Posts by demeter

9

WARNING: Is this life all there is? JW's etal believe what you are told...

by sinis in

after much thought and research, i with heavy heart, must say yes.

i know there is a creator or supreme being of somekind.

the chances of life just happening flies in the face of all mathmatical probability models.

demeter

I have thought and read alot about this subject. When I was an active witness, Why does God permit suffering? was my favorite topic to talk about. I thought I had the answer. But there was still something unsatisfying about it.

I'm not a mathematician and I don't have any mathematical theories supporting my ponderings but here are a few of my "conclusions" and ideas so far:

Pardon the randomness:

The JWs use 2 accounts from the Bible to answer the question on suffering: 1) Adam and Eve sinned and we inherited it from them and thus needed a perfect ransomer to purchase our perfection and good standing with God back. 2) That we are tested to see if we can individually maintain faithfulness to Jehovah because of a dispute between him and Satan.

First of all the Job story don't make any sense taken literally. It doesn't even claim to have global implications. It was one imperfect man's struggle to understand why bad things were happening to him and why people were blaming him for his troubles.

If I had a parent or a mate who was continually testing me with hurtful things to prove to himself or one of his enemies that I would put up with it and never say an ill word and totally stay loyal--well, I say that this mate/parent is insecure and cruel, and had a severe mental/emotional problem. I would go as far away from this person as possible and seek protection from him. I think in the human world, people thrive and learn loyalty from being in a supportive, loving environment. If there is a God, I think that he is of this mindset too.

This brings us back to Adam and Eve. If God is all knowing and all powerful and the personification of LOVE, then how could this story be the total answer of how wickedness came into the world? Taken literally, he let the newest and most innocent of his creatures be manipulated by a vastly more powerful and intelligent spirit creature into putting herself into eternal destruction and alienation from God. What loving father could look on and let this take place? If your young daughter were alone in the forest and you knew that a terrible seducer was about to take away her innocence and murder her--would you sit back and see if she would resist him strenously first? Would you allow her to take poisonous fruit back to her husband to see if he would refuse before you intervened, out of some honor test? I know what I would do to protect the ones I love. I refuse to believe that an loving deity would allow this either.

I think that many parts of the Bible are the result of reactionary patriachial Israelite mentality that wanted to erase mother earth theology. I think believing those parts as concrete literal events are the basis for many ethnocentric, misogynic cultural attitudes in western society and a spring board for mental illness. It causes diseased attitudes because it causes a split between the natural desire for humans to be loving and accepting and this idea that God is inherently judgemental and punitive ...so his followers must be too.

I wonder, if you take the self discipline you learned as a witness or some other kind of fundalmentalist and seasoned it with love, what kind of spirituality would you come up with?What God would grow in your heart that you could believe in and trust? How would you feel if you thought God wanted you to love yourself and respect yourself and trust your own inclinations? If he was someone there for you rooting for you to grow and become the beautiful spirit you were meant to be? What if he thinks it's time for us all to grow in maturity and write our own personal Bibles of spirituality deep with in us? How would you treat others if you treated yourself well and knew what good treatment looked and felt like?

I think it is time we looked at ourselves and the archaic beliefs we have been burdened with and look at the fruitage it has brought to our own circumstances and the world around us:Would we be so careless about our relationships if we unburdened ourselves of self guilt and shame and we refused to cast guilt on others? If we looked around and saw the underlying unity that bonds us all together with God (LOVE)? Would we not treat everything with more respect and dignity, including the physical world around us?

98

Sad news from Maui

by Makena1 in

jw
friends

we went to our favorite beach, met up with some of our local friends.

we don't have much in the way of details - but heard some devasting news that ari (well known to seattle area exjw's and i am sure by many on the board) killed himself sometime over last weekend.

he was so excited about moving to maui, and starting a new life here.

demeter

I just read about Puternut and it is very sad. He wrote some nice posts and was a nice guy. I think shunning is terrible.

But, most of us have been Witnesses at one time and trully believed that what the organization said and tried to be obedient even when it was very difficult. I don't think a person should judge his daughters or the rest of the family so harshly. I'm sure they are in world of pain right now.

Feel love and compassion for everyone, even the ones who have not gained the understanding we have. I think God is Unconditional love and Ary is at peace with God. I think God wants us to feel unconditional love for him and his family. Elizabeth Kubler Ross wrote that these kind of things help us to know the eternal lessons we are here to learn. And the greatest lesson we are here to learn is unconditional love. Even if the Watchtower doesn't preach it, at least we do know it. When we get away from the organization, then this knowledge does come from deep inside us if we learn to our innermost voice.

I think this is what Puternut would want us to know right now. I think he would want us to feel compassion for his family.

Peace, Demeter

10

Filling the Void

by demeter in

jw
friends

what do you think has been the most helpful thing you have read, heard, or learned lately?

what helps you get along in a post-jw life?.

i think the reason people go back to an organization that they once rejected is that they find a void and have no experience with filling it.. what do you do to make a new social life?.

demeter

"Oh dear...I still haven't got this one figured out so good yet. My new social life seems a lot like my old one (I stay to myself a lot and read and meditate and walk in nature) only I don't go door-to-door 4 days per week and sit through 5 hours of "schooling"and I don't make my daughter do any of those things either"

I can identify with all that. I am so glad to not have all the stress of getting ready and attending all those meetings and studying for them and studying and reading to keep up with all the extra stuff that was recommended and service etc.

I think some might find a void when they give all that up because Witnesses give up personal fulfillment up to fulfill all the requirements and look to someday distant in the New System, after the earth is all cleaned up and all the resurrected are taken care of, etc to think about doing anything personally satisfying. Living in the present, enjoying the present moment, this is a foreign idea to most witnesses.

10

Filling the Void

by demeter in

jw
friends

what do you think has been the most helpful thing you have read, heard, or learned lately?

what helps you get along in a post-jw life?.

i think the reason people go back to an organization that they once rejected is that they find a void and have no experience with filling it.. what do you do to make a new social life?.

demeter

Hi,

What do you think has been the most helpful thing you have read, heard, or learned lately? What helps you get along in a post-JW life?

I think the reason people go back to an organization that they once rejected is that they find a void and have no experience with filling it.

What do you do to make a new social life?

What do you do to fill the spiritual void? I was trying to explain my philosophy to my mom while being careful not to upset her but it is hard. JWs are trained to believe there is nothing out there for them if they leave. No hope. And of course the 'world and its people are wicked'

I think former JW's do have major trust issues. I know I have had to struggle with learning to believe and trust again in others.

If the organization were to disintegrate, I do feel for the ones who have sacrificed everything. What comfort will they find?

Another major hurdle is the belief that independent thinking is wrong and dangerous. That is drilled in JW's from infancy. This makes witnesses distrust themselves. One scripture quoted ad nauseum is the one about 'the heart is treacherous--who can know it? " and another: 'the one trusting in his own heart is stupid'. I don't have a NWT here or I would give the citation. I think one of them is Jer. 17:9

The KJV : " The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked: who can know it? --Jer 17:9

Yet the Bible also says 'Be sound in mind', and: "For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind."--2Tim 1:7. So according to the Bible here, when we turn to God he does give us a sound mind--one we can trust. I think the key here is turning to God and not to a man-made organization. I think you can have a closer relationship with God if you don't have an organization running interference for you. I had been programmed to believe that leaving the WT org was the same as leaving Jehovah.

It was an interesting and pleasant surprise to me when: I found that I felt closer to God when I started using the brain that God gave me.

10

The Grape Cure (Cancer) WTS

by blondie in

when i was growing up, if a jw was diagnosed with cancer (or a non-jw family member) they would start eating grapes.

being a jw born in the 50's, i had never read anything in the publications on this (or the danger of aluminum--another story), so asked where they had read it.

if anyone has the golden age or a scan of the endorsement by fred franz, that would be nice.. http://www.premier1.net/~raines/ruthoccult.html.

demeter

http://www.wcpo.com/wcpo/localshows/healthyliving/207648b8.html

10

The Grape Cure (Cancer) WTS

by blondie in

when i was growing up, if a jw was diagnosed with cancer (or a non-jw family member) they would start eating grapes.

being a jw born in the 50's, i had never read anything in the publications on this (or the danger of aluminum--another story), so asked where they had read it.

if anyone has the golden age or a scan of the endorsement by fred franz, that would be nice.. http://www.premier1.net/~raines/ruthoccult.html.

demeter

I remember my Grandmother giving that book to a friend who was into grape fasts. I had no idea it was related to the society. I would have liked to read it just to see what it had to say. The book sounds quite strange.

I have been reading some though, that indicates that grapes do have some properties that are helpful to prevent or cure cancer, also heart disease. Especially red grapes. Also, tomatoes and certain other fruits and vegetables are reputed to have some of these same healing nutrients. My own Physician advised me to "eat like a vegetarian" because of high cholesterol.

16

beliefs I thought were unique to JWs because they had holy spirit

by demeter in

this forum rocks.

i like it very much.. i want to talk about something that i have noticed since leaving the jws.. i thought the ideas about the millenium, armeggedon, invisibility of christ's presence, etc were inspired as truths given only to the anointed to pass on to the faithful witnesses.

the parousia idea was an idea borrowed from a preacher named miller when one of his apocalyptic prophecies failed to come true.

demeter

Tetrapod.sapien--thanks for the welcome.

I think I'm already fat,but not with knowledge--more to do with Pringles and Breyer's...

I think a chart would be cool.

Pentecostals think Halloween is evil. That's another one. Mormons and Babtists have been known to go door to door.

How about the narrow twisted road that leads to eternal life and the broad road that leads off to destruction? All of christianity might fit in that one because actually christians are a minority in the world.

The belief that the Faithful and Discreet slave is the Anointed might be unique to witnesses though. And the insistence that the 144,000 anointed is a literal number going to heaven--Revelation---I think that understanding might be unique. However I was reading in a book about religions that Adventists,as a catagory of religion,generally believe that the faithful will rule with Christ for a thousand years.

16

beliefs I thought were unique to JWs because they had holy spirit

by demeter in

this forum rocks.

i like it very much.. i want to talk about something that i have noticed since leaving the jws.. i thought the ideas about the millenium, armeggedon, invisibility of christ's presence, etc were inspired as truths given only to the anointed to pass on to the faithful witnesses.

the parousia idea was an idea borrowed from a preacher named miller when one of his apocalyptic prophecies failed to come true.

demeter

Hi,

This forum rocks. I like it very much.

I want to talk about something that I have noticed since leaving the JWs.

I thought the ideas about the millenium, armeggedon, invisibility of Christ's Presence, etc were inspired as truths given only to the anointed to pass on to the faithful witnesses. The parousia idea was an idea borrowed from a preacher named Miller when one of his apocalyptic prophecies failed to come true. Turns out the Bible students appropriated this idea in the 1870's and then again in 1914.

Turns out JWs are an offshoot of the Adventist movement began in the 1800's with the Millerites. None of those ideas were unique to the Witnesses.

What things have you discovered are not a unique identifying mark of this "true God inspired" religion?