Posts by Open mind

13

"We're involved in a life saving work"?

by eyeuse2badub in

as my wife left for fs this morning (aka gossip and coffee time with her friends) she mentioned to me that one of the parts in the clam meeting this week was:.

to remind the 'faithful' that, "we are involved in a life saving work!".

so i just calmly mentioned to her that if he really wanted to, jehoober could save thousands of lives every day just by controlling the weather or providing just clean water or just a just a few loaves and fishes!.

Open mind

Many JWs, my wife included when she was still in and I was mentally out, cannot bring themselves to believe that their loving God Jehovah is going to kill virtually everyone (except maybe those who are Bible Studies) on earth at Armageddon. They would much rather believe that Jehovah will individually judge "the hearts" of humanity and that hopefully tons of non-JWs will be allowed to survive.

If that's the case, the preaching work is NOT a "live saving" effort. The only way it can be is if the all-loving Jehovah kills 99.9% of the planet's population at Armageddon.

17

Do Circuit Overseers outrank Elders? Why can't they talk to disfellowshipped people?

by garyneal in

jw
friends

last sunday, our family went to the kingdom hall and i realized that this was the week that the circuit overseer was in town.

when we sat down, i noticed he came over and talked to her then he walked away i guess to talk to others.

a few minutes later, he returned to tell her that he could not talk to her because he was informed that she was disfelloshipped.

Open mind

What dubstepped said sums it up pretty well. The CO isn't likely to be involved in meeting with her to determine whether or not she qualifies for reinstatement, so there's no reason for him to talk with her. The only reason I could see is if the CO has a particularly over-sized ego and thinks that he might be able to read her mind/heart by speaking with her.

36

I've graduated at last

by fulltimestudent in

jw
friends

after a bit of a kerfuffle over a procedural matter, my university has awarded me a degree.

(the procedural problem was caused by my independent selection of what i wanted to study).

award : bachelor of arts.

Open mind

Very well done!

25

How to deal with struggling with the doctrines

by Dval in

this is my first post.

i'm still a jw but am inactive.

im struggling with the fact that i agree with some of the doctrines (i,e, the stance on the trinity, there is no hell) but i disagree with a lot of things (i,e, men can't have beards, women have to wear skirts).

Open mind

This oft-cited quote by the late theoretical physicist and free-thinker Richard Feynman echoes some of the ideas already given here:

"I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned."

That thought helped me have the courage to begin to objectively evaluate the teachings I had been force-fed since infancy.

All the best to you on your path.

61

For Active JW Men: Ideas on Awakening Your JW Spouse (Long post)

by Open mind in

jw
friends

disclaimer: your mileage may vary.

if you are a married, "active, in good standing" (tm), jw male who has recently discovered that the .

watchtower is not what it claims to be, this thread is for you.

Open mind

bumping at the request of Confusedandangry.

5

Current/recent Elders: WT Legal phone hours?

by Open mind in

when i was serving as an elder about 10 years ago, the wt legal department's main number could not be reached on the weekends.

does anyone know if they have since made themselves available to elders 24/7?.

the most recent instructions i could find (october 1, 2012 letter to boe) still say the first thing elders are to do when becoming aware of an accusation of child sexual abuse is to "immediately" call watchtower legal.

Open mind

Thank you sir82. Their policy is still bad, just not quite as bad as when I was serving.

carla: Yes, that's how it was, and I was able to make quite a few JW relatives squirm with that information. I would lay out the hypothetical scenario of a child saying he was raped in the back room of a Kingdom Hall at 3 pm on a Friday afternoon and all the DNA evidence being gone by Monday morning.

An elder relative of mine chimed in once saying, "There's nothing stopping the parents from calling 911. It's their primary responsibility."

I replied, "OK, let's say the parents have headed out for a cabin in the woods for the weekend with no cell phone coverage and they drop off little 13 year old Johnny at the Kingdom Hall for a cleanup afternoon on their way out of town. You're the elder on scene and Johnny comes out of the back room saying he was raped and his parents can't be reached. Are you going to call 911?"

He looked at his toes for a few seconds and then said, "Yes, I would. But that's a pretty far-fetched scenario."

I said, "Maybe, but the policy should be changed to accommodate a situation like that, don't you think?"

20

Make the Truth Your Own

by neat blue dog in

this is something that hit me just relatively recently.. the phrase "make the truth your own" is a very famous catch phrase in jw culture.

it was a pet philosophy of daniel sydlik and has been used and is used in talks, literature and song.

every witness knows this trope.

Open mind

During my 2.5 years of purgatory, serving as an elder & awakened to TTATT but waiting for my wife to awaken, I used to play a few little games at the meetings to keep my sanity.

One was changing song lyrics and singing them just loud enough for my wife to hear. Since I had started to rely more heavily on the spirit (mainly gin) to make martinis I would sing to my wife:

"Make VERMOUTH your own..."

Bada Boom. (I'll be here all week!)

5

Current/recent Elders: WT Legal phone hours?

by Open mind in

when i was serving as an elder about 10 years ago, the wt legal department's main number could not be reached on the weekends.

does anyone know if they have since made themselves available to elders 24/7?.

the most recent instructions i could find (october 1, 2012 letter to boe) still say the first thing elders are to do when becoming aware of an accusation of child sexual abuse is to "immediately" call watchtower legal.

Open mind

Hello,

When I was serving as an elder about 10 years ago, the WT legal department's main number could not be reached on the weekends. Does anyone know if they have since made themselves available to elders 24/7?

The most recent instructions I could find (October 1, 2012 letter to BOE) still say the first thing elders are to do when becoming aware of an accusation of child sexual abuse is to "immediately" call Watchtower legal. If the elder was made aware of it on a Friday afternoon on the West coast of the USA, they would have to wait around 60 hours before making phone contact on Monday morning.

37

"Hard work never killed anyone," or "I have to give up knitting."

by compound complex in

greetings, my aging friends:.

it's not really a funny subject, our getting old and our bodies falling apart.

sure, as the saying goes, hard work won't kill you, but it can wear out your body.

Open mind

Sorry, CoCo, to hear about your pains and having to keep working to pay the bills.

I'll never forget how my Mom would occasionally catch herself after describing her latest list of age-related ailments. She'd say, "Well, I guess you've heard enough of my organ recital for now."

Not trying to minimize your suffering, but a little humor can sometimes help keep things in perspective.

Best regards.

29

How about prayers being used as a talk?

by NikL in

jw
friends

another thread on here made me think of it.. its a personal peeve of mine.. you bow your head in prayer and the brother says thinks like thank you for the lessons we learned today like bla bla bla and for that wonderful point about yadda yadda yadda.

jehovah we know that etc etc etc therefore we must...well you get the gist.and on and on it goes.

absolutely drives me mad..

Open mind

Magwitch: "The final prayer would get started by one of my long winded foreign speaking Ukrainian uncles and the majority in the audience just wanted death........"

Ahhhh, Good Times!!

I'll never forget a CO who counseled the entire audience at a CA re: the nature of our public prayers. (Which of course only applied to the penis-possessors in the audience.) His counsel was absolutely spot-on, IMO. He said something to the effect of "Brothers, Do you think Jehovah needs a refresher course on the content of the program today? (Long pause) He doesn't."