'no one has greater love than this, that someone would lay down his life for his friends.'.
many have been hurt by the practice of shunning.
family members, [former?
The Searcher - Most J.W.s - not all - are just people who are doing what many of us here used to do.
Having the scales removed from the eyes should make us far better human beings.
It depends on who, but for someone I care about, yes. What The Searcher states above is reality, and I am not into being a hypocrite.
d4g
i remember when i was a kid, how the importance of meeting attendance was continually drummed into our heads.
through the magazines, meetings, and especially traveling overseers, it was stressed that missing just one meeting was akin to allowing satan into our lives and would jeopardize our everlasting life in paradise earth.. one particular bit of 'advice' stood out, even to a small child: even if out of town relatives showed up on meeting day, you shouldn't let that cause you to miss a meeting.
i remember trying to play that out in mind... 'welcome, grandpa!
I have noticed they tend to respond that way more often when they are fighting their own cognitive dissonance, especially if they thought you and your wife would likely not go to the hall with them. If it were something else they wanted to do, (without you being there), they may not even think twice about missing the meeting. Based on the context here, its sounds like it was implied going to the hall was not on the agenda, so you received their self-inflicted guilt trip response.
d4g
In the org? Almost never, even when I went...I guess I was voting with my pocketbook without realizing it.
Now?
ASPCA - Monthly
National Center for Science Education - Monthly
Public Broadcasting - Monthly
Various clothing and food drives, etc.
long time lurker (2009-ish), first time poster.
first of all, i want to say thank you everyone who contributes to these boards and provokes stimulating conversations and thought processes.
all the opinions and different perspectives are very enlightening.
Good post, DJS. Always liked that movie.
d4g
long time lurker (2009-ish), first time poster.
first of all, i want to say thank you everyone who contributes to these boards and provokes stimulating conversations and thought processes.
all the opinions and different perspectives are very enlightening.
Welcome, humblepotato and good post.
If there is one piece of information I would offer, it us that you should not feel pressured into coming to conclusions too soon. It is quite enough in the beginning to unlearn the lies you were taught by the WTS. This in of itself will help you develop the proper lines of reasoning needed to ask questions as you experience life, since now you are able to think for yourself. Btw, I am an atheist today. I just did not come to this conclusion overnight.
Like yourself, I read Ehrman, Dawkins, both of Ray's books, lots of religious history, lots of history, biology, etc. In fact, most of that I read within the first two years of leaving. I was still an agnostic at best. If anything, I would say learning physics played the biggest part for me in allowing myself to accept atheism. This was in 2011, a whole 5 1/2 years after I left.
My point is, I probably had enough information long before I understood anything about relativity or quantum mechanics to become an atheist. For me, being a big picture thinker, I could not commit until then. I believed there were still too many unanswered questions. My simple point in all of this is, you will know when your questions are answered to satisfaction, and that is when your existentialism will ease. This process is automatic if you just let it happen.
So keep questioning, and keep an open mind.
d4g
i am new to this forum - it is only a couple of weeks since i have allowed myself to acknowledge and research my doubts.
i am trying to be fair by reading both sides of the story and considering jw official explanation of confusing matters.
one of the issues i have been looking at is shunning - and i was shocked to see the misleading information about shunning on the jw.org website: .
freemindfade - During this time I heard it said to me or my spouse "using the word shunned is an apostate word"... while there it is in print. I was also told by someone I have been so close to for 35 years "I am not shunning you, I just won't do anything with you socially, I wont follow you on social media, etc, but I AM NOT SHUNNING YOU, we just wont do anything together again"...
Unfortunately, this type of anti-logic is almost impossible to reason with. You need to get them to understand logical fallacies first. You likely will not be able to have the ability to get that far in conversation.
d4g
i am new to this forum - it is only a couple of weeks since i have allowed myself to acknowledge and research my doubts.
i am trying to be fair by reading both sides of the story and considering jw official explanation of confusing matters.
one of the issues i have been looking at is shunning - and i was shocked to see the misleading information about shunning on the jw.org website: .
FMF: I was also told by someone I have been so close to for 35 years "I am not shunning you, I just won't do anything with you socially, I wont follow you on social media, etc, but I AM NOT SHUNNING YOU, we just wont do anything together again"...
JW's lie to everyone, including themselves. They are completely dishonest about who they are and what they believe, even to themselves.
Just one minor point of clarification. They lie to themselves first, which is precisely why they can lie to everyone else and not even know it.
d4g
so many of us have been caught up in the negative effects this religion placed over our lives and those who we love very much.
i am the first one to tell my kids "i don't know s&^^ about this or that subject", if the watchtower is truly our brother or spiritual mother why don't they tell us the following questions we all have asked them?.
1. we screwed up about 1914 and "life is short, go live your life to the fullest while maintaining justice and morality, don't hurt your fellow man by making his life screwed up!.
The answer is simple. They would cease to exist.
Think about it for just a minute. If they told they don't know the answers, people would look elsewhere. They would lose members, (almost overnight), then...
Survival drives many instincts, both consciously and subconsciously, for both organisms and organizations alike.
d4g
i realize that many here still have a form of spirituality or faith, and i mean no disrespect to those individuals.
i suppose i am posting this question to those, like myself, who have come to the conclusion that religion in general is a major hindrance to the progress of our species and needs to be put aside so that we can advance to our full potential.
so my question is, do you think this will ever actually happen, and how do you think we can get there?
Social evolution happens. While they technically still exist, really how many flat earthers are there?
For all intents and purposes, religion will one day make about as much sense to society as a whole.
one reason is because the governing body's policies allow them to run loose in the congregation with their secrecy/kangaroo courts.
.
to keep jehovah's name untarnished(organization sock puppet) they have put the little rank and file member at risk.. one member of the gb was a child molester.. sexual repression also seems to aggravate the situation and make matters worse.. the governing body main concern is not children but how to keep the scam going and so if they can get the victim to shut up and not go to the police as it offers a temporary fix.. etc.....
