Posts by OnTheWayOut

6

Happy Memorial Day

by Perry in

jw
friends

just wishing a happy memorial day to everyone!

we had some friends over, barbecued and let the kids run around slap crazy playing cops and robbers and hide and go seek.

we have so many freedoms that those under tyranny do not have.

How much sediment would have been moved in Noah's flood?

by Zoos in

i flew over this crate yesterday on my return home from las vegas.. .

they say this crater was created by an asteroid about 50,000 years ago.

then about 6000 years ago, presumably, god wiped out all life on earth with a global flood.. how much sediment would have been moved around during that flood.

The Neanderthals had a tall structure there and survived the flood with provisions. They may have had the dinosaurs with them. When the water was subsiding and they were about to get down onto the dry earth again, God blasted this structure with so much energy that the building material disintegrated without a trace of it nor the neanderthals nor the dinosaurs.

There's a silly answer for everything. They stop being silly when enough (religious) people adopt them.

53

Spirituality

by Jonathan Drake in

if you are a current practitioner of some religious faith i would appreciate it if you abstained from this thread entirely.

im curious if anyone has had what could be discribed as a spiritual experience.

i'm currently reading sam harris book waking up and it's very good so far.

OnTheWayOut

Sounds like the perfect beach book for me. I ordered it and will read it this winter on vacation.

Without previewing the book, it sounds much like a western version of eastern Zen/Tao philosophy. Let go, less is more, be at harmony and peace with your surroundings. There are terms for that without the word "spiritual." It is called "inner peace" and "serenity." One can be "enlightened" when they realize what it takes to get this feeling.

You don't have to be religious to benefit from eastern philosophy. But I tend to agree with others that your "spirituality" is not an achieved "oneness" with the universe, but rather a journey down a path that your own mind wants to go, so different for each person and their focuses.

I like to say that "spiritual" is everything that is not secular. "Secular" is labor and paying for things. But "spiritual" is enjoying life and other people, and includes escaping from daily routines in any way. It can include work and paying the bills when you reflect on what those things do for your character.

28

Can This Be True?

by Hold Me-Thrill Me in

jw
friends

i was very tired today, still am.

age is getting to me.

that video will be shown to millions of parents around the world.

OnTheWayOut

What you suggested about the timing of the release to allow children to actually drop something in the box right away after seeing the video, YES- You bet that was the plan.

41

Help? :(

by BlackWolf in

i apologize for how rantish this is but please hear me out.

anyways i'm a 15 year old girl and i've never really wanted to be a jw.

its just never been something thats made me feel happy or loved.

OnTheWayOut

Black Wolf, what with the lawsuit-happy world we live in, I can't really advise you on what to do as a 15-year old. I can tell you that when I was 16 and 17, I managed to do things my parents didn't know about. It wasn't preparing for art school, but it could have been were that what I wanted to do.

I know that life is terrible right now and that you think a few years is a long time. But really, you will be an adult soon. Were it me, I would be pretty open about how I don't care to be a JW, no matter how my parents react. I would not give talks in the school nor ring anyone's front doorbell. All they could do would be to drag me to the meetings and to the neighborhood for recruiting. Any punishment seems to be what they would do anyway, like keep me from other kids and the mall and stuff like that. I would probably be well-behaved and silent at meetings and JW stuff so that I wasn't being disrespectful. Then, I could say how they aren't winning me over with their punishments and maybe they would not make things worse. I would keep enjoying music and secretly learn what it would take for me to get into an art school, even if I couldn't really do it for several years (into my 20's).

Flipper mentions any non-JW relatives. Is it possible that at 18, you could go to them to help you on your way to college? If not, then you can still do it on your own. It'll just take a few more years.

Don't be obsessed with "now." It seems just a tiny while ago I was an active JW and now I am almost 10 years out.

8

Out of the Mouth of Babes - Bethel Gift shop?

by 4thgen in

jw
friends

about a week ago i posted to ask for some suggestions on how handle my (pre-teen) sons upcoming trip with his father trip to bethel this summer.

i got some wonderful suggestions.

some of which was to leave him alone, as he will see through the bullshxt himself.

OnTheWayOut

Spiritual AMNESTY -- Return to Jehovah

by FusionTheism in

basically, from what i can tell from the new return to jehovah brochure, is that the governing body is now offering amnesty to anyone who has been gone from the congregation but now wants to return.. it claims it doesn't matter what sins you've done, or what caused you to leave, if you repent to jehovah and ask the elders to help you, and return to the meetings, you'll be warmly welcomed with no disciplinary action or judgment against you..

OnTheWayOut

Suppose their amnesty offer is true. Or even in my case, there is no reason to hold a judicial committee. So what? So they invite people back to bonds of slavery?

No thanks. While ceasing the shunning would be great, not all kind acts from Watchtower lead to better.

I actually wish the recruiting work got harder, instead of this standing or sitting by a literature stand. And that meetings become more burdensome instead of shorter. I wish they would cracked the whip more and drive people out faster.

4

Jehovah's Witnesses Give Presents Their Own Way

by Bangalore in

jw
friends

jehovah's witnesses give presents their own way.. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/lara-ruffle-coles/jehovahs-witnesses-give-presents-their-own-way_b_7231380.html.

.

bangalore.

OnTheWayOut

All fine and good. In one former Jw''s experience, she did not feel cheated by their not celebrating. Three things: 1. The typical JW family does not do well making a difference to the kids with gifts at other times. 2. Many JW children are terrified of violating Jehovah''s rules at birthday and holiday celebrations. 3. JW children feel left out from the other children.

Even most non-Christian kids don't run away terrified from birthday cupcakes at school or feel like lightning will strike them if they accept a piece of candy connected to a holiday.

16

They lie about everything, why don’t they lie about annual publisher growth?

by John Aquila in

jwfacts show that publisher growth was 15% pre- 1975 and has decline to about 2%.

what prevents them from fudging the annual growth and keeping it at something more positive like 10%?.

"a great crowd that no man is able to number".

OnTheWayOut

Lying about the numbers would take some corroboration. I think that GB members and the others who assist them with the writing of their articles are aware of problems, but don't directly think they are liars. It's kind of like a state government saying that "profits" from the lottery go to schools. Some of them do, some of them do. So it's not a lie to omit other places the money goes.

Watchtower leaders think that it is okay to mislead the members as long as there is "truth" within what they say. I think that they have manipulated numbers enough to make the "growth" of the last several years seem true in their minds. For some reason, they think that the USA should have growth so they have consolidated lands that used to be counted separately, they have allowed the 15-minute publishers, they have allowed both parents to count a study with their children so that even an inactive couple could claim some time.

They will probably cross the line of truth/lying sometime soon about this, but first they will have to either convince themselves that they are telling "truth" or that deliberate misleading without truth is necessary. If they have a couple of years of no-growth no matter how they manipulate the numbers, I see them flipping to counting people differently by using meeting attendance and phone-in numbers will be included, then they will start counting website hits somehow.

64

What triggered your doubts / awakening?

by Tornintwo in

i am sort of new here, used a different username for a while but things got 'difficult' at home so i've since been lurking.... what i would be really interested to know, if you don't mind sharing, is what it was that triggered your doubts and initial research which led to awakening, was it a bad experience, injustice, changed doctrine?

for me, it was seeing mistreatment of young ones in the congregation, they're under so much pressure and as soon as they go even slightly astray they are shunned, either informally (as bad associations which pushes them further into the 'world') or formally - with elders dying to throw the book at them so they even lose their family.... ...then reading about child abuse issues in the press.... ...which led me to silentlambs.

...then jw facts, this forum and coc, wham!

OnTheWayOut

I was never burned by a judicial committee or some major injustices. In 1995, it was the changed doctrine of "generation" that started me down the road of questioning WT, but I stayed another 11 years because that was just the start. I have a feeling that I would have found my way out no matter what.

I was a brand new elder in 1995 and this radical change was dealt with by seasoned elders with "they change things sometimes" and it was no big deal to them. To me, it meant the end wasn't necessarily so imminent. I realized that I needed a career instead of a job. I stopped being an obstacle to my wife wanting to go to college.

By 11 years later, I saw the injustice of rules that allowed elders to commit Watchtower-defined sins and get forgiveness while keeping their elder title. I saw how people were thrown under the bus to be examples to the congregation, and these ones seemed to be the ones with no elder connections. I had become an expert on looking things up on their CD-library and on the internet.

So one day, I simply told myself, "I google everything, why don't I google Jehovah's Witnesses and look at everything no matter what?" I had a feeling I would be surprised. Well, I had no previous knowledge about Ray Franz and his story fascinated me. I got a much clearer picture of what dangerous mind-control cults were and realized I was in one.

There's no magic method to free another person. If there were, I would have paid for it. Good luck.