JW's are taught how to ACT loving, but they prove false to its power. I saw this a lot when at big gatherings as an Elder or MS. Brother so and so would greet another brother he hadn't seen for a while and be all loving and kind and when the other person walked away he would state his true feelings about that person based on dealings with him. Sisters are far harsher with each other from what I saw. And the smaller and more petty the person the bigger the show of love! Acting all loving really gives a person the edge. You can be a real passive aggressive jerk if you are all sweet and nice to your victim. They just have to forgive you and give you the benefit of the doubt! BS! I would call them on it and was not considered very loving! Maverick
What's up with JWs only loving each other?
by new light 22 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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bull01lay
just a quick thought on this....
Wasn't it the Israelites, Gods chosen people, who had to keep themselves 'clean' by not associating / marrying the surrounding nations ? These same people were under the Mosaic Law...... Didn't Jesus sacrifice 'nullify the mosaic law' ?? "I give you 2 commandments, 1st, Love your God with all your heart.... 2nd, Love your Neighbour as yourself". When questioned about who is my neighbour, Jesus used the parable of the 'Good Samaritan - a worldly person who helped a jew (gods people)'. (I always find it interesting that he didn't do it the other way round)
If that's so, then, doesn't that mean also associating with these 'surrounding nations' i.e. the 'world', i.e. NEIGHBOURS is now possible / acceptable / A COMMANDMENT??? Shouldn't marriage be left to a matter of conscience, and the JW side of the union be given as much SUPPORT as possible instead of JUDGEMENT ?. Taking that a step further then, are the WTBTS sinning against the Holy Spirit - 'pronouncing unclean that which I have said is clean?'
If my reasoning is way out of line on this, please feel free to 'steer me', but be gentle!
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new light
Wait a second. JWs are misapplying the bible? (Covers ears and walks in circles) La la lalalala la lala ........
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A Paduan
Two jw families built their houses in this street - both were nasty to their neighbors, without even knowing them - their arrogant and hateful behaviour, including the vicious spirit of the female, is the reason I came to this site to find out, "Where does this evil come from?"
paduan
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avengers
Love?
I'm birdfeed in the eyes of the JW.
Is that called love?
Ah. Now I know. Theocratic Warfare. That's Love.
Or is it Love Thy Neighbor, but don't get caught?
Andy of the I've had enough of their BS class.
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amazone
I think that you have to differenciate between different types of jw, as they are not all alike. some of them are goodhearted, loving and caring not only to jw but to all people as they obey biblical laws more than wts principles. but many on the other hand are more self-righteous and think of jw as some kind of an elite group. these are the fake people always smiling, always commenting in the meetings, always giving you some spiritually "uplifting" advises, abusing their children, gossipping etc. - these are the ones that are the white washed graves that gave me the creeps when i was still a jw.
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Quotes
Hey Amazone, let me be the first to say WELCOME to the board!
Now, back to the thread at hand: the amazing thing is the self-deception JWs show when thinking about how "loving" they are (supposedly).
When talking about the Floods/mudslide in Haiti, my Mum slipped in the comment
"...because of course The Brothers (tm) are always the first to get in and send help..."
I didn't have the heart to say how, in all my years of being a news junkie, I heard of RED CROSS emergency shipments, I heard of various agencies sponsoring collection of funds, but I never, EVER saw/heard/read any news coverage about the Watchtower relief efforts to the general public or otherwise, in any news report.
To JW lurkers: don't misunderstand me; I'm not saying JWs don't send aid/relief to their own brethren, but I posit this effort is neither (a) the first relief nor (b) helpful to any non-JWs.
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cyber-sista
How can it be called love when it is contingent on religious fervor?
As far as non-JW people go the absolute truth is they will only act nice to you if they think there is a hope you will come into the Org. If it is determined after a period of time that you are not JW material they will consider you dead meat. I remember about 10 or so years ago when a new JW mandate came out and it was being put into operation in the state where I was living and wonder if others remember this too?. It was when the United in Worship book was to be studied with the householder. We were informed then that if a person did not make progress and start to come to meetings within a certain period of time, or if they did not progress to baptizm after 6 months we were to drop them as a study and move onto the next door, because they were only wasting our time that could be spent seeking out more right-hearted ones. Pioneers were encouraged to weed out their old long time studies and stop wasting so much time with them. The zealous pioneers in our congo took this to heart and some even informed their bible studies of this pressuring them to move ahead a bit quicker. I used to accompany one pioneer on a bible study with a woman who was very depressed. She was working full time at a very difficult job, had difficult children, a difficult husband and was exhasted all the time. She claimed she looked forward to our uplifting bible study each week and seemed very hurt when she was told unless she straightened up and started to serve Jah more fully (meetings, etc.) she would be dropped as a bible study. I felt terrible about this pioneer telling her this, because this woman was obviously in need of help and too exhasted to keep up with the JW routine at present, but the pioneer sister just blazed on claiming that she was following the direction of the faithful and discreet slave. We were also told that in parts of South America there were so many who wanted to have a bible study, and not enough witnesses to study with them, so they had to meet a certain criteria before they could study, a main one being meeting attendance. If you did not attend the meetings regular you would be dropped as a study. Even in the past couple of years it was brought out again not to be wasting so much time making return visits on those who are not progressing. Strange, that those hard hitting policies of 10 or so years ago seemed to be covered up a bit afterwards and I didn't hear of it the way we originally heard of it for that period of time. Maybe they realized this was not an effective tecnique afterall. Yes, there are some JWs who act nice and seem to care, but I have personally experienced that much of this is an act. When I was abused by the Org and when I broke under their abuse and became inactive I was dropped by all my friends and some family for being weak, though I had commited no WT sin--I had been a JW for some 20 years and of all the friends I ever made in there I have 1 friend who will still speak to me on any kind of personal level--the others just say the same old programmed responses "WE miss you at meetings" etc, etc They don't call me nor do they really seem to care...On the other hand I have been shown unconditional love by friends and family who are not JWs. So what's up with JWs only loving each other? They belong to an organization that demands their total devotion, time and attension ahead of anything and anybody else in life AND if anything gets in the way of serving that organization even if it means showing love and kindness towards fellow human beings you are not to do it. You are to harden your heart, avoid all questionings and to obey whatever it is the leaders are commanding you to do. I don't think that most JWs know the true meaning of love and if they do they are trained to harden themselves to having fellow feelings. I feel that some of the young ones raised in there really have a warped view of what love is being that they have been constantly fed with the WT version of love, which is emphasized by the scripture "For this is what the love of God means--that we obey his commandments" 1 John 5:3. Of course being that the WT claims to be God's spokeman--this translates: For this is what the love of god means that we obey the WT. One of my final contacts with the Org was talking to a CO. I was still trying to make sense of with some of the things the elders had done to me and others in my congo. He was defending the elders and what they had told me about my relationship with my non-JW husband and daughter. He told me what he had to do was emotionally separate himself from his "worldy family" so he wouldn't feel so bad when they died at Armegedon (obviously advising me to do the same). He also told me that if my daughter ever had children being that she was not a witness he and the elders had a fear that I may become emotionally attached to them and this could divide my heart. Later an elder told me " I love my worldly family too, but I consider my real family to be Jehovah's Witnesses!" (He said this in a way that it made it sound like he was chewing me out) So what were these men trying to tell me to do??? So, I confess I have practiced unconditional love in my life and I now realize this is the WT sin that I am gulity of. Interesting how this question brought up some things I had forgotten about, but had really bothered me in the past. This site is a good place to purge these things out at times. Thank you all for being there and listening. Unconditional LOVE, Cybs
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cyber-sista
If a fleshly father has an unconditional love and support for his children and God is supposed to be so incredibly MORE forgiving and loving beyond a man's comprehension what RIGHT do people in some religion have in judging someone as to take away their support and appreciation for them? That's right-- they SHOULDN'T. Like I said, however-- their minds have been conditioned to do so and I just have to remember that every so often so I am not consumed with resentment towards every one of them. You better believe I cannot stand organized religion now, though.
GOOD COMMENT Alena
I think that you have to differenciate between different types of jw, as they are not all alike. some of them are goodhearted, loving and caring not only to jw but to all people as they obey biblical laws more than wts principles. but many on the other hand are more self-righteous and think of jw as some kind of an elite group. these are the fake people always smiling, always commenting in the meetings, always giving you some spiritually "uplifting" advises, abusing their children, gossipping etc. - these are the ones that are the white washed graves that gave me the creeps when i was still a jw.
I AGREE! WELCOME AMAZONE!
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acsot
We were informed then that if a person did not make progress and start to come to meetings within a certain period of time, or if they did not progress to baptizm after 6 months we were to drop them as a study and move onto the next door, because they were only wasting our time that could be spent seeking out more right-hearted ones. Pioneers were encouraged to weed out their old long time studies and stop wasting so much time with them.
cyber-sista: you are absolutely right about that, I remember those directives also. I must have been a "rebel" at heart because I knew that there was no chance in h&ll that some of my studies were anywhere near being ready to "progress" according to WTS policy, so many of us in my old hall kept on with our Bible studies as before.
Such insanity. Real love is spontaneous, given to all, not merely as a way of getting in time or trying to impress those who are sitting on the fence with how wonderful the dub way of life is. And it certainly can't be measured by the number of paragraphs studied nor meetings attended.