i mean i remember growing up as a jw and then 15 baptized adults years, and every year all the jw's would say something to the effect, "lets go look at all the pretty lights", or they would tell their neighbors that they really liked their lights.
and i remember teaching my kids the same thing, that it's ok to look at the lights (but not ok to like anything else about x-mas, oh regrets!
) doesn't that seem weird or something?
It's really dependent on the person...I have relatives that are viscerally creeped out by them. They just see them as utterly evil. Maybe it's a case of potesting too much, I don't know.
But as for the ones that not-so-secretly enjoy them? Hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance!
twenty-nine years since lennons murder.
my oldest sons birthday is today, he is 30. .
john will be remembered for his contribution to art, music and world peace.........paul mccartney.
In 1969, a 14-year-old Beatle fanatic named Jerry Levitan snuck into John Lennon's hotel room in Toronto and convinced him to do an interview...in 2007 this video was produced with a delightful animation set to that tape.
there are a few bible verses i'm going to discuss that probably don't bother anyone but me.
in fact, most people, including ex-dubs think they are wonderful verses.
i think they are really, really creepy verses.
Glad to see you again.
You mean if it's forced, artifical, or just for show, it's not LOVE?
I'm crushed! ;-)
thou hast made me endless,.
such is thy pleasure.. this frail vessel thou emptiest again and again,.
and fillest it ever with fresh life.. this little flute of a reed thou hast carried over hills and dales,.
Out beyond ideas of wrong-doing and right-doing, there is a field. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass, the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase 'each other' doesn't make any sense.
-Rumi
i just don't understand.
i was raised a jw, believed the whole line of bullshit, hook, line, and sinker.
after leaving i still believed in the bible.
ALL religion is "man made" and cannot be proven otherwise. It is spoken by men, explained by men, determined by men, told to men.
Sure, you can claim it comes from some non-human source - anyone can say anything, believe anything, assert anything - but there is no evidence. At all. Just belief in your interpretation of what someone else said that someone else wrote down.
I may never know all the mind bending questions, but who cares. Why bother.
Even with religion, all you have is BELIEF. If that's what works for you, great! But let's not pretend that it's objective proof - it's assurance of things not in evidence. It's a CHOICE to believe in it.
Why do people waste their time, lives, and who knows what else, mentally masterbating over some book written during the stone age?
Because the SENSATION, the BELIEF of having answers and knowing the future gives a sense of safety and comfort - people will go to GREAT LENGTHS to maintain that sense of safety, of comfort, of BELIEF.
The alternative is just too frightening to accept.
i drew a blank on a particular question.
i basically had a talk with my parents over the weekend.
they've been jw's since the 50's and pops been an elder since 83. so i knew it was gonna be hard, but i basically told them to their face that i am no longer going to be a jw and gave a few reasons why.
Why does anyone have to live on Earth? If there's a cataclysmic Armageddon, why does Earth as a physical place have to exist at all?
Why isn't Heaven just another word for paradise Earth? Why does there have to be a distinction at all?
If everyone achieves reconciliation, or even if all the bad guys are blown away, does it really matter what "heaven" or "earth" is?
i was doing reseaerch on early days of the society and remembered a radio programme about the apostle paul from earlier in the year.
the gist of the programme was that paul had remodeled the early christians in his image and that many of the restrictions and edicts from that time had little to do with jesus earlier teaching.
for example the vilification of homosexuals and the denegration of women.. this made me think about how rutherford changed the early bible students and added restrictions to them as well trying to remodel the organisation into something he could control.. jesus spent time teaching about the kingdom, preaching the need for love, forgiveness and acceptance.
Paul and Rutherford subverted reinterpreted a code to their own devices.
The difference is that Paul was immersed in a Stoic context and tried to impose his lifestyle on others, while Rutherford was a Hedonist and tried to manipulate others to heighten his own lifestyle.
Paul prolly believed his own line; Rutherford was a hypocrite.
before i became a witness i was a shallow egotistcal happy go lucky married man.
i owned 2 houses which were rented out.i lived rent free in london working for a rich arab-.
due to being a witness i quit a job and a lifestyle i will never have again.. i now live in sweden with the same wife and have a kid- i can think critically.my good friends are those i met on the ministry (but never converted)-i have good friends from my congregation in england.
The best thing about my Witless experience: when it ended, I felt clear-headed and good about life.
it's a classic sci-fi plot: you have a time machine and a snipers rifle.
do you go back in time and kill hitler?.
i can justify hitler but only because we now can see how central he was to events in europe.
Where do you begin? Hitler? Where do you end?
That road is endless, just staying with the obvious low hanging fruit. Pick some of it and the Paredo Effect takes over: you see the next low hanging fruit to be picked.
There is no end. Until perhaps you are alone. You keep shaving the bell curve until, like in Niven's "Known Space", traffic violators become the State's next organ donors.
And the Ninth Doctor did indeed bring war to the Daleks (is it to his shame or his credit that he didn't quite succeed?).
i believe the way the organization keeps many people in its clutches is by means of guilt.
no one can adhere to all of the theocratic rules of the organization and they know that.
i believe jws do things to ease their consciences.
Yuppers.
