that's great news! Way to go A@G!
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JoinedPosts by Switch
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Congratulations Awakened @ Gilead!!!!
by oompa ingraduating from college right next to bethel........and a gilead grad......too much.........and did you guys know he is the valedictorian.....like top score there.........awesome!.............inspirational!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
but you may want to slow down a bit dammit.............oompa.
you are now a serious pain in the ass for wt.........college and bailing on your gilead skills......hope that does not need two l's bthw.
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ARE YOU AN INTELLECTUAL? Why not?
by Terry ini think i heard the word "intellectual" for the first time when i was less than ten years old.. my grandmother said to me that the presidential candidate for the democratic party (adalai stevenson) was an "intellectual".. the way she said the word...the timbre of her voice...the look of admiration on her face...led me to believe this was a good thing indeed!.
i think i may have asked her what the word meant, but, i don't recall exactly what she told me.
perhaps enough to confirm that this fellow stevenson was a "thinker" of admirable stature.. fast forward.. by the time my teen years came along there was a kind of dichotomy in society between so-called "eggheads" and common folk.
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I have an avid curiousity and want to learn as much as I can. Unfortunately, my mind doesn't cooperate and retain things like I would like. I haven't touched any books on philosophy like you have, Terry so my powers of reason wouldn't be the same. I try to stay well-read though and love to hear out differing viewpoints. I've only had time for this, mind you, in the past 6 mos. since I've drifted from the meetings. But who knows, given time, I may get a few cobwebs out of this brain.
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The Most Tasteless Awake Cover ?? - Feb 8th 2003
by BluesBrother inthis magazine was disturbing to me at the time, but i lost track of it and only recently found it .
this is exactly as it was printed, no photo shop, i am not that clever.. it is credited to a newsagency, jan banning , panos pictures - so i do believe that she was a real child prostitute .
there is something that gets to me even now about this picture.
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That child prostitution cover makes me cringe. I didn't realize that was a real victim either. Some WT's and Awakes didn't go out in service with me. They went in the bin. I wasn't about to place sensitive issues like that at the door. I thought we were supposed to be bringing God's message to people doors, not making them aware of MORE problems they don't have and being a public news service.
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Are all congregations equal?
by kzjw ini've not posted much, but as i've lurked here trying to find the answers about the wt lies, it only re-enforced my disdain for it's cult like properties.
i've read the horror stories of some who've been trapped in the "jw-multi gen" families trying to extricate themselves from the borg, and truly have empathy for "these ones".. i have also attended a couple of months worth of sun meetings with my wife (i listen to the talk, then walk during the wts) and as you've seen from previous posts, if the speaker lies, i will point it out to him after the meeting.
but yesterday in a conversation with my wife i shared with her what i read on jwd, compared to how her congregation operates.
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Congregations are SO varied I've attended 6 different Halls from moving around and they've all been dramatically different from each other. They take on their own personality depending on the area and mix of people's personalities. The hall I grew up in was very strict, follow the rules to the letter, and if you're not a pioneer or striving to be a pioneer then you're a nobody. After I moved away, the second hall I attended was in an affluent area so the brothers were largely materialistic and loved status. I think my records from my old hall had barely arrived before we quickly got out of there. The third hall was more the same with lots of young people leading double lives. The fourth hall was a decent mix of people and seemed friendly, though had some real oddballs in it. The fifth hall was in a big city and the brothers and sisters were very humble but very social and not judgmental in the least. The sixth hall (which I've currently been in) has a wide range of nationalities and doesn't mix well together. Not that there are spats or anything, just little cliques everywhere.
You can get a decent sense of a hall by attending a few times. Certain halls have affected my spirituality over time. If I had attended a couple of them as an interested person, I definitely wouldn't have gone back. As it is, I was pretty much raised in so I accepted all the unbrotherly love as pretty much normal. Everyone is imperfect...God will correct things in his due time...blah, blah, blah. Now looking back at the majority of people I've met, the percentages of genuine, loving people can't be any different than people in other religions. So I guess that love that is supposed to be so evident between brothers and sisters doesn't really match up to what I've witnessed.
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Why do you put up with crap off your JW famlies?
by dawg ini see where many of you have jw family members that give you a ration of crap once in a while; i've heard many rationalizations as to why some of you refuse to speak out.
as many of you know, i wrote a series of letters and exposed my apostasy formerly; in the letters i told my family they had better beware of shunning me of treating me like a pile when they run into me, i realized that i couldn't make them accept me into their houses, but in public was a different matter.
i basically told them that in public, especially at funerals, that i would rain down a load of crap on any family member that shunned me or treated me badly in anyway.
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I hear ya too Dawg. I've said before that I can't understand how people do a slow fade and keep any sort of sanity. My life has done a total turnaround in only 6 mos. I went from being a totally faithful, little lemming to NOT believing in the organization (obviously) but also pretty much chucking the idea of God, the Bible or any sort of eternal future. I'm keeping an open mind but if nobody has come up with all the answers in thousands of years past then I hardly expect a brilliant breakthrough in my life. At least I feel like I'm in reality now with the rest of the world.
Anyway, I know I couldn't possibly dump all of this on the family at once. Gotta take that in stages. But I've definitely stated my views of the Gov. Body to my friends and family. They are still reeling from the shock and audacity of me, I'm sure.
Also, I have to take into account that I always have to take crap from my mom on a weekly basis anyway. Usually it's not religion related. So why should the JW issue be any different? I guess that's what families do....or maybe it's just JW families? hmmm. Now you got me wondering. I think my mom has a very critical personality but maybe the cult has emphasized it more.
Well, my point was...families are going to give ya crap all your life. They criticize, question your decisions, treat ya like a child when your 37 yrs. old, etc. Hopefully, they'll still talk to ya after all is said and done. I don't care if my friends and family agree with me but they should at least show some respect and hear what you have to say. Unfortunately, my mom doesn't (so far) want to hear anything from me, but at least I have opened my mouth and I feel better for having expressed myself to her.
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My notes from the circuit assembly ( sorta )
by Metamorphosis inas i sat through a day of the latest assembly - these are some of the notes i was inspired to write:.
(entry #1).
there's a light.
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very poetic....remember to read your notes whenever the review of the assembly is covered at the KH. ha, ha
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The Skeptic's Annotated Bible
by easyreader1970 inthis is worth taking a look at.
the skeptic's annotated bible.
er.
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thanks for the link, ER. I love looking at different viewpoints now that I'm mentally out of "the Truth" and part of the world....or nearly. I'll have to check it out in more detail later. I noticed it had the Quran and Book of Mormon on there too. Should be very insightful and good for a laugh.
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JW wife says she loves me more often NOW???? Should I test that?
by oompa ini was pm with a@g and have with others here in the one-in-one-out marriage situation, and have a question.
time flies.....i have been considered apostate for at least two years now, and it seems my wife says she loves me all the time....almost makes me uncomfortable.
i have changed, not her, and i realize that.
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Oompa - you have a PM.
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Wow. I'm glad I didn't miss this thread.
Doofdaddy nailed it for me:
Being a jw is like being in a one act play over and over.
You put on a costume, put on a face, put on an attitude, then you go home to a semblance of normality.
Like actors in a play that goes for years,after a while the lines come out without thought. The mind separates. The gb cannot really control people any more than a director of a play.
That's exactly how I felt the past couple years without realizing why. I thought I was lacking in some way and I can now understand why I've seen friends plunge into pioneering. It gets so repetitive that you don't even think about what you're doing and then you feel compelled to DO MORE cuz you're not happy. It's not just NY that has all the rules. About 10 or 12 years ago, hubby and I were touring around and decided to find the Bethel in Ireland. It's on a coastal road south of Dublin so we eventually found it. We stopped to see if we could have a tour and they were welcoming but noticed our casual dress and said maybe we should leave the tour for the next day when we could dress appropriately. So we came back the next day. The Irish Bethel has 10 to 12 Bethelites. They mainly only handle distribution of literature and organizing the assemblies. The printing is all done in the UK. We were the only couple there having a tour so I'm not sure who could have potentially noticed our casual dress the day before. The Irish are generally laid-back people but we still had to follow the rules. It seems pretty silly now. I can't believe they'd tell you what to wear in NYC after your visit to Bethel. Oh wait, yes I can, because they always want the brothers and sisters to stay in their stuffy, stuck to you with dried sweat, wrinkled convention clothes (with badges still showing) to dinner after the sessions. Same good advice still applies.
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JW wife says she loves me more often NOW???? Should I test that?
by oompa ini was pm with a@g and have with others here in the one-in-one-out marriage situation, and have a question.
time flies.....i have been considered apostate for at least two years now, and it seems my wife says she loves me all the time....almost makes me uncomfortable.
i have changed, not her, and i realize that.
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oompa and the rest of you in the same scenario,
I feel for you guys. I'm pretty new here so I don't know everyone's history. Hubby (MissingLink) and I had some terribly emotional conversations at the end of last year. At the time, I felt terribly alone and was on the verge of being convinced that I was going to have to live as a JW in a divided household. That REALLY didn't appeal cuz my mom was a JW but my dad and brothers weren't, so I'd already lived that scene and knew it wasn't fun. I decided to give my hubby a chance cuz he's been my best friend for two decades. Even though the UN thing and pedophile reports upset me, I still sort of figured there's two sides to every story. I admit they unsettled my faith but weren't the deciding factor. Upon seeing the total misuse of quoting outside sources, that was another story. That settled it for me that if they had to stoop to misquoting sources, then their intentions were NOT in my best interests, did not bring honor to any God, and qualified as lying - which God hates (supposedly).
I gave my hubby a chance to show me what upset him so much because I knew it was our whole family's future at stake. So, like previous posters have said, there has to be some trust extended.
Does your wife still see you read WT literature? If so, then maybe you can help her prepare for the upcoming WT article (june 9 -15) Young People, Remember Your Grand Creator Now. It has the Oct. 1, 2005 WT article (about education) in the footnote. So look up the misquotes from the box at the end. I know the Newsweek and American Educator articles are on their own websites. If you need a link, let me know.
If your wife can rationalize those lies without creating doubt, then I'd love to know how she does that. Does she usually trust people that lie to her? And how much could they actually have right since they can't even write a simple article about education without bias and misquoting? Just some thoughts to ask her.
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