For most of my JW life, I usually said something intended not to stand out as unusual, while technically not saying "merry christmas" or whatever. "You too" or "back atcha" type stuff. A couple years ago, though, I just decided that it didn't matter if I wished someone a merry christmas, because I genuinely wanted them to enjoy their christmas. Same for new years or whatever. I wasn't afirming their belief system, just wishing them well in the traditional way. Of course I was careful not to do that around JWs...
OneEyedJoe
JoinedPosts by OneEyedJoe
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Did you piss on their parade? Christmas?
by jambon1 inwhen you were a jw and someone mentioned 'have a nice christmas' or 'have a nice holiday' did you just say 'thanks, enjoy it yourself' or did you piss all over their good mood and bore them to death about why you don't celebrate it?.
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Governing Body new Branch letter begging for donations !
by ToesUp ini just want the governing body to know how "happified" i am today.
keep sending those branch letters to the congregation(s) about sending your donations in.
not only did you humiliate the rank and file with your tony morris tight pants talk but now you are begging the same people you humiliated for money.
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OneEyedJoe
I read this letter four times when it came in. I cannot for the life of me understand what they are saying. This looks like a letter that got washed through a dozen committees and ended up saying nothing.
That's a good way of putting it. At first it reminded me of many of the emails I get at work this time of year, where they basically say 'thanks for all the hard work, we've got a big year ahead next year!' The primary difference, though, is that those emails always actually provide something of some substance. This letter, on the other hand, was just a bunch of fluff about nothing and says 'give us more money unless you're unhappy with the way god's been treating you.' The bit about giving in proportion to your blessing almost has the same attitude as AMIII in his zone visit: "Take it up with god!"
I'm so glad that I stopped giving money to this cult years ago. Ironically, I stopped giving them money when I saw the over-the-top and unneccessary renovations that were taking place and I determined they had more money than they knew what to do with. The reality, though, was that those renovations where a symptom of the exact opposite.
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Governing Body new Branch letter begging for donations !
by ToesUp ini just want the governing body to know how "happified" i am today.
keep sending those branch letters to the congregation(s) about sending your donations in.
not only did you humiliate the rank and file with your tony morris tight pants talk but now you are begging the same people you humiliated for money.
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OneEyedJoe
There is ample evidence that Jehovah is speeding up the work.
They keep saying this, but never actually cite any evidence.
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Governing Body new Branch letter begging for donations !
by ToesUp ini just want the governing body to know how "happified" i am today.
keep sending those branch letters to the congregation(s) about sending your donations in.
not only did you humiliate the rank and file with your tony morris tight pants talk but now you are begging the same people you humiliated for money.
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OneEyedJoe
When was this letter read? Any more details on the contents beyond it begging for more money? I haven't been to a mid-week meeting in a while (yay!) so I may have missed it if it came in recently.
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What's with this "no windows in kingdom halls" thing?
by Trapped in JW land ini hear many people on this forum say that kh's don't have windows.
but i have never been to one that didn't have windows.
is this only in a certain area or something?.
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OneEyedJoe
Kingdom halls in my area used to be built with windows - one of the older ones I've been to had windows last I was there, but that was probably 15-20 years ago, now. I haven't seen a new kingdom hall in the last 20 years that was built with windows, but that may vary depending on climate and local culture. I've often heard from the platform that it is because people sometimes would throw rocks through them. Sometimes this is mentioned in the context of "angry appostates" or "protesters." Litterally every time I've heard it, though, it follows the script below nearly verbatim:
<discussing questions/objections people might have regarding JWs, things like "you don't believe in Jesus" etc.>
"Some people even wonder why kingdom halls don't have windows. 'What are you doing in there that you don't want people to see?' they ask. Well there's a simple answer - we don't have anything to hide, but at one time when kingdom halls had windows there was often a problem with vandalism. Sometimes people <sometimes this is changed to appostates or something similar to fuel the persecution complex> would throw rocks through them. So, after a while, it was decided that new kingdom halls would be built without windows. We can also assure people that are meetings are open to the public, and invite them to attend." -
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Mormons getting hollowed out: The tipping point has occurred.
by Qcmbr inever since mitt romney turned the spotlight on the lds church a growing tsunami of disaffection has been accelerated and brought to a head.. the lds core faithful members are leaving in increasing numbers such that growth has not simply stagnated in the west but it has actively reversed.
to their credit the church is responding aggressively but not only is it too late, it is an impossible task.
you can only paint sh*t so many ways.
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OneEyedJoe
I think were both right new halls will be built for mutiple congregations and ownership issues but at the same time this allows for them to quietly delete congregations with out anyone knowing the numbers are down. Some one posted here that they know a co in a circuit near Seattle Wa, and he was told by this co that there lossing half a dozen people per circuit per assembly. No way to know for sure but the last few circuit assemblies I attended seemed down in numbers as well as the District assemblies. But there always changing things around so it hard to tell. Maybe that's the reason why so people won't figure out that the numbers of people attending are down.
On the topic of anecdotal evidence for decline, I'll add my observations: The last CO visit we had, in his final talk he said what boils down to - the elders have expressed concern to me about meeting attendence, but I don't think it's a problem because your congregation has some of the best meeting attendence in the circuit. Our meeting attendence is probably 70-80% on sundays and 50-70% on the mid-week meetings. That was never passable when I was a kid (we'd get local needs talks if it dropped below 90% for sundays) in the same area so something must've changed. I think the trend is that meeting attendence is dropping everywhere and they've switched from trying to recover the ones that are leaving to trying to put on a good face so that the ones who are still there don't leave too.
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Mormons getting hollowed out: The tipping point has occurred.
by Qcmbr inever since mitt romney turned the spotlight on the lds church a growing tsunami of disaffection has been accelerated and brought to a head.. the lds core faithful members are leaving in increasing numbers such that growth has not simply stagnated in the west but it has actively reversed.
to their credit the church is responding aggressively but not only is it too late, it is an impossible task.
you can only paint sh*t so many ways.
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OneEyedJoe
but is all about ownership
I suspect that has a lot to do with it...just probably not in the way you meant it...
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CREATIVE "DAYS" - What do JWs believe?
by Bloody Hotdogs! ina few weeks ago, i asked you to critique my website article on dinosaurs (http://www.jwbeliefs.com/what-do-jehovahs-witnesses-believe-about-dinosaurs/).
it was pointed out that much of what i wrote depends on the creative "days" being relatively short - something i believe jws teach.. after being prompted to review my conclusions/research, i was more convinced than ever that jws promote relatively short creative days.
the nail in the coffin was the teaching that day seven is indicative of the length of the other six days (i.e.
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OneEyedJoe
Sir82 hit the nail on the head. The 7000 year "day" teaching has been quietly retired and they've backed away from it. I suspect that they didn't want to upset the oldtimers by publishing a QFR on the matter, and now they just go with "thousands of years" instead. This is clearly their trying to have it both ways. When old timers read "thousands of years" they think "7000 years." When younger or more scientifically literate JWs read that they read it as being much longer to coincide with their scientifically accurate understanding of the age of the earth/universe.
The other thing I'd add is that even COs seem to have the idea that the 7000 year "day" is "old light." I don't know how much of it was in the outline, but I distinctly remember a couple years back a CO gave a long talk in which he talked about how Jesus had been hangin' out with Jehovah for at least 13.8 billion years since that's the age of the universe and jesus was around before that.
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Can anyone tell me any narrative of having successfully avoided Baptism while being raised JW?
by SonoftheTrinity ini just worry for my stepkids about their future that way..
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OneEyedJoe
Not to distract from the topic, but you guys who weren't interested in getting baptized -- weren't you worried about being destroyed at Armageddon?
I had fully bought into the hype that Jehovah was loving and just. I knew that my hesitation/skepticism was justified, so I figured that he'd let me be a part of the ressurection of the unrighteous, even if I had to be killed to do it. Really, though, I figured that being a good person that believed in him as much as I could would warrant getting me through. I knew all the doctrine, so if armageddon really started i'd immediately believe 100% so I figured god wasn't enough of a dick to let something as trivial as an outward display stand in the way of letting me in to paradise.
In short - if I didn't make it then he was no god that I wanted to serve anyway.
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Can anyone tell me any narrative of having successfully avoided Baptism while being raised JW?
by SonoftheTrinity ini just worry for my stepkids about their future that way..
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OneEyedJoe
I managed to avoid getting baptized until I was 19. Had I been able to put it off a couple more years, when my doubts started to surface, I probably would have avoided it altogether. Unfortunately, there was an aggressive, utrazealous elder in my congregation who wouldn't let that happen.
My story is almost exactly the same, save the ultrazealous elder was my father. I made it to 19. After about 14 people just sorta assumed I was baptized, so it didn't really come up. What did it for me was my brother telling me at one point that he only got dunked because his friends were doing it, and that he felt like he'd done it for the wrong reasons. I resolved then and there that I'd only get baptized because I was sure about the religion and "loved jehovah."
Whenever someone pressured me to do it, I always came back with "This is a very important descision, and I don't want to do it for the wrong reasons. The more I'm pressured to do it, the more I instintively push back." Sometimes I would add something about them causing me to delay my baptism by pressuring me to do it. That always ended that, and I never got pushed by the same person twice, with the exception of my father.
I eventually broke my promise to myself and got baptized for the wrong reasons - I was heartbroken over a GF that had just broken up with me (she presumably assumed that I was already baptized) and my father knew just the right thing to say to take advantage of that, and somehow I was convinced it was all god calling me to the cult.
So, basically, if you can keep the kid from getting baptized because all their friends are doing it, then all you probably have to watch out for is when they're in an emotionally vulnerable situation. People only do things (this especially applies to joining a cult) if they think it's going to solve some problem for them. In my case, I essentially thought god was going to give me a girlfriend if I got baptized. Most kids don't want to be left out. Many just want the guilt-trips to end and don't realize that it's only the beginning of the guilt.