Relationships

by wanderingjew 2 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  wanderingjew

  To anyone who can give me an honest answer:

  For the past few months I have been dating a disfellowshipped Witness. The Witness is being shunned by other Witnesses and has been going through this for around 2 years now. The Witness is intent on getting reinstated. The Witness is truly repentent and cries due to guilt and shame several times every week.

  I truly love this person and I do not want to lose her. Although I am not a Witness, I can understand her need/desire to get back into the religion. I would like to know if, when she is reinstated, whether she will still be able to associate, date, possibly marry me in the future?

  I want whatever is best for her and whatever will do best for her well-being.

  I have been reading through websites (I really tried to ignore the blatantly Anti-JW ones and focused more on ones that seemed to present both sides of the religion) and I have tried to do my best about doing research on the religion but I cannot find a definitive answer.

  Within one website I read that marrying between a Witness and a non-Witness is strongly discouraged, but it didn't mention if it was, in fact, forbidden?

  A little more background with her, she divorced two years ago due to an affair (hers and reason for being disfellowshipped). She is still not over her marriage and is petrified of marriage in the near future. It has gone as far as she does not want to even have a boyfriend due to the fact that there is a connotation that it leads to marriage no matter what. She has told me that the only way I would ever be able to marry her is if it were before she was reinstated. I know she is not ready to get married but she is ready to start her mission on getting reinstated.

  What do you think?
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  Cautious

  Hi Wanderingjew

  If your friend is serious about being reinstated, then she will have to do what the elders advise her to do. They will advise her to not have any friends who are not JWs, let alone marry anyone who is outside the faith.

  If she gets reinstated, she will be strongly discouraged from re-marriage to a non-witness. This would put sufficient pressure for her so that she would not be able to cope with marrying you, and is likely to end any friendship with you.

  You said

  I want whatever is best for her and whatever will do best for her well-being

  - I feel that she would be better married to someone who obviously loves her, IMHO.

  All the best
  Cautious
• 

  esther

  Wanderingjew, hi. You said

  Within one website I read that marrying between a Witness and a non-Witness is strongly discouraged, but it didn't mention if it was, in fact, forbidden?

  Witnesses are told that they should only marry in the lord, so they should only marry a JW.

  While it is not expressly forbidden, you need to realise that for a JW, if something is strongly discouraged, it might just as well be forbidden. This is especially so in the case of a JW who is disfellowshipped and is trying to get reinstated.

  To get reinstated, she needs to be living an exemplary life, and that, unfortunately, means that if you and she are not already married, she will be urged to break off her relationship with you.

  It is a pity she doesn't read boards like this

  esther