Posts by Dagney

23

All the Old JW Acquaintances Passing Away

by StephaneLaliberte in

yesterday, my dad told me an older sister passed away.

she wasn't too old (in her 60s), but i knew her 30 years ago and haven't seen her in 15 years; the main reason being that i faded 10 years ago.. yesterday, i seriously considered attending the funeral and catch-up with old jws i used to know.

after thinking it over, i decided against it.

Dagney

When my dad tried to kindly explain that he was too ill to attend the co-ordinator cut the call short and said he didn't have time to listen to all of my dad's health problems.

This infuriates me. I had a friend who experienced this. He was a month away from his passing and the secretary called to get his "time." He told him he had none to report. The elder pressed him for quite a while even asking "didn't you talk to meals on wheels, anybody? I don't want to put you down as irregular!" My ill and very sensitive friend was so distressed. I kept trying to tell him the elder was clueless and just "doing his job." But for me, this is one of the nails in the coffin. I left 1 year later.

Unless there is a caring group within the congregation who look after older/infirmed ones, they are on their own. There is no direction from the society to do any sort of care giving. I really hate this religion.

23

All the Old JW Acquaintances Passing Away

by StephaneLaliberte in

yesterday, my dad told me an older sister passed away.

she wasn't too old (in her 60s), but i knew her 30 years ago and haven't seen her in 15 years; the main reason being that i faded 10 years ago.. yesterday, i seriously considered attending the funeral and catch-up with old jws i used to know.

after thinking it over, i decided against it.

Dagney

It's curious that given how important funeral talks are (and by the nature of things, how often they have to be held), there seems to be such variety in the quality of them. Especially when you think how tightly the org controls the content and tone of every other meeting.

I think it lies with the speaker. There is a good portion of them who get that this is the time to not just preach. They understand it's offensive to people who are grieving, even though they use the outline. I attended two HUGE memorials held at auditoriums, with live feed to the KH where the talk was given, one with a Bethel speaker. Other than the segue from warm and introspective to the resurrection and pet tiger, they were good overall. Also note literature tables set up with all the brochures Bibles etc. UGH.

I went to one where none other than Geoff Jackson attended via zoom, and gave a few words and gave the prayer. It was a very personable talk with lots of slides and experiences.

My mother's memorial speaker and Br. Dreadful were totally out of touch with the audience. They wanted only to get their message across and that is "all you guys out there need to come back to JeHOvah because you are bird food." My mother's was so horrible my brother, an elder, apologized for it later. As if anybody would ever want to join or rejoin after hearing these types of talks. Absolutely clueless.

So it appears HQ "allows" the speaker to make the call of how to integrate the outline, and face it, some guys are just clueless in any talk they give. In their mind fire and brimstone is the tool of choice.

9

JWs Using the system

by XBEHERE in

jw
friends

i have it on good authority from a friend living near warwick that many bethelites filed for covid-19 economic relief from the us govt.

he said that one bethelite actually told him that they were being instructed to file some sort of income, not sure of the logistics of that with the vow of poverty and all, but if they did that then they would qualify for economic relief.

basically getting thousands of dollars for free.

Dagney

Mike and Kim have a list provided by WTBS of all the government agencies people can use for whatever. Watchtower spent a lot of time investigating and organizing this list so they don't have to look after their own.

Watchtower is a special sort of grifters.

23

All the Old JW Acquaintances Passing Away

by StephaneLaliberte in

yesterday, my dad told me an older sister passed away.

she wasn't too old (in her 60s), but i knew her 30 years ago and haven't seen her in 15 years; the main reason being that i faded 10 years ago.. yesterday, i seriously considered attending the funeral and catch-up with old jws i used to know.

after thinking it over, i decided against it.

Dagney

It's sad that I can't properly grieve someone I once liked due to the cult's dynamics.

I know. Since leaving I feel it's more important to honor the life, any life, that has ended. That is not the thought shared by JW's.

I zoom attended a very large memorial earlier in the year. I was super close to the family for years, and my JW family bent over backwards to make me aware of the memorial. It wasn't too bad and I'm not sorry I "attended" for the reason above.

On the other end of the spectrum, Aude and I attended a KH memorial a month ago for a relative of another poster from here. She said she could use the support and we were there for her. OMGoodness, it was truly a DREADFUL talk. Just dreadful. There were many nonJW relatives there and I was anxious for what was being said. I mean this speaker had a total disconnect from the crowd, going off into great detail about unacceptable behavior to Jehovah, mainly homosexuality. He used all the words. Thankfully I don't think it affected any of the relatives like it triggered me.

I know 99% of the JW's I've known for decades would not attend my memorial. I will attend one if I feel it's right for me to do. That's what alcohol is for.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

Dagney

I’m going to say that he was indeed getting off on hearing these stories about sex abuse and was probably a bit sore he did not get to hear such tales as an elder.

That was my feeling also when this went down. Aside from the "ick/creep" factor of sharing such intimate information with an admitted sex addict, it is completely inappropriate and irresponsible for him to be any part of the CSA community, or participate in any abuse victims matters.

362

Just read that Carl Olof Jonsson died yesterday

by slimboyfat in

for newbies, who was carl olof jonsson?

he was a jw in sweden who was challenged by a householder in the 1960s, who pointed out to him that secular history books don’t agree with watchtower that jerusalem was destroyed in 607 bce, but instead place the event 20 years later.

the reason the date is important is because it is the starting date for jw chronology which leads to 1914 as the end of the gentile times, and the beginning of the last days, as jws understand it.

Dagney

I occasionally suspect he can't really be as dumb as he seems, but whatever his intent, honest readers can benefit from responses to his drivel.

I'm enjoying this immensely Jeffro! Thank you for your responses.

JWs at least teach both publicly and privately as superior Bible teachers.

There was a time when a good portion of JW's could argue what they were taught from the literature, along with the hop-skip cherry picking of phrasing from the Bible. That is SOOO not the case anymore. They are following direction and pointing people to the website and produced videos, then handed a pamphlet. The WT has been so wrong about so much, they don't want their peeps doing any teaching. The the peeps gladly agree. They stay far away from any prophecy discussions and concentrate on the bad conditions and god's going to kill everybody except them.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

Dagney

Looks like Santa!

362

Just read that Carl Olof Jonsson died yesterday

by slimboyfat in

for newbies, who was carl olof jonsson?

he was a jw in sweden who was challenged by a householder in the 1960s, who pointed out to him that secular history books don’t agree with watchtower that jerusalem was destroyed in 607 bce, but instead place the event 20 years later.

the reason the date is important is because it is the starting date for jw chronology which leads to 1914 as the end of the gentile times, and the beginning of the last days, as jws understand it.

Dagney

I like others here read COJ's book right after I left JW. I kept thinking "I KNEW IT!" as I read chapter after chapter. And for COJ to pull the data together and document the lies the WT corporation published was a tremendous assistance to thousands of people who were truly searching for truth, and knew something wasn't adding up in the JW literature.

RIP Mr. Jonsson and thank you for work.

11530

It's been a long 9 years Lloyd Evans / John Cedars

by Newly Enlightened in

original reddit post (removed).

Dagney

This video popped up in my YouTube menu this morning. A thought occurred to me. Not that it matters but I wonder if LE drops Dijana's name in asking for support so donors may think they are supporting the family as much as his "activist work." She was attending university for her own career, (thank goodness). Speculating I know, but it doesn't hurt his cause to use her name when asking for support in hoping to garner more sympathy

I agree with the poster that mentioned LE was ready to move on...as he had illusions of glory of being an international activist/journalist/writer.

92

Chance or intelligent design?

by ExBethelitenowPIMA in

cofty could you answer how the single cell came about by chance?.

i know the argument for complexity in nature says natural selection over billions of years but this could not explain the complexity of the single cell the building blocks of life?.

Dagney

As Disillusioned JW said, the series with Stephen Hawking is most excellent. The experiments will give you much to think about if you are truly curious.