one of my best friends in the world pam who is a non-judgmental born-again christians told me that she thinks that we are only "pawns" in a chess game played by jehovah and satan.
at first i thought pam was joking with me but she told me she was serious as a heart attack.
she then started to explain her position.
Certainly in the Grand Scheme of Things as described by the Watchtower Society, humans are indeed only pawns:
- Not exactly a very entertaining thought!
IF there is such a thing as a Master Intelligence, surely he/she/they/it can come up with something better than this?
(After all, if a simple bushman turned electrician like me - or in the case of Candidly Nuts, a child - can see something is not right ; then surely a Master Intelligence can, too?)
Very much:
- that is one of the reasons why, at every opportunity, I load up my pack and disappear into the mountains (alone) for several days.
(Early on, this got me into trouble with the local JW administration. Instead of removing myself into the bush for the weeked, I should have remained in town to help sell WTS products for them!)
The words of the Canadian poet, Robert Service come to mind:
"....Its that great big broad land way up yonder,
Its the forests where silence has lease,
Its the beauty that thrills me with wonder,
Its this silence that fills me with peace."
He was talking about the Yukon, but he could just as easily be describing where I go (i.e. the hinterland of Turiwhate!.)
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a group calling themselves the lord's witnesses has predicted the collapse of the wt administration in late may/early june of 2006. you can see their prediction timeline at their website.. http://www.truebiblecode.com/understanding101.html.
Notice that this lot, too, draw heavily from Daniel and Revelation?
That seems to be a common theme of all authors of whacko theology.
For nearly thirty years I was avid reader of everything that the WTS wrote - and then in the latter part, saw it all exposed for what it really was.
From that experience, I could never now take seriously any utterances like these - not even remotely!
What sort of cigarettes were these guys smoking when they dreampt up this story?
(Must be good stuff!)
i guess next week will mark the co visit at my congo.
should be loads of fun for all since last time he publicly humiliated and literally tongue lashed the yoots for dressing worldly and the moms for letting their children cry.. the 20 something guys had the audacity to wear flashy ties and dark shirts, the baby room was being used by a korean book study and it was raining outside.
wtf were the moms supposed to do with their kids when there was literally no place to put them.. something that i found very interesting was that i was exempt from the flashy tie and dark shirt thing even though i made it a point to stand in front of him and take off my coat while discussing the down pour after the meeting.
Since this thread seems to be rather open-ended, I hope that I can add my five cents worth now without being accused of bumping / hijacking it.
Firstly, my recollections of Circuit Overseers are that they were a very mixed bag - some were almost human!
There was one, though, who served on the circuit in the Central South Island during the early 1980s:
- I knew him well from when he had been a "Special Pioneer" ten years before that.
- While a Special Pioneer, this person's language and behaviour was worse than a lot of "Worldly" people I knew. i.e. Four-letter words were an integral part of his vocabulary; plus he had a definite and well-developed nasty streak in him.
Knowing first hand of his background, I could never take him seriously whenever he visited our congregation in his capacity of Circuit Overseer.
Going back to the opening post in this thread, I think that in a broader sense, the JWs are not a Family-Friendly religion:
- DOs / COs berating parents for a baby crying during a meeting.
- Expecting small children to sit still / sit quietly for two hours at a stretch.
- No provision for the needs / capabilities of small children and babies (i.e. a "Sunday School" type arrangement)
- Demanding that parents bring their children to all the meetings (whatever the time of day or night that these are held at).
I resent the WTS for many things - but top of the list would be for how they prevented me from having a happy, stable family life.
The Circuit Overseers were of little use in this regard. Without exception, all the ones I ever knew had never raised a family - yet seemed to think that they, and they alone could tell you how to do so!
(Just thought that I would finish in the same way that this thread started - i.e. by jabbing pins in the CO's backside!)
would you have any qualms about taking blood??
do you believe in a paradise earth?
do you think there is only one "truth"?
I no longer hold to any of the beliefs/ doctrines that are peculiar to JWs.
The only beliefs that I still have in common with the dubs would be those principles that are common to all the worlds major, enduring religions.
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anybody ever bungee jump or do anything quite dangerous?.
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The most dangerous thing that I ever did wasn't done deliberately - i.e. to be dangerous, get an adrenaline rush or anything like that!
As it turned out, I reckon that the most dangerous thing I ever did was to enter an apprenticeship as an electrician.
I say this as my closest call with death came three years ago, after a succession of errors on the job one morning led to my receiving a massive electrical explosion fair in my face!
As a consequence, I was semi-blind for a week afterwards, and my eyesight has never been the same since.
Any young person reading this and contemplating an electrical apprenticeship, go for a career in IT or something - a bloody sight safer!
i want to put this in the right frame, as what is happening in iraq is not about dying for our countries.
so this is what i mean by this question.. if a foreign government were to suddenly invade your country.
would you be willing to join the arm forces to fight for your country, knowing full well that you may die having never been able to reap the benefits of any possible victory?
The way I see it, citizenship of a country carries certain responsibilities with it.
One of those reponsibilities is to take part in the defence of the country, should that it ever be required.
It goes without saying that to be engaged in armed conflict is to risk death or injury.
Sometimes, the most effective form of defence is to take the fight to the enemy, rather than wait for the enemy to come to you:
- Uncle Bruce makes touches on this with his reference to the 1942 Kokoda Track campaign in Papua New Guinea. It is generally acknowledged that Allied Strategy in stemming the Japanese advance in the Owen Stanley Ranges of Papua was the correct one - and that the defensive "Brisbane Line" plan that was advocated by some would have only ended in disaster.
Most of us would desire peace.
Unfortunately, though, the lesson that history teaches is that peace can only be maintained by force of arms.(Unpalatable as that may be).
For example, unilateral disarmament after WWI only meant that when WWII broke out, the free world (if I may use that term) was caught woefully unprepared - and the price for that unpreparedness was paid for in blood (that of thousands of young men who need not have died).
The dictators Hitler and Mussolini got as far as they did only because the countries that should have opposed them
1) Were unprepared for war.
2) Either thought that Hitler and Mussolini represented no threat - or else could be somehow stopped by doing nothing!
Further to the matter of defence - it is much more effective if carried out in an organised manner. An organised force is infinitely more effective than individuals each singly confronting the enemy with a collection of makeshift weapons.
So going back to the question about fighting in the defence of the country:
- It is a responsibility of being a citizen.
- And as defence is most effective when carried out by an organised force, it is best done serving as a member of one of the Armed Services.
My thoughts anyway,
The Mayor of Turiwhate.
i was intrigued by an earlier post.
the point was made that the jws are going door-to-door to meet a quota and are not really concerned about the people they are witnessing to, but only in saving their own butts.
has anyone ever had a non-jw friend and asked them if they could talk about jehovah for a while to them, in order to fill the time they need?
Thanks for your comments, stillanxjwelder.
My first post on this site led me directly into a s##tfight with someone! Good to now receive some positive feedback.
Mayor of Turiwhate.
if you had to write down just a few sentances about why you left the truth, what would you say?.......
jambon;.
wholeheartedly embraced it for a few years after love bombing etc then saw widespread hypocrisy.
Minimus's remark "Because it wasn't" - plus the fact that I could not keep up the charade any longer.
Looking back, I knew that it was all so much BS after the 1975 fiasco - it just took me (others too?) a while to confront reality. Family ties / pressure added to the delay, and the break lost me my family.
i was intrigued by an earlier post.
the point was made that the jws are going door-to-door to meet a quota and are not really concerned about the people they are witnessing to, but only in saving their own butts.
has anyone ever had a non-jw friend and asked them if they could talk about jehovah for a while to them, in order to fill the time they need?
I jumped at every chance to witness rural territory:
(i) Call at some door (usually a "Not at Home") before leaving town, drive two hours to get to the territory (We had plenty of those type maps),
(ii) Still count the time while sitting in the car, when at least someone from the vehicle was at a door.
(iii) Come up with novel ways of "placing" (more like dumping) huge numbers of Watchtower and Awake magazines:
- Such as leaving bundles of the things in Forestry Huts.
( One of our maps had a Forestry Hut over 1 km from the end of the road. I counted the time taken to walk there and back to that, too!)
(iv) Finish the day with Step (i) in reverse.
That way, you could achieve your month's quota of 10 hours in one just day - no need to go out again that month.
In doing this, I always used to feel that I was giving the Elders plus the CO the proverbial "Two Fingers". Given the way the R&F are continually harassed on this matter of "hours", I would admit to receiving a certain sense of satisfaction from doing this.
In reading the reactions of others to this post - together with my own memories of the subject - I think that there is an element of "Monkey See, Monkey Do" at work here:
i.e. By its actions, the WTS shows itself to interested only in numerical increase - NOT in the welfare of the Rank and File.
(I seem to remember reading somewhere in "Crisis of Conscience" where N.H. Knorr is on record as actually volunteering that the WTS is not interested in the welfare of the R&F. Not having a copy of C of E on hand, I can't pinpoint the exact page. Maybe someone can help me here? Not that you need the words of N.H. Knorr to demonstrate that the WTS has no interest in people's welfare - the evidence is everywhere, and well documented on this discussion board!)
Given then that the WTS cares nothing of people's welfare - but rather continually harps on about "hours" - it is hardly surprising that the R&F, too, are only interested in that column on the Monthly Report entitled "Hours".
