ummmmmmmm..........
well.........
you could say you are washing your hair................
they will not give up!!
i live a ways away from my old congregation and i work with a couple of active witnesses who know i'm inactive.
so, i've been bombarded with phone calls and asked by my co-workers to go to the memorial.
ever notice how the "happiest people on earth" are also the most class-oriented?
to say that jesus said his followers should all be on equal footing, it's incredible how much the r&f witness is not on equal footing.
the social structure in the congregation is more complex than the blueprints of a nuclear warhead, but just so that you "remember your place", see if you can find where your niche was/is:
my wife is joining.
she feels that the choice is between nothing and god, and that the only way to have a relationship with god is through these people.
i have accepted that.
typically, what life does a jw lead?
witnesses relish the thought that they are "different" from the rest of the "world"......how so???
?
I know a few JW's.....they all live different lives...one is a nurse....she is OK...and keeps all opinions to herself......one i use to work with.....totally opinionated and full of Jehovah that it flows out from her mouth.....then there is the one who gave me lessons....he is manic and desperate....there is one i e mail and is a freind of the manic one whom i don't talk to anymore...she is full of the joys of Jehovah and what grand things are in store and how plagued her life has been with satan doing bad things that cause much hardship and distress.....all except the nurse say they are bright and clever....and go on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on....(get my drift).....about all the good things that Jehovah has is store for us....i bet they cannot wait to get their hands on me and drag me to the Kingdon Hall given the chance....their essence of life to me is go convert and pray.....the borg comes to mind....so beam me up scotty.....
as most of you know by now i have told you that my mom has been a "devout" jw for over 40 years and i can't get her to budge.
well the last time we debated she left me totally confused and in a daze.
i did some fast research and this past sunday we had a free-for-all debate that lasted 5 hours.
the wts & its various corporations are a behemoth, rudderless ship with no one at the helm; only concerned with self-preservation.
the result is an inflexible organization slow to make change and not interested in the welfare & rights of individual members.. the internet and boards such as this allow for excellent communication and freedom of information.. because the internet is free and provides relative anonymity it has proven to be one of the greatest threats to the wts.. the wts leaders could be proactive and act in an ethical way, but they'd rather react when a perceived "threat" arises -- telling members to avoid the internet, shun family members, do more/stay busy, and so on.. as jt used to say, "i love this 'net thang".
dmp
I would say that the WTS hates the internet....while JW's themsleves love it....."love it"?.... i hear you say....
Well....up to the last few months i had on line lessons with a chap in USA....i would love to say his name....but lets say J.....
I met J in a chat room.....i also met many others too....anyways....i didn't know J was a JW....i was having a bit of a difficult time and i poured my heart out to J and he gave me reasuring quotes/scriptures from the Bible and i thought you nice considerate man.....i asked him if he was religious and he said he liked to keep the Bible at hand......and i thought OK fair enough each to their own.....so after a year we had a disscussion on the state of the world and religion.....i said the Church of England was a government ruled religion that stemed from the victorian times.....and if you were not Church of England you were noconformist and not really Brittish.....(thats in a nut-shell)....and he agreed with me and gave me lots of web sites on the bad state of the world and the evil religions of the world....he gave me more Bible quotes.....and so i said i didn't understand the bible and would like to.....
Guess what......I FELL RIGHT INTO A TRAP.......
J saw me coming and i bet i made his day......So i had online JW lessons....not knowing that they were JW lessons.....after a time it came apparant to me he was a JW and he didn't seem to push me to go further untill after a year of not progressing far....what i did in a year he done in a month when he had lessons...he kept telling me to hurry up and i thought yeah in my time.....
MEANWHILE......He fed me lots of info on the state of the world from the net and how bad it was with reference to the NWT.....and said my time was running out.....so while i kept saying i will get there....(which i should not have done)....he was getting manic....HE WOULD SPEND HIS DAYS SEARCHING THE NET TO PROVE HE WAS RIGHT AND HE LIVED THE LIFE ACCORDING TO THE TRUTH. AND SEND ME SOME OF HIS RESEARCH.....
Up to last year....(sorry i can't remove the highlight!)
we got on well.....and then we started to fall out...i didn't believe the JW theory on Jesus dying on a stake...and the end of the dominated freind ship started to fall apart....
Because i was getting to like J very much....i was more than willing to listen to him....he said he loved me after giving me a hard time with a lesson....AND...he considered me to be like a daughter....and i felt quite flattered.....then i started to search around the net too....and i found this site when looking for evedence of Jesus and the cross.....
THEN I REALISED I WAS FOR HIS USE ONLY.....WHEN WE FELL OUT HE SAID HE HAD INVESTED HIS SOUL IN ME.....
He didn't care about meat all.....just his needs.....i don't have anything to do with him anymore.....and it took a while to sever the ties...and now i don't miss him.....
Nor do i miss the "Organised religion"......
thank you for putting up the highlights.....
The escaped one called Rosemary......
what is the wt publication you hated the most?
why did you hate it?
for me, it was probably that damn pink great teacher book.
I'm just reading through some of the old soups on here....some catch my eye...and so did this one...i wasn't a member when this one came out.....
But can i say the "best WT publications are the ones that got thrown out".....in other words....i liked them more when i had the satifaction of chucking them in the bin....(trash can.....i think you say in the USA)....i also enjoyed ripping up my bible lessons.....
this is a long post, i dont usually post in these lengths so bare with me.
i wrote the following letter some years ago for someone who was battling to see their children, parts of the letter became used in court cases, a lot of info is deleted but i have kept the drift.... .
dear ***.
That is one amazing life story....thank you Brummie....
It has made me thinks of JW children differently...I can now understand now why one child of about 10yrs went up to my freind and pointed to her cross and chain and said "thats evil"....then was promptly rushed away by an older woman (possibly her mother)....I thought what a dreadful child...but now i know that child was indoctrinated.....
i noticed after being a jw for a while that many members of my congregation were having to take antedepressants.
(i counted at least 30 out of 100).
after a few years i too began to have bouts of depression and problems with anxiety.
i noticed after being a jw for a while that many members of my congregation were having to take antedepressants.
(i counted at least 30 out of 100).
after a few years i too began to have bouts of depression and problems with anxiety.