Posts by Doubting Bro

38

How Did Your JW Wife or Husband Leave You?

by new boy in

inspiried by other post and threads....and the love to type.. after going from being a self rightious pioneer and bethelite, to someone who had major doubts.my years drifted by me.

i had been a watchtower slave for over 50 years.

one day at a time, i sold my soul.

Doubting Bro

Keith, thanks for sharing your heart breaking story. It basically sums up my worst nightmare.

still_in74

at 33 years old I am beginning to wonder how many more years.
Today I found the pressure of "living the lie" got to me so bad today that I actually broke down... just for a few seconds a couple of times... but it happened. I choked it down and moved on.
for a brief moment today I just wanted to leave everything behind and be done with it. But here I am... living the lie.

I hear you man. I wish I could write some encouraging words but know that you aren't alone in feeling this way. I love my wife and child more than anything. Honestly, I just don't know if its worth it without them.

23

Flaky JWs drag down the Cong Performance Stats. Doncha' hate that? ;-)

by Open mind in

some quick advice for faders re: level of field service activity.

btw, this assumes you have no problem turning in "fluffed up" hours as part of a reverse "theocratic warfare" strategy.

if you really don't care one way or the other whether you turn in a field service report, turn one in at least every 6 months with one hour of "time" on it.

Doubting Bro

OM,

I'll give it a shot (which will surely kill your tread!). The key in my opinion is to avoid generating attention to yourself:

Pioneer - insane, way too high profile and you've got to be at least a little visible

High-Hour Publisher (18-50 hrs/month) - if you're a male, too risky. You'll generate attention from the BOE in the form of recommendations for "privileges". if female, you'll get "encouragement" to aux pioneer or regular pioneer - see above.

Strong Publisher (10-18 hrs/month) - Still too risky for a male. 10 hours per month is enough to get appointed. Female, this is probably ok but why increase the stats?

Low-Hour Publisher (5-10 hrs/month) - Man, you're tough. I would call this slightly below average. To me, this is the perfect range. Not enough to get appointed, too much to get the sheparding call that the next category will get. Basically, you'll be in the majority of the congregation and therefore under the radar. You can show up once a month to be "seen" (try to work with the SO or Secretary so someone will vouch for you at the BOE meeting.)

Super-Low-Hour Publisher (1-4 hrs/month) - You will get unwanted attention if you're a male. If a female, you'll likely not get too much hassle. On the plus side, a bunch of these publishers really knock the wind out of the averages.

Irregular - It will get attention but if you make it like every other month or so for about a year, the attention will drop.

Inactive - Not good if you're trying to stay in for family. Way too much attention, especially if you still attend meetings. Eventually, they'll give up on you but it may take a while.

42

JW LOOPHOLE ON BLOOD IN PRINT!!

by Burger Time in

ok just read this article and didn't see it anywhere else.

anyways in this article the liason committee gives permission for a "forced" transfusion.

the article basically points out the loophole!!

Doubting Bro

I thought it was always understood that if there was a court order than you had done what you could?

Me too. Actually, I've had discussions with a friend a few years ago who has been on a local HLC for several years and he confirmed to me that in cases of young minors, the only thing you can do to prevent a medically necessary blood transfusion is make them get a court order for each pint. He told me it was a no win situation and that as long as a parent tried to talk the doctor out of it, there would be no action taken against them by the congregation.

Also, I've never seen anything in print that suggests a parent hide their children or refuse to take them to the doctor in an effort to prevent a blood transfusion. Not saying that the WTS hasn't planted the idea that to take a blood transfusion is equilivent to the unforgivable sin, but they've never told people to not take seek medical assistance. The policy is insane and makes no sense and should immediately be revoked.

56

Still think the Society is not running out of cash? ...

by sir82 in

jw
friends

...then check this out!.

(of course the society has $billions in real estate, but many have speculated that they are low on cash for day-day operations).. unfortunately i don't have a working scanner, but here is a summary of & a few quotations from a boe letter dated march 1, 2008:.

"for an number of years, an arrangement has been available to congregations to place funds on deposit with the branch office.

Doubting Bro

I'm not really surprised that they're doing this, but I'm a little surprised that they sent a letter to the BOE on it. I would think they would just instruct the COs on their next visit to review each congregations accounts and if there is more than say 1k in excess, "suggest" the way COs love to do, to the BOE that they move it to the WTS. Same spin, but not have it in writing.

By the way, how much do you want to bet that compliance with these "suggestions" will be a checklist item for the next CO visit?

Man, they really are cash short aren't they? I really didn't think they are that short on cash and were simply liquidating the Brooklyn properties because they thought the timing was good.

20

Here's how the Society can get out of the "anointed" dilemma

by sir82 in

jw
friends

there's been several posts the past few days about the issues raised when the society dropped the "1935 as the end of the selection of the anointed" doctrine in may 2007 and reinforced the teaching with the 1/15/08 wt.. many ideas have been thrown out regarding how the society will be able to "spin" the almost assured large jump in memorial partakers this year and in following years.. it suddenly hit me how they can do it, and come out smelling like a rose:.

(warning: speculation ahead!).

go back to the "2 class" heavenly calling!.

Doubting Bro

I've got an even better way of explaining it away. Right now, they tie the "new covenant" with the partaking of the emblems and the declaration that you are "annointed". These same folks are also said to be included in another covenant called the Kingdom Covenant. The new covenant is the one that Jesus mentions in at the Last Supper and provides for the forgiveness of sins. The Kingdom covenant is the promise Jesus made to the apostles to come to heaven to rule as kings with him and was made that same night but after the passing of the emblems.

So, all you need to do is say that the new covenant applies to all Christians and all should partake in the emblems. This is just a recoginition that Jesus died for your sins and that because of this, you can be forgiven and have an opportunity for everlasting life (either in heaven or on earth). Since they've got the Kingdom covenant seperate anyway, they can say that this promise is for a select 144k of humans that started with the apostles and is a spirit annointing and is personal between the individual and God.

This way, you don't have to report on the partakers since its not relevent. And, you can keep the number a literal number since there would be no tracking mechanism in place. Bada-bing, problem solved!

35

Am I an idiot??? - ok, don't answer that... but, seriously... I've....

by cognac in

jw
friends

noticed that i'm seeing all these things that i didn't see before... like when the wt or revelaton book states something, or when the bible states something... i mean, i never noticed this many things before... before, i noticed only a few major doctrine issues.

but, now, i'm noticing things all the time.... i mean, i'm trying to take a break.

i'm trying to not pay attention... but, they are saying things that really piss me off and i'm wondering to myself, what the hell was wrong with me... how did i not notice it before???

Doubting Bro

Cognac,

You certainly aren't alone in your feelings. Just like Scotsman, I also whisper comments to my wife about things said. We've had long discussions about the WTS and she knows I only go to maintain contact with my large JW family. She thinks most Christian religions are similar and that God will sort them out in due time. I'm not so sure but whatever.

I also find it difficult to keep quiet. I sometimes feel like standing up in the middle of the kingdom hall and screaming at the top of my voice - ARE YOU PEOPLE BLIND.

I feel the same way.

43

Elders in their 20's?

by Princess Daisy Boo in

my little sister called me just now.

exciting news - stop the presses - her husband has been made an elder.

she is 27 and he is 26... is that not a little young to be an elder?

Doubting Bro

I was appointed in my late 20s in the late 1990s. I've been on BOEs that had elders in their mid-20s. I thought I was too young but had been a MS for almost 10 years so they felt that helped me "qualify". Really, being a WT elder is about doing a bunch of parts and administrative duties.I was very compentent at that duty. I never really worried about people coming to me for advice because there were others that would fill that role. And sheparding is so rare that I didn't worry about that either. And I usually managed to wiggle out of JCs.

I was the youngest at the time on the BOE and myself and the other young elder would be assigned to handle issues with the kids. Never really got called on to provide advice to someone older on life issues. I probably would have asked someone else to do it anyway as some of the other comments show that getting life advice from someone young enough to be your son isn't usually received very well.

Really, what choice do they have? Most of the guys I know that were appointed around the same time I was have either been deleted or have stepped aside. I think the burnout rate on the young ones is just as high as it is on the older ones. If they could drop the burnout rate, then they wouldn't need to appoint guys in their 20s to run their congregations.

118

Losch reveals newer new light at Australia Zone Visit

by Billy the Ex-Bethelite in

okay everybody, grab your barf bag because i just got a steaming shovel full of craptastic notes from gerrit's zone visit to the land down under !!.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ read at your own risk ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~puke.

zone overseer was losch and his side kick was a big black guy, quite a scolar, cant remember his name though.

Doubting Bro

Losch is known for saying crazy things in his talks, so I'm really not suprised. After all, anyone that would say American football is from the Devil is obviouslly insane

However, 2 things caught my eye:

8. Matt 24:14- Now totally fulfilled!!!

Ok, that's not the first time a Bethel speaker has said something to this effect. Remember last year when one of the Bethel "heavies" said this very thing at either a CA or a SAD? Then a copy of the talk made the JW e-mail rounds? At the time, I thought it was a trial balloon. Now, a GB member is saying it? Perhaps another trial balloon?

Then the geographic flight. That's a little scary. They've always said that the flight was figuaratively the flight from "false religion". The theory was that since there are JWs all over the world, the flight could not be literal. However, I could easily see them tying in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans (which seems to me what Matt 24 was talking about anyway) and the physical flight by the Christians to the mountains to a physicial flight to some remote location by JWs today. The connection is easy enough to make but selling that to the membership I think would be quite difficult. If this ever makes it into print, then I'd be really worried for family & friends. But, I think it would take either 1) a major world event that makes 9-11 look like nothing or 2) years of conditioning this teaching for them ever to pull a Jonestown off.

78

JWs: Biggest Turnover Rate of Members! "Masked churn" rate of 2/3rds!!

by Seeker4 in

jw
friends

an article just out this afternoon said the following.

note especially the second paragraph about jws: .

for some groups, their relatively steady number of adherents over the years hides a remarkable amount of coming and going.

Doubting Bro

Even on a local level you can see the churn. The congregation I'm "in" over the past year has had 3 baptized (all kids in the 12 y/o range) while 5 df'ed (all unrelated incidents).

I think they're calling members what the WTS records as publishers.

I'll bet in some of the non-English congregations where many of the converts are first generation (both to JWs & to the US) are the ones where there is more being converted than are leaving. It will take a while for them to catch up on the curve. Proof that it will eventually happen to those congregations as well is found in Japan. 10 years ago, all you would hear about is how the Japanese were putting the western countries to shame with their large growth. Now, the growth has slowed to a crawl like the west.

In the not too distant future (5-10 years), the non-English language congos here in the US and western Europe will start taking the same sort of hit out of the back door.

66

HERE'S THE 2007 SERVICE YEAR REPORT

by Mary in

i'm not sure if this has been posted yet, so i took the liberty of scanning a copy.

here is the figures for the 2007 service year report.

interesting that over 9,000 partook at the memorial last year when the numbers should be going down.

Doubting Bro

At last night's SM, the article about JW's being the fastest growing "church" was read(in part of course). But, the SO who was handling the part didn't have any problems about calling JWs a church or religion. Of course, if he did the math, he would see that Catholics have around 67 million members in the US and added about the same number of members JUST in the US as JWs have in total WORLDWIDE.

The increase in baptisms is somewhat interesting. I think the increase in publishers could just be with all the tract campaigns getting the inactive to report something one month. I know there was a strong push in my area. The general trend has been slower growth, so I suspect that 2007 was a blip. If they can put together a couple of these +3% years, then I think we have a trend.

Of course, the LDS are right behind them in terms of fastest growing and I don't think they're correct as far as religious theology either. Just because you grow, doesn't mean that you are Gods chosen channel.