Posts by Cadellin

66

BART EHRMAN answers my question

by TerryWalstrom in

as a member on bart ehrman's blog, i am able to ask him direct questions.is jehovah in the bible?.

question:.

how firmly grounded in reality is the claim of jehovahs witnesses that the divine name (jehovah) belongs in the new testament?.

Cadellin

Thank you so much for posting this, Terry. I'm a big fan of Ehrman, having read two of his books. His "awakening" is interesting because he started out as a conservative apologist but delving into the scholarly side of the Bible led him to realize that it is definitely not infallible.

With respect to Jesus using the divine name, I reasoned with my elder husband this way: If Jesus or his apostles had uttered the Tetra., don't you think it would have caused a tremendous accusation by the Pharisees who were looking for any pretense whatsoever with which to accuse them? And wouldn't it have been a wonderful witness for Jesus to stand up to them and defend his use of the Name and decry the Jewish superstition banning it? And wouldn't it be recorded in the Bible as a stirring testimony of courage? Wouldn't that have been totally appropriate for Jesus? And wouldn't he have been put to death for it, since the Pharisees wouldn't have to cook up a false accusation?

His response: Silence.

57

Please Welcome me

by Sofia Lose in

jw
friends

have lurked here for many, many years.

female, latina, middle-aged, born-in, 3rd generation jw, northeast usa.

my fate is to continue to play the game 'till death do us part because the very strong and tangled web of friends, family, business, etc.

Cadellin

Welcome. As someone said, there is no wrong way to leave a cult. So if operating under the radar is your way, strength to you. The point is knowing the truth...

48

Just woke up

by Doctor Who in

new to the site.

currently i am a ministerial servant and was told i was appointed to be an elder.

i told the brothers i was not ready for that assignment.

Cadellin

If you've never heard of CofC, you're in for a major treat. It's a beautifully written memoir by a former GB member who himself woke up to the hypocrisy of the organization. No bitterness, slander, lies or name-calling, unlike the WT who doesn't mind using slanderous labels for anyone who disagrees. It's a must-read for anyone making the journey out.

48

Just woke up

by Doctor Who in

new to the site.

currently i am a ministerial servant and was told i was appointed to be an elder.

i told the brothers i was not ready for that assignment.

Cadellin

I don't know how old you are, Doctor, but from what I've seen, pretty JW girls outnumber marriageable guys 5 to 1. Now, emotional issues...well, that's another story!

43

The floodgates are about to open in the UK.. Sunday Times article

by defender of truth in

jehovah church faces flood of sex abuse cases.

"a woman who was abused from the age of four by a senior officer of the jehovahs witnesses has lodged a 500,000 claim for compensation in a test case that could open the door to hundreds more suits involving members of the religious organisation in the uk.".

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/crime/article1525363.ece.

Cadellin

Thanks for posting this. It's a good article, but I wish the writer could have been accurate with the name in the headline. I can remember my father commenting about negative articles that "if they can't even get our name right, what else have they got wrong?" How many witnesses will dismiss this--or maybe not even read past the headline-- simply because the name in the title offers them a seemingly valid excuse?.

48

Just woke up

by Doctor Who in

new to the site.

currently i am a ministerial servant and was told i was appointed to be an elder.

i told the brothers i was not ready for that assignment.

Cadellin

Welcome, Doctor. Nice that you've been able to see firsthand the hypocrisy. You're in a good position to see through the Society's defense against negative publicity--that it is all a result of "lying apostates." For me, it was discovering the gross misuse of scientists' and others' quotes in WT literature, along with the bone-headed misrepresentation of evolution, so-called flood geology and early human history.

Waking up leads to challenges, though, if your family is all in and especially if you have a spouse who's active.

57

New Caleb video uses fearmongering on children

by Jonathan Drake in

jw
friends

check it out.

literally the message is if you don't pay attention at the meetings you could die.

how insane, i feel like this must wake some people up..

Cadellin

I feel so sorry for little kids who get sleepy at meetings. Even when I was uber-active, I never thought it was a good idea to force a small child to stay awake while some adult droned on about some incomprehensible trivia. You put a child to bed at 8:30 every weeknight except for one and then on that night, you expect her to stay alert until 9:15 pm. Right. Mind you, most small children are not put to bed that early anymore. But they should be--they need adequate sleep! And yeah...if Noah hadn't paid attention, then the whole entire realm of living species would have been toast. Right.

Oh, wait! It's been said before but it's worth repeating: It's a cult.

72

Last nights meeting...

by DATA-DOG in

i know dubs are delusional.

i know dubs don't reason well.

i know dubs are a bit off, like many groups.

Cadellin

The kids being baptized are in the 11-12 range. The African-American boy near the beginning looked more like 10-12, the boy near the end maybe 12-13. These are CLEARLY prepubescent boys; way shorter/smaller than their mothers. This is a definite change from 20-30 years ago. I was an uber-zealous born-in and got baptized when I was 15. That was considered an appropriate age. My husband was also a zealous born-in and he was 15 when dunked as well. It was not the norm to see pre-teens getting baptized, although if you go back even further (50+ years), it did happen more often, based on what my mother has told me.

This video is aimed at an even younger crowd, however, based on the paradise and other imagery--6-12 years of age or so. To beseech children to "give your all to me" the way this does is just plain creepy.

Oh, yeah! It's a cult.

125

WTS leader rants against higher education

by hoser in

jw
friends

on jw tv.

anthony morris is ranting against higher education.

he is blaming parents for enrolling their kids in college.

Cadellin

All I could think watching a few minutes of this is--What a f*cking idiot. At the same time, he's got it right. The purpose of a university education IS to affect your thinking, so you don't blindly accept whatever someone hashes out. It's to learn about recent scientific research so you know that there's no way the entire earth could have been submerged 4700 years ago, or that the human family is only 6,000 years old. It's to encounter other perspectives to which you wouldn't ordinarily be exposed, like other cultures, religions or sexual orientations. It's to see that your own way of thinking isn't the be-all and end-all you once took it to be. Oh, yeah--and it's also to engage in the sheer joy of learning about more than pipes and hammers. INot that there's anything wrong with pipes and hammers, understand. Trades are wonderful but my point is, you should have the right to choose.)

So, yeah, he's right. The WT should be damn scared of anyone going to university. Ironically, however, this angle of higher ed is under attack, with the evisceration of public funding, the move to vocationalizing and privatizing programs, the adjunctification of faculty and adoption of a retail, consumer-based business model by most public universities. But I digress.

9

Canada's MACLEANS article "Against their will: Inside Canada’s forced marriages." The main subject in the story is an XJW we all know.

by AndersonsInfo in

http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/against-their-will/.

forced marriage is one of the last taboos to break.

a new law could make it a crime.

Cadellin

Interesting article. I have to say, though, that in all my 40+ years as an active JW, I never once heard about forced marriages. In fact, just the opposite--constant counsel about being careful in making a choice and avoiding marriage until "after the bloom of youth." While the JW example in the article is a sad story, I think it's more a case of a nutcase parent rather than anything doctrinal.