision of truth, those who are not in the group are bound up in evil, are not enlightened, are not saved, and do not have the right to exist; impediments to legitimate being must be pushed away or destroyed one outside the group may always receive their right of existence by joining the group; fear manipulation -- if one leaves this group, one leaves God or loses their salvation/transformation, or something bad will happen to them; the group is the "elite", outsiders are "of the world", "evil", "unenlightened", etc.

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• 

  peacefulpete

  I posted that material to focus on the subtlties of psychological control present in JWs and many similar groups. I read somewhere (perhaps one of Hssan's books)that the line about "where else is there to go?" was being effectively used by a number of high control groups. Of course it must be said that some of the authors of the NT shared this us vs. them mentality that was rightly deemed dangerous by the Roman authorities.