that's what a brother said during his public talk.
i mentioned this to the missus afterwards and asked if i heard right?
seems quite a high number!.
...and how many would even bother to put in all those wasted hours with heartfelt devotion to proclaiming the truth if there wasn't a status label attached to it?
"Sorry, I can't go visit old sister shut-in this week because I have to get my TIME in."
"Nice to meet you. I'm sister so-and-so, a REGULAR PIONEER for 20 YEARS from _____ congregation."
Phae
i'm sure most of you have read bits and pieces of my story throughout the last year being on this site.
i've decided as a human being, and as an adult, i'm going to make the decision on whether to stay with the jw religion or leave it.
i of course have many doubts about the organization which has lead me to do research.
Good on you, Brother Mike. That you can even plan strategically for your future well being, even more so.
Phae
my daughter came home from school and said they are doing some cards at school for mother's day and asked me if that was ok. i looked and just smiled and said darlin, just make a lovely mothers day card and make sure to put lots of love from dad on it too .
Ah, Truthexplorer, that's so sweet and affirming of your love to your daughter. What a great start to her life for a solid relationship with you.
I remember when I was in kindergarten in the mid-70s, we made a special Mother's Day craft as a gift to our mom's. I remember it being a baby food jar and paint markers or something of the like. It was so different and fun and anticipatory for us to be doing such a 'grown up' craft at age 6 to gift away as an expression of our affection and love to our mothers.
My parents were only studying at the time, but somewhere in the process after I joyfully made the gift (I didn't know any better), it was communicated to me that such a gesture because of this 'bad' holiday was wrong.
What a crushing lesson to a child who's only goal was to make her mother happy on a special day.
"Mother's Day" = Bad. Only in JW land.
Phae
so, i was thinking about pierce's dead.
so, supposely he is in heaven, right?
and down here on earth, they are going to give a talk about him, maybe with his body present or his body already buried, but the question is, if his body is still here on earth, what went to heaven?
Yep, 'the dead are conscious of nothing at all' and the 'SOUL is the sinning body that dies...'
But the convenient fact that the Bible states that 'the spirit goes back to God' and that 144,000 change into *something else* 'in the twinkling of an eye' is still unconvincing to them that something exists/can live on after the fleshly body expires.
On top of that, they do believe in myriads among myriads of unbodied creatures exist in the spiritual realm. Go figure...
What is a twinkling of an eye, anyway?
Phae
i thought i was young giving one at 6 or 7 years old, now there are 3 year olds giving talks.
.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnyjkzxg-j8.
Awww, how cute.
At least his parents will have this cute video to remind them of better days when he's a teenager caught living a double life.
Phae
despite jw's lying to outsiders about there being no hierarchy in the religion, we all knew there was plenty.. i love that in the real world, by enlarge equality is something we strive for and seek.. that aside, focusing on this forum in paticular, isn't it refreshing to see that the opinion of females, of the youth, of everyone... is as valid and equal as everyone else.
i hated the sexist, ageist, authoritarian rule of the jw's when i was a member.
so females of the forum, how does it feel to have a voice post wt ?
:::takes napkin off head:::
To have a voice is a fundamental right of all humans.
This site is a great equalizer.
Having a voice is GOOD.
Phae
what do you think of the reasoning in this paragraph from this week's meeting study?.
draw close to jehovah - chapt 4 .
21 consider jehovahs self-restraint from a different angle.
That they can even speak as if they know the thoughts of God and what he thinks/feels towards humans is most remarkable. As if they just had a breakfast conversation with him this morning where he expressed such sentiments:
GB: Boy, you sure do have a lot of restraint, Jehovah. With all of your power, you can make the nations know that you are God and make them serve you!
YHWH: Well, I'm too kind to force people to do that! I'll allow each person the dignity and free will to choose to serve me. Otherwise, if they don't, eternal death, you know? Their choice...
Phae
i wanted to express appreciation to the members of this forum.
there are resources here that are deep.
like we heard from the stage, "what is your depth and breadth of bible knowledge?
Welcome, ML.
You are among some good company.
Phae
in the uk, this sunday is mother's day!
ask a jw why they don't celebrate holidays and they'll tell you it's because of some nefarious pagan connection.
but this is really just a cover.
JWs miss out on so much normalcy in life. My bio mom is a JW and we were never close (our whole family life relationships are strained and dysfunctional) so Mother's Day was always bittersweet to me after I faded and started celebrating holidays on my own.
Then I had amazing wish granted from the universe: I found and 'adopted' a surrogate mom in my 30s whom I have an amazing relationship with now. After learning of my JW past, she promptly caught me up on all of my missed birthdays and she IS my mom on mother's day who I get to love and treat like my own. An amazing twist of fate that has added so much joy to my life, that I am ever grateful for.
Phae
being a jw makes one feel special, no doubt.
when i found out ttatt i realized i'm not special at all.
i'm just one of the other 7 billion human beings who will live and die being nobody, the world will forget about them (and i'm not talking about relatives and friend), they didn't make anything special in their life, they didn't change the course of history, were not famous nor rich, didn't invent facebook, google or anything awesome, didn't have an article published in newscientist, had no imdb profil, not even a wiki page, didn't write a book etc.
Hi will-be-apostate,
Just yesterday I was speaking my own very similar thoughts as you did in your OP, as a culmination of trying to carve out a sustainable path in this world with my life over the last two decades. I, like millions of other JWs who will eventually die, was nicely catapulted into the world right out of high school into a system that was supposed to 'end' before I had to grow up in this world and need to make a living for myself.
I've had both abudnant and fallow seasons in my work and in making a 'mark', so to speak, but I can't seem to bypass the sentiments of Eccelesiastics and feeling like it's all a striving after the wind.
Incidently, I was triggered by seeing the bones of my toes under my skin and muscles as I flexed and stretched my bare feet while sitting on the sofa drinking my coffee before going to work. That made me think of my skeletal system, and the 'bones' that we all end up being after we've come and gone our short time on this earth.
That reminded me of a documentary about Pompeii I saw, where the skeletal remains of a very wealthy (royal?) family were found lying with many gold bands and bracelets and other jewelry still around their dead bones, lying next to their "servants" who had nothing of the sort, but arrived just in time for the same fate as their masters because of the volcano lava.
Death, the great equilizer, which none of us gets to bypass. That's one of the ways I've been able to come to terms with being just one of the 7 billion. Life does seem to be like one big act in a play, with all its varied actors, doesn't it?
And yet, being here right now in this connection with others seems miraculous.
Phae
