I like to treat people by the standards I hold to, kind and compassionate.
I do not sink down to theirs if they are lower than mine.
Why should I ?
And I do agree that his language has left much to be desired, especially of late, but he has never been one to "suffer fools gladly".
i have just thought of a way to leave jehovah's witnesses using information from the new shepherd the flock of god book.
it's quite simply: rebaptism.
here are the steps:.
Dear Daniel,
Thank you for your frank reply, we now know where you stand ,and your motive for posting what you did. anything that may help anyone leave the WT/JW is appreciated on this site.
I was very similar to you, I made my dedication, and subsequent baptism way back in 1962, to Almighty God, not an organization.
To get you to examine your religion, its true history, and its teachings with an open mind I fear may be difficult, if not impossible. If you ever feel that you are not happy about the religion in any way, then why not discuss it with us on here ?
Also why not enter debates on various threads here ? We do not get the perspective of an active JW very often on here, just XJW's.
I know that the WT cautions against discussing things with people like us, but if what you have is the truth, what is there to fear ?
Lies are easily defeated by the truth, truth stands up to any scrutiny.
Broken Promises needs a huge injection of compassion. Injected painfully in the bum.
Farkel is really ill, and needs our good vibes sent to him.
I enjoy his acerbic comments, and his contributions to this site over the years have been nothing short of brilliant.
An education for Newbies is archived here in his threads, he will live forever.
we all know theory, that a cult personality masks the authentic.
but after reading some of the cult indoctrinated posters here , i am beginning to think that they are showing their authentic personalities.. they don't appear to show any true human emotion or demonstrate any independant thinking ability, ony what they are told feel and think by the cult.
is it possible that some people are born to be cult members in order to survive?.
I think many people are genetically programmed to " worship" , they have the God Gene.
I don't think I have that, thank god.
There may be many also programmed to want direction and control from external authorities rather than make their own decisions.
(Though this often stems from mental and moral laziness)
Such people already have a major part of the Cult personality. I think though, that with the majority of JW's it is a persona that they put on when with other JW's, and underneath they do have the real them. This certainly does not apply to all, but I think to a majority.
How do we know if someone like my oldest sister , UberDub and damned annoying because she is so willfully blind, is a genuine 100% cult personality, with no "real" her underneath ? we cannot be sure, but I firmly suspect that is the case with her, and her ilk.
i was just thinking today at work about the whole ngo thing and got pretty deep in thought about it.
i remember reading about it and i remember reading on a pro jw site i think it was jehovah uk or something like that.
on the pro jw site they said that when the society signed and joined as an ngo there were no requirements to pledge that you will uphold the ideals of the un etc etc.
Thanks to all for this thread, I have read on here (JWN) in the past, some inaccurate info. on this matter,which if said to an active JW would be seized upon by them to ignore the whole issue.
We need to be spot on with what we reveal, or we lose the argument in their eyes.
The pertinent , most damning point, is that they LIED about it all. There is no justification for that in a religion that calls itself the "truth" and supposedly worships a"god of truth".
i don't know how to embed youtube videos on here but heres the link:.
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http://youtu.be/hjgzlpbjilw.
As XYZ said on page one, they never deal with the issues raised by Apostates. If what we level at them are "counterfeit words" "deceptive reasonings" etc. they should be easily defeated by "The Truth" as taught by the WT/JW's.
So, why are they so afraid to put both sides of the argument under the infra-red light ?
Because their teachings will be exposed for what they are, FALSE !
i was inspired by a recent thread i know i aint gunna crumble the wt, but a girl can dream to look at the effect we as individuals are having on the watchtower society.. 3dogs1husband quoted a story to show that even helping only one person is worth it.. it is encouraging to note that the one person you may have helped has lead to millions being helped, due to the power of compounding growth.. compounding growth is well illustrated by the rice on a chessboard problem.
if you start with 1 grain of rice on square one, and double it to 2 on the second, 4 on the third, 8 on the fourth, by the last (64th) square there would be 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of rice.. likewise, if you help one person out of the grip of the watchtower this year, then next year you help one more and they help one, in a few years that is going to have a formidable result on the number of jehovahs witnesses.
look at the following statistics.
A long time Uber-Witness Elder said to me "It makes no difference to my faith if the figures go down", they have an excuse for every eventuality.
But it does us a power of good to see that these days fewer are being sucked in to the cult, and as the Internet becomes available everywhere, they will have a hell of a job making converts. Good.
i've noted on here before that one point that got my attention was the small pool of scriptures that the gb seemed to use over and over again.
leaving out all the rest.
whole swathes of paul's werid and wonderful writings go ignored.
They are very selective,using just a phrase quite often, not even a whole verse, and always without any reference as to context.
Remember too, that what they do use comes from the twisted NWT, so may seem to support their doctrine,when really the opposite is true.
I reckon they only use a small fraction of one percent of the available verses.
When they read the bible they do so with no understanding, what a waste of all those hours of "study" and TMS etc !
where does the urge to convert people to ones own view come from?.
i grew up a jehovah's witness and jehovah's witnesses are always right.
that's where i learned to always be right and it took me years to realize that i could also "agree to disagree", although i still often forget about this.
It was certainly something we were supposed to do as J.Ws , make more (paying) cult members.
I did not try hard, ever. I never felt the urge to force my opinion, even then.
Since finding out that any opinions I held were likely to be wrong, as I was a born-in bereft of information, I have made it a point not to insist my point of view is correct, though I will fight my corner.
I do not wish to convert anyone, unless it will benefit them greatly, hence I leave long-term J.W's to wallow in their ignorance, more often than not they could not handle reality.
Fundie types do get steamed up about it, life is too short for that.
theology is the study of religion and religions are human systems of spirituality.
it could then be said that theology is the study of the applications of human spirituality.
human spirituality is a chosen way of life.
I too enjoy it P.Sac, and I enjoy comparing how the great thinkers have wrestled with the same problems, the existence of God, the Intelligent Design, the problem of evil etc etc. From Aristotle through St Anselm to the modern philosophers and theologians these, and many other questions have been thrashed out.
When we debate such matters on here, we are merely standing on the shoulders of giants.
Different conclusions have been come to, or sometimes none, just a choice of possibles, but fascinating stuff.
Theology by its very definition is not a science, it is really an art, like poetry say. It still has great value, but this is dimiished by those making claims for it that are not correct.
