StephaneLaliberte

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Posts by StephaneLaliberte

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  15

  Can't deny my JW's past

  by StephaneLaliberte in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  today was a beautiful day and so, decided to drive by my old town with my wife.

  at some point, she asked me to stop talking about jws to which i said: i'm talking about were i lived, what i did and who i knew.

  its just that all of it was jws!

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  StephaneLaliberte

  Magnum: My wife is POMO, like me. We left together 5 years ago.

  Simon: You’re correct that things become a bit more vague. For instance, I passed by a community center where I know I was there but can't remember what it was for. There is one difference however with a work place and when you grew up a JW: There are portions of your life that are not at that work place. You don't grow up immediately into a workplace, and the longest I've held a job so far is 6 years. I was born a JW. the first 35 years of my life was entirely IN the JWs. My friends, family, my jobs working for other JWs, field service, construction work, all those evenings, mornings, afternoon at the hall. How I was persecuted in school for my beliefs, etc. I passed by the house of a girl I turned down because I was a JW. EVERYTHING was connected to my JW beliefs. Heck, even the small waterfall is where I dedicated my life to God in prayer at 12! I'd fall asleep listening to biblical drama and would read the daily text in the morning. I'd be the one preaching at 6 am in the business district. That aint a simple job, that was my everyday life from when I was born to finally calling it quit at 35.

  My point is that trying to forget my JW experience would result in forgetting my own existence.
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  15

  Can't deny my JW's past

  by StephaneLaliberte in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  today was a beautiful day and so, decided to drive by my old town with my wife.

  at some point, she asked me to stop talking about jws to which i said: i'm talking about were i lived, what i did and who i knew.

  its just that all of it was jws!

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  StephaneLaliberte

  Today was a beautiful day and so, decided to drive by my old town with my wife. At some point, she asked me to stop talking about JWs to which I said: I'm talking about were I lived, what I did and who I knew. Its just that all of it was JWs! Its what happened; can't change my past.

  I understand my wife, she's not the type to be on site such as this and she tries to forget about JWs, but today was wierd in that no matter what I do, JW will always have been part of the first 35 years of my life.

  What a weird feeling.
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  22

  My email to JW Following Trolley Conversation

  by cofty in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  a few weeks ago i had an really interesting conversation with three male jws who were loitering around a trolley at the west end of princes street in edinburgh.. i managed to completely avoid giving any hint about my jw past and focussed on why they thought the bible was a reliable moral guide.

  i used the subject of slavery to illustrate my concerns.. one of the three was in his early twenties, knew a lot about his own beliefs but nothing about the real life and it was difficult to get through his thought-bubble.

  the second one was in his 60s and not very bright.

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  StephaneLaliberte

  That, sir, was a beautiful email. Nothing to add there. Beautiful!
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  20

  Jesus said ''help and feed the poor,'' not build large headquarters

  by RULES & REGULATIONS in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was watching a news report last night on the homeless people in chicago, who were living outdoors in extreme cold and snow.

  the homeless were seen living under bridges and street tunnels.. a missionary church called ''the night ministry'' was driving around helping the homeless with water, food , blankets and free rides to a local hospital if they were in need of medical care.

  talk about following the words of jesus!.

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  StephaneLaliberte

  Following up on my last comment, while JWs could indeed do some real charity work, their concept of teaching people to work for themselves and take care of themselves isn't wrong at all.

  JWs can be poor, but usually, their houses will be clean, and will learn to cook decent meals on a low budget. My point here is that charity is a temporary answer and JWs do understand that.

  Still, they could be helping people a little more.

  For instance, in Gatineau, when there was a flood and hundreds of citizens were filling sand bags, they were out there preaching door to door. That is having their priorities at the wrong place.
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  20

  Jesus said ''help and feed the poor,'' not build large headquarters

  by RULES & REGULATIONS in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was watching a news report last night on the homeless people in chicago, who were living outdoors in extreme cold and snow.

  the homeless were seen living under bridges and street tunnels.. a missionary church called ''the night ministry'' was driving around helping the homeless with water, food , blankets and free rides to a local hospital if they were in need of medical care.

  talk about following the words of jesus!.

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  StephaneLaliberte

  Quite frankly, while I understand the concept of religions giving, I always felt that charities were demonstration of our governments failings, at least, here, in canada.

  If you feel that you should give to a cancer research charty, then it means that our government arn't investing enough in those.

  If we should feed the poor homeless, there should be public soup and shelters for those.

  Give monney to the veterants? Why isn't government giving them enough?

  Don't get me wrong, I believe in capitalism. But there should be a baseline at the bottom for most of the people that charities are trying to fix.
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  20

  Elders Know of Serial Killer & Told to Keep Quiet

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

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  StephaneLaliberte

  The only thing I find surprising about this is that they would actually put it in writing.
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  25

  For those of you who've watched the Witnesses documentary, let's suppose for a moment that...

  by My Name is of No Consequence in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  for those of you who've watched the witnesses documentary, let's suppose for a moment that the org was forced to make their database of abusers available to the courts.

  if this database is as detailed and meticulous as it is claimed, how in the world could the org (in its present form) survive that?

  assuming they don't go bankrupt after all of the new abuse claims, would they go underground, shut down the kingdom halls, stop the preaching?

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  StephaneLaliberte

  They’d be at serious risk. That’s one of the reasons I was so surprised to see how they set themselves up in NY Warwick and more recently, that letter from England where they want to centralize everything. I don’t get it. I really don’t.
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  18

  The Witnesses

  by Kathy1978 in

  1. watchtower
  2. scandals

  has anyone watched “the witnesses” documentary on oxygen (usa)?

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  StephaneLaliberte

  First, this is a very well done documentary and I’m very happy it was made. I was personally shocked by some of its content too.

  That being said, I would’ve like the documentary to start with something like this:

  Jehovah’s Witnesses are good people who abhors pedophiles. Unfortunately, most of them are unaware that classified policies put in place by their leaders actually puts their children at risks while protecting pedophiles. This documentary will explore the content of these policies and how they have impacted several thousand people.

  I know they expressed this during the documentary, however, I wish that they had made it clear at the beginning so as to get the attention of the moderate JWs. When you start something by “JWs are doing this and that”, they all take it personal and switch the channel. If you name specific policies, they’re first thought will be: it is this policy that is under attack, not my religion/belief itself.
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  30

  If you're "anointed" don't seek out other "anointed" so says the Watchtower January 2020

  by RolRod in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  when i was affiliated with the witnesses, there were barely 6,000 who profess to be of the anointed remnant.

  i recently read somewhere that today there are over 20,000 who profess to be anointed.

  that figure may be more when you consider those who meet and partake privately for fear of the stigma of claiming to be anointed.

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  StephaneLaliberte

  I remember, a good while ago, they wrote in a Kingdom ministry that brother's should not form small groups to study the bible; that they should rely on the brother's in bethel to do this. That particular article had a severe impact in waking me up. Lets hope this artcile does this same to many JW in the cult right now.
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  18

  Before cutting my hair my witness barber had to check with Bethel...really? Not a cult?

  by Witness 007 in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  i was balding and grey so i asked my witness barber friend to "just shave it all off" many brothers were doing the comb over which looked friggin stupid.

  but oh no in the 1990's this was rebellious he had to call a brother we knew at bethel to see if it was ok. we got his ok to go ahead but at the time i could help thinking about the no beard rule and how controlled and cultish we were..

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  StephaneLaliberte

  Though this story may sound extream, I do remember that there was a brother that shaved his head as he was bolding and back in the 80s/90s. Even if he was a good guy and all, I remember he was frowned upon. Then, around the year 2000 where Bruce Willis started to shave his hair. All of a sudden, several respected brothers started doing it. It was ok now.