my parents said they received a directive from the society not to buy from the street vendors at the district convention.
is that just a unique situation?
i don't think this has to do with religion, but revenue...
Not necessarily... the WTS used to sell food at the conventions before they had to pay taxes on such sales, and people were still able to bring in their own food if they wanted.
True, but a lot of venues will not allow people to bring things in if the concession stands are open. It's not so much a WT policy as it is the policy of the individual venue.
let me just start off by saying that my mother asked me to read the new brochure.
she said, "i expect you will be critical of it.".
i said, "mercilessly so.
wonder if he is frightened by the newspaper, or the fact that he has wasted his life serving the WT and now he is old and Armageddon still hasn't come.
Maybe he's reading about another molestation case among the witnesses and thinking "Ha! Glad I got away with it for as long as I did. Better go prepare my public talk for Sunday." (o.k....that was tacky...sorry...lol)
damn!
witnesses are stupid.
i'm going to a family wedding this weekend of a non-jw family member.
DAMN! Witnesses are stupid. I'm going to a family wedding this weekend of a non-JW family member. My cousin, who is still a JW, told me today that he doesn't feel comfortable going because my mom and my ex-wife, both of whom are disfellowshipped are going to be there. He said he was looking forward to visiting with me, but was uncomfortable going to the wedding. Now, here's the kicker. As he stated jokingly, I should probably be dissed b/c of my lifestyle. On the other hand, my mom and ex are both going to all the meetings and studying and all that to get reinstated. HOW STUPID IS IT that he feels comfortable visiting w/ me, who should be dissed and is living a non-JW lifestyle, but not with them, even though they're going to all the meetings because they are technically df'd. Does anyone see what I mean???? What the f*&^ kind of reasoning do these people use??? I mean, I know, 'cuz I was there once, but now it seems so damn dumb. I told him that what he had just said made absolutely no sense and did he not see that. He said I sounded like an apostate and now isn't sure if he's coming at all. Anyway, just needed to vent. Thanks.
i caught my boyfriend of 8 years cheating on me about a month ago.
he claims it is the only time he has ever cheated and he never thought he would ever cheat nor would he ever do it again.
some of my friends are upset at me saying i should have left him immeditately.
Unfortunately, I've been on your 'side' of this a few times. In my experience, once a cheater, always a cheater. I truly believe that some people have it in them to cheat, and some don't. I've never cheated, and not because the temptation hasn't been there, I just wouldn't let myself do that. People make all kinds of excuses for cheating, but the fact is that you can control who you have sex with. My first wife said it was an 'accident'. I was like, ACCIDENT? Did you trip and fall onto his dick a few hundred times?
Whether you leave or not is up to you. Just because you caught him doesn't mean he has done it before. But once he has, and you've taken him back, the chances that it will happen again are very good. Again, I say this from experience. In both cases that it's happened to me, I took the person back, and it happened again at a later point in time. I've made a firm committment to myself that if I'm ever in that situation again, it's ADIOS mf'er, regardless of whether or not I love that person. Cheating is a selfish, bullshit act - nothing more, nothing less. There is no 'rationale', no reasonable excuse. It happens because people let it happen - they pursue someone else and follow through with it. It shows a lack of love and respect for their mate. All that "I cheated, but I still love you" is nothing but pure BS. You don't do that to someone you truly love. My advice is to begin breaking things off now and save yourself the heartache in the long run. Remember too, that even if you 'get over this', you'll never feel the same, you'll never trust that person, and when you get mad, you'll want to bring it up as ammo.
Just my $0.02
my parents said they received a directive from the society not to buy from the street vendors at the district convention.
is that just a unique situation?
i don't think this has to do with religion, but revenue...
There was a recent WT article that linked street vendors and concession stand workers with ancient pagan rites, as the vendors would sell food to those worshipping false gods. Further, the hot dog and the taco are both sexual symbols created in ancient Rome, where they would be eaten in the Colesseum while Christians were being fed to the lions. Additionally, since the mustard seed was used in one of Jesus' illustrations, it would be irreverent to use the product of the mustard seed on a phallic symbol, such as the hot dog. The article went on to say that one of Jehovah's people must think long and hard about whether their conscience would allow them to be employed in such a spiritually precarious environment. A Christian who sought alternative employment would be showing respect for the 'food at the proper time' given by the 'faithful and discreet slave'.....as long as that food wasn't a hot dog w/ mustard on it sold by a street vendor.
Seriously, though, you would think they would view it as a great opportunity to 'witness' to those concession stand workers who couldn't help but hear all the assembly parts and see the brothers existing in 'united love'......
i'd like to know if it were possible to find the new world (english) translation on the web?
i'm french and i only possess the french translation, both editions 1987 & 1995 (actually the french translation is not very good...).
i heard that some copies formatted for e-sword were available somewhere on the web.
Uh, why do you want one? Please tell me it's to compare it to other Bibles and see how wrongly it is translated......
from the current new england journal of medicine:.
god at the bedside.
to the editor: we agree with dr. groopman (march 18 issue)1that religious faith may be an essential part of coping withillness and death for many patients and doctors, affecting thequality of life if not medical outcomes.
Board-certified chaplains have graduate-level theological and clinical training that enables
That's why, even though some 'worldly' clergy are hypocritical a-holes, many of them that I've met are compassionate and understand how to provide needed counseling and support, not just carry out judicial policies based on a confusing and ever-changing set of 'rules'. Most elders are poorly educated and have absolutely no training in nor understanding of the way the human psyche works. Have you ever seen them try to console or counsel someone in need? It would be comical if it weren't so pathetic. Many of them don't even keep up with current society literature on 'touchy-feely' type stuff, but they DAMN sure know every little thing you can be counseled or df'd for. My mom suffers from clinical depression and has been treated badly by elders who think it's all a 'state of mind' that prayer and service will fix. When she was dissed this past spring, she asked all three elders if they had read the most recent Awake! articles on depression and not one of the three had. How sad that they are responsible for the well-being of so many people.....
my parents said they received a directive from the society not to buy from the street vendors at the district convention.
is that just a unique situation?
i don't think this has to do with religion, but revenue...
Yeah, this whole situation is stupid. Although, in all fairness, if they open the concession stands, then people can't bring in their own food, so it would make it hard on some of the brothers to attend. (Not that it would be a bad thing if they couldn't....lol). What they need to do is work a deal w/ the stadium that will open the stand for those that can afford it, but allow people to bring in their own food/drink if they want to. Or better yet, stop having assemblies altogether....lol.
dear friends,.
of course, the jw doctrine says "no" to a connection between un and the watchtower society.. but: my personal opinion as a long-time witness is that this was a ultimate chance for the society to change things for good: the wts as a ngo, helping many people in the world to improve their lives, just as they did on a small scale with aidafrique in africa and asia earlyer.. why did the wts disconnected from un so soon after the guardian-story?
now, there are only losers, no winners: the wts, with all the pr-problems on this subject now, but more important, the many people who could be helped with a wts/unhcr aid-program or an aidafrique/unhcr aid-program.. the reaction of disconnecting so soon as possible was not a professional act!.
Ozner,
It's not about whether or not they could help anyone or anything else. They had to take quick steps to destroy the link w/ the UN because of the hypocrisy it showed. After years of preaching that the UN was the wild beast, here they are in bed w/ it. Keep in mind too, that the WT has never recommended or condoned donating time or money to any 'worldly cause' that would actually help feed, clothe, or house people. I was told by an elder that I couldn't volunteer to help with our local Habitat for Humanity project, because any spare time I had should be given to the preaching work or the society's building work, and any spare money should go to the society as well. See, the WT 'helps' people by preaching and bringing them into the 'correct' understanding of the Bible. Everything else is just 'window dressing' in the 'last days' of this system. All humanitarian efforts would be wasted, because only God can fix things. Never mind that you may help someone to eat or have a place to live out the rest of this 'wicked old system of things'. What a bunch of BS!
i know this is from 2003 but i havent been here that long.
anyone recall this or comment?
secret order banishes religious minorities from police.
I love the hypocrisy (in the WT?, nah, surely not). Growing up in the south, nearly every elder I knew hunted and a number of them had quite the impressive gun collection. Just don't carry them on the job to help make the world safer for all of us - idiots!
