thom

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Posts by thom

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  28

  What to do??

  by RichieRich in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  think about this for a moment.. jws believe that their relentless work now will be rewarded with paradise later.. however, in an effort to get into paradise, many jws do nothing but work, and serve god.

  i know my mother does.. so i wonder, what does she think she's going to do in paradise?

  what is there that she likes, that will occupy her eternally??.

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  thom

  I tend to wonder what God is going to do. With everyone at peace, no war, no death, won't he get bored?
  He won't be able to rain down fire on entire cities. Won't be able to kill firstborn children. Won't be any stonings. I wonder if he's thought this out?
  I know killing billions of people might be satisfying for a while, but I really think he's going to get bored after a while and then what's he going to do?
  I really think he would have put more thought into this.
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  12

  If A JW Can Let A Loved One Die, What Else Could They Do?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  if a witness would not allow a blood transfusion to an innocent child, what makes us think that they would not be more capable to do something else?

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  thom

  "I think more than a few of them have indicated that if certain legal restraints were removed, they might be more than happy to engage in a stoning or two."
  Yeah, it must be rough to be so restricted. From The Watchtower March 1st 1952:
  "The law of the land and God's law through Christ forbid us to kill apostates, even though they be members of our own flesh-and-blood family relationship."
  Wow, EVEN if they're our own flesh and blood? How restrictive! Well, I guess you have to control yourself no matter how strong your desire to murder your family.
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  32

  help my mother is brainwashing my 10 yr old

  by squirlyboo in

  1. social
  2. family

  ughhhhh, i left "the truth" when i was 16 i had my daughter when i was 18. while is was finishing college my mother watched my daughter for me , so they are very very close.

  well whenever my daughter goes to visit usualy about a week at a time my mother takes her to the hall .

  she fills her head with the doctrine and tells her that ill say bad things about it and scares her into not telling me about it .

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  thom

  My situation is similar as I am a single father of a 12 year old daughter. I (we) stopped attending meetings about 9 months ago and just about 100% of my extended family are JW's. I travel now and then for business and leave my daughter with my grandmother or her aunt/uncle (on mothers side) sometimes when I do. They take her to meetings and she basically does all the JW stuff with them.
  What's worked for me is that I know what they're pumping into her head and I know what JW's teach and believe. I then teach her the REST of the stuff JW's believe, like "What do you think of your friend *******? Do you think she's bad? What would you think if Jehovah planned to kill her? We'll, did you know that witnesses believe that God is going to kill everyone who's not a witness at Armageddon? Do you think that's nice, or fair? Is that how you want to believe and what you want to look forward to?
  I realize that might be harsh talk for some kids, but my daughter can handle that type of discussion well. She seems to really understand the strange and cruel things that JW's teach even though my family never tells her about it. I do. I feel it's HER decision what she does in her life and I just want her to have all the facts. At this point she has no desire to be a JW and feels their teachings are very cruel and strange. But she's respectful to JW family and does what she's told when with them.
  I felt that if I just insisted she not be talked to or anything about it from family, she (my daughter) would see that restriction and later in life might become interested again. As of right now she expresses regularly how happy she is we are not JW's and how she doesn't want to be. Hopefully, that will continue.
  I think the critical part is to maintain a very open relationship with your child so they are always ready to open up and discuss whatever is on their mind. I never quickly react when she says stuff, even if it shocks me. Early on she told me she wanted to still go to meetings with family. I told her that's fine and that's her decision, but we talked more and discussed it and a couple of weeks later she had changed her mind. I want her to know that she can ALWAYS talk to me about ANYTHING. Without that, I think it would be very difficult to protect her from their (JW's) influence.
  Just wanted to express how I handle such a situation in the case it's helpful.
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  17

  Helpful JWs

  by greendawn in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  we generally hear negative stories about the jws but were there any who did an act of kindness towards you that really helped you out?

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  thom

  I remember once a df'd sister had a flat tire after the meeting and everyone was ignoring her. Then one brother went over and changed the tire for her.
  People were looking at him like he was doing something wrong, and he was looking back with a look like "I dare you to get me into trouble for this.
  As far as I know, nobody did anything to him about it.
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  45

  Phone Witnessing...

  by RichieRich in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  in my congregation, there is a well established group that does phone witnessing every thursday.

  the society actually encourages us to try other avenues of ministry, however it seems like phone witnessing is hurting more than its helping.... even i, the covert apostate, don't mind phone witnessing.

  i mean whats not to love?air conditioningfoodsitting around and talkinggirlsdid i mention food?.

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  thom

  Several years ago I was tasked with creating telephone territories for our cong I was the territory servant (and the literature servant as I was the only MS in the congregation). They were made for apartment complexes that we couldn't get in to. I looked up the addresses on the internet and did reverse phone number lookups to create the territories. They came out pretty good and were pretty accurate. But I never actually did phone witnessing myself, I was way too self conscious and paranoid to call people that didn't want me to call. Anyway, that's how I made the territories. People would then sit around a table and take turns calling numbers. I guess the ones who's turn it was NOT would still count their time during the 20 minutes or so it was until their turn again.
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  30

  The next cover-up or scandal?

  by kwintestal in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  my personal thoughts are this.

  with the population aging and with jw's becomming incresingly poor, there will be a lot more elder abuse, and i don't mean congregation elders, but elderly people.. does anyone know of this taking place in the congregations?.

  kwin

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  thom

  Thanks kls :)
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  30

  The next cover-up or scandal?

  by kwintestal in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  my personal thoughts are this.

  with the population aging and with jw's becomming incresingly poor, there will be a lot more elder abuse, and i don't mean congregation elders, but elderly people.. does anyone know of this taking place in the congregations?.

  kwin

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  thom

  I think Daunt has a good point that it's really how it would play out in the media.
  JW's feel that they're better than everyone else, more moral and stuff, but most people don't really know what the "leaders" have to say and basically think JW's are just generally weird.
  The Catholic Church, on the other hand, gets politically involved to try to push their idea of morals on the rest of us and ends up looking like they think they're more moral than the rest of us.
  To people in general, it's probably more "fun" to see those that promote their morality through media and everywhere else get toppled than to see some weird small group get the same thing.
  Just my guess.
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  15

  227 District Conventions in U.S. - Some Ideas

  by TheListener in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  ok so on the watchtower website it says there are 227 district conventions to be held in the u.s.. by my count:.

  54 spanish.

  3 american sign language.

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  thom

  I seem to remember hearing a few years ago that the intention was to have smaller conventions but more of them. Not sure the reasoning.
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  67

  What did shunning do to you?

  by hillary_step in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  there can be little doubt that the wts 'shunning' policy is a dangerous weapon.

  each year tens of thousands of people are disfellowshipped, and experience the reality of being shunned.

  many of them still believing the wts doctrine that if they die in this condition they will shortly be executed by god at har-meggedon and die an eternal and disgraceful death some leaving the faith altogether.

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  thom

  I'm neither df or da, but I find that when I run into someone I knew who is a jw, they just ignore me. Which doesn't really bother me as I didn't really like most of them anyway. But it's my grandmother that bothers me, she doesn't shun me, but she just lays on the guilt heavy and tells me I'm "diseased" and "how could you do this to your family." She's really the one that's causing me stress right now.
  
  But one interesting thing (to me) that I've noticed: When I was a JW (up until about 9 months ago), I would wake up every morning and lay in bed and daydream for up to 2 hours about dying. About how I could kill myself and different ways to do it and it really appealed to me. For several years I really really wanted to be dead. I didn't want to hurt people, just be dead and gone. Not looking toward resurrection or paradise just dead. In fact, I would think of praying and writing a note that basically said "Please don't ressurect me, I don't want to come back. I want to be dead and gone and I don't ever want to see anyone or anything again."
  
  But since I've left I now realize that I have not thought about that at all. I never think of killing myself or wanting to die anymore. I'm pretty happy with my life and hope that it just keeps going the direction it's going. I think I'm a happy person for the first time in my life.
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  14

  Pipe bomb at Bethel.

  by Etude in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  does anyone remember the incident that happened back in the summer of 1974 at what was called the "squibb" building at bethel where a pipe bomb detonated at one of the doors just under the bridge that spanned the complex across columbia heights?

  i was at bethel at the time and i even have a picture of two nypd cops standing in front of the scene the day after (if i can only find the picture).

  i was thinking of posting it on this forum but i don't know how.

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  thom

  gespro: I remember reading about that one (pipe bomb at the platform). Heard the same comment about "good thing he was reinstated first". The ones I remember first hand was a KH in Indianapolis getting broken into and having KKK slogans spray painted all over it. Another was a couple of kids (My father and I saw the kids leaving) that broke into a hall and pulled all the paperwork off the bulletin boards, and one other where some guy decided to use the KH parking lot to pipe his car exhaust into his car and kill himself. He wasn't a JW as far as anybody knew, just some guy that found a secluded place to die I guess.