i am writing this group to discuss a topic that as you can imagine i really cannot discuss with too many people, at least as of now.
i am a married male jw, married to a another jw, and she's content with being a witness, and in fact, i don't want to change that if she's happy.. for a very brief history, i was baptized at 19, and have been a jw for 10 years.
fact is, i 'believed' in everything in as much as a lot of it 'made sense' and i was wrapped up in the whole thing.
>>I just don't want to go to meetings, and I don't want to go out preaching.
MANY jw's don't go to meetings, claiming depression or illness or whatever. Or claiming they were "stumbled" by one thing or another. How many of them are in your position and are just using that as an excuse? Can you do the same?
Welcome to JWD, I hope you find help here. I'm sure you will.
Dave
today i had a sister do a bible study with me and i asked her if jesus really died on a torture stake instead of a cross and i showed her john 20:25 emphasizing hands with an s and nails with an s. what the sister had told me was "yes one nail though his hands and one nail though his feet" ok so now back to the emphasis of the s if that were the case why make hand and nail plural be written in the bible then?
I don't think you can get too far with this one. There are imaginable scenarios in which a person could be secured to a stake using four nails.
My opinion only, but I don't think this one is worth bothering with. Yeah, the stake idea is almost surely wrong. But since you can't prove it definitively, and you CAN prove so many other things, why bother with this one?
Dave
okay, so i just checked my ups status of crisis of conscience.
it just arrived!
but now i have to wait for the end of the work day to pick it up at the barnes and nobels.
Wonderful book, a must-read for any ex-JW. If you want recommendations, I recommend skipping chapter one for now. Read from 2 onwards, then read chapter 1 last. It's dry and doesn't tell you anything you're going to care about. He sets up his credentials, essentially, to tell you the tale he's about to tell. Suffice to say he was on the governing body!
Read it, but read it last. (Have dessert first!)
Dave
hey friends,.
for those of you who know him, i just can't stop obsessing over this yet, and feel the urge to share, our lovable resident hippie (i can say that 'cause i mean it in a positive way and i adore him, so there), openfireglass, has shorn his dreads.
he gave himself a haircut yesterday and the dreadlocks are no more.. it was a surprise that i came home to after work yesterday.
>>Not that anyone "really" cares
Nope, couldn't care less about a beautiful couple that met on JWD! ;-)
So glad things are good for you. Sorry you're feeling isolated and "whiny". Perhaps a few glasses of "whine" might help?
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
Another problem similar to this is a motorcyclist that chooses not to wear a helmet, that is struck by a drunk driver and dies. The drunk driver is clearly responsible for the accident, but how much of the death is the fault of the cyclist for the choice he made to not wear a helmet? Or to ride a motorcycle at all?
In order to call this blood story the extreme (and I agree that's what it is), we have to identify where the line is. That's all I'm trying to do.
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
>>Dave, the harvesting issue is a non-issue because it will never happen...
That's the second time someone has dismissed this line of reasoning because it isn't "real". WTH? Since when is a hypothetical not a valid basis for discussion?
You say it will "never happen". You say this because society at large objects to it. The premise is that society at large changes that viewpoint. If that happens, then it will almost certainly happen.
If society at large felt accepting blood was wrong, you would also say that blood transfusions will "never happen".
I'm not saying I agree that the company owes more money. In fact, all things considered, I think justice was served. He got hurt, the company paid compensation, he made some decisions that cost his life and created some consequences, and his widow is now living with those consequences. Sad, but probably just.
But I AM saying that this issue of motivation for refusal is not being discussed. It's being ignored. And I'm not at all sure why, since this is a group that doesn't generally shrink from discussing things, even uncomfortable things.
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
>>If you fell and refused to get up, and refused all offers of assistance, and then were hit by a car, I really don't think I can be held responsible. You're free to make the choice but you're not free to blame me for it.
I'm with you here to an extent. I'm just not sure how "motive for refusing" comes into play. If at all. See above re: organ harvesting.
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
>>This is why, "Reasonable" doesn't refer to what is reasonable to the individual in question. If that were the case, what is "Reasonable" would be entirely subjective, which would run contrary to the very purpose of the standard.
Very nice, thank you for this.
>> >> What if committing adultery would have saved his life?
>> If there was a real, tangible medical value to any of these things, these would be legitimate questions.
No, that's not fair. The blood issue just happens to be a doctrine that runs counter to medical practice. And there doesn't happen to be another one in mainstream christianity. But that doesn't make the hypothetical useless.
But ok, how about this one: What if society at large accepts the idea that it's ok to create a baby for the express purpose of harvesting its organs to save the life of another child? My child's heart is damaged by Disney World, and I expect them to pay for a lifetime of care for him, estimated to cost twenty million dollars. I refuse on religious grounds to use the "harvesting" practice to obtain a new heart for him, so Disney says that is my choice, and they will only pay three million -- the cost of the medically-accepted procedure.
Should Disney pay the 20 million, or the 3? I think it would be the 3, by the standards we're discussing here.
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
OK, you're swaying me here. I think some black-n-white thinking is trying to reassert itself. Thank you for this, Purps:
>>The company is responsible for his injury, yes,
>> But they are not responsible for his death.
I know that seems obvious, but it jarred me out of my either/or view. They DID pay for his injury. They paid medical bills, AND they paid 70% of his salary for some period. So it's not like they blew it off.
Consider this: A woman is raped on the job, and it can be shown that the company is responsible for it due to negligence. (Hired a sex-offender, inadequate security, whatever.) As a result of the rape, she becomes pregnant, and just for kicks, it's a tubal pregnancy. She -- based on her conservative Christian views -- refuses an abortion, and dies. Is the company responsible for her death? By our consensus here, I'd say it isn't. And I guess I'd agree.
Dave
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/stlouiscitycounty/story/6dc0ac2739be6e63862573b000160633?opendocument
should not she just get a job?
or express her faith that jehovah will take care of her?
>>The company is not responsible for his death and should not have to pay compensation to his widow.
Why are they not responsible? What if they had allowed him to become exposed to peanuts, but he had an allergy to them and died as a result? They wouldn't have intended to kill him, nor could his death have been reasonably predicted (assuming they didn't know he had the allergy), but wouldn't they still be responsible for his death, since they took the initial action that led to it?
I'm not entirely certain I disagree with you, FD. I'm sort of limping on two different opinions here, waiting for one or the other of them to collapse.
Dave
