"There are just not as many "older ones" at the Kingdom Halls."
Well, my Dad doesn't attend anymore. He is chronically ill. My Mom is dead, so are most of her family that were JWs, and so are a lot of their friends.
i read this article on exjwreddit and thought it was so well written, that just summed everything up.
i've cut and paste it.
here is the link to it on reddit.. https://m.reddit.com/r/exjw/comments/4spw99/where_have_all_the_jws_gone/.
"There are just not as many "older ones" at the Kingdom Halls."
Well, my Dad doesn't attend anymore. He is chronically ill. My Mom is dead, so are most of her family that were JWs, and so are a lot of their friends.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ox2ypajugq.
sit a spell and listen to my story.. i once met a fella unlike any other.
let me tell you about the man--a strange and wonderful guy--one of a kind--but housing two personalities at the same time.here’s a quick list to capture your interest.. .
Terry, thank you for sharing your story about meeting Tom Laughlin. I enjoyed it thoroughly.
I was a kid when the movie Billy Jack came out. It came to television and was one of 2 movies I remember 'sneaking' to watch (the other one was a few years later at the theatre - we got in underage to Life of Brian). There are some very disturbing scenes in Billy Jack. The "One Tin Soldier" song is one of my all time faves.
i was skimming the july 2016 wt study article and came across a paragraph indicating that, despite scriptural evidence, the governing body indeed feels that god's son now knows the exact day and hour of armageddon.
is this 'new light'?
from the second study article, page 14, pgh 4:.
I still don't understand how a 2,000+ year old dead guy can have any thoughts at all. A decomposed brain and central nervous system are no longer functioning.
so real quick, i know this comes up now and then and i've looked over some of the posts from the past but here's the thing.. when i was a jw i drank all the cool aid, i was 100% and so i have all my own arguments (from the jw's) for why the bible is inspired.
i no longer believe this but i'd really like to read something that is pretty much 100% academic on this subject.
i want to read what scholars have to say about the authenticity of the bible and it's claim at being the inspired word of god.
Hey Freeandclear... researching the history of the Bible and previous belief systems (eg read up on the Egyptian "Book of the Dead" and pagan beliefs) helped educate me on the false claim of the Bible being inspired by any sort of god.
As cofty stated, the issue of Theodicy, why an all loving, all powerful god allows evil to persist is an issue most believers have to face at some point. Once again, I will reference Bart Ehrman, as cofty did and recommend his podcast on The History of the Bible:
Bart Ehrman - The History Of The Bible: The Making Of The New Testament Canon
is physical and emotional abuse taken seriously in jws ?
do they address this form of abuse that their members inflict on others?
.
All cults use emotional abuse as a control mechanism. JWs are no different. So no, they don't 'deal' with it. They encourage it.
"make for yourself an ark from resinous wood.
you will make compartments in the ark and cover it with tar inside and outside.
" - genesis 6:14. because, you know, that's how you build a giant boat - just wood and tar.
our world is about to change big time.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnuyctuzjpm.
We have entered the Cognitive Computing era. IBM Watson uses natural language and machine learning to process massive amounts of unstructured data to formulate predictive results.
Within IBM, it is estimated that Watson will take over 1st and 2nd level Remote Tech Support within the next 2-5 years. It's already in the problem records making suggestions to Customers on recommended manuals to reference for their issues. The Support guys have been instructed to 'teach' Watson, ie, feed it information. IBM recently gave Watson 'eyes'. It is now able to scan images as well as text, and perform it's analysis. IBM is partnering with the Health Industry in a big way as well as Weather, Banks, Apple, Twitter, Universities, etc, etc.
While there is no discussion, yet, that Developers are at risk, it sounds like Engineers' jobs will be. It's not a stretch that one day, Developers won't be needed either.
Ginni Rometty wanted to make IBM 'essential'. Cognitive Computing is IBM's 'moon shot'.
i know that some people on the board have experience of being mormons, so i would be interested in your feedback.
at church this afternoon it was an uncanny experience.
in the past i've read a lot about mormons, so i thought i was prepared in general for what it would be like.
A former Mormon wrote in to comedian Lewis Black with his little rant. I think this has been posted before but it's probably worth placing here. Enjoy!
anyone seen sister williams working her assests on the latest beyonce video?
what's the go, surely she is not a declared jw?.
she needs some serious council from jehovah, and i'm guessing bro sammy herd wouldn't mind being on that little committee.. the song is called "sorry".
This song (and video) is definitely NOT GB approved
there's simply no way to honestly deny that the ot condones genocide, slavery and misogyny.
there are too many passage showing yahweh commanding his people to wipe out this nation and that nation - women and innocent children included!
it leaves us with a god who wrote a book that very, very, very much seems like it condones genocide, but it doesn't, etc.. what kind of god does that?
Ah, I see you've discovered one of the biggest cruxes between the old and new testaments of the Bible, between the Jewish and Christian belief system, that being the issue of Theodicy.This was one of my issues starting around the age of 10. For me, it was the extensive and massive suffering of the Ethiopian Famine of the early 1970s and why God did nothing to help these poor people.
I think a lot of current day believers eventually come to this fork in the road.
The Hebrews thought God to be all things, both good and bad. But it does present a huge logic issue to call him all loving whilst he commits atrocities or allows atrocities to occur.
One of the key requirements of faith is the abandonment of reason and logic. It was something I was unable to do.