Posts by Juan Viejo2

35

I think Limbaugh is out and out wrong on this

by JimmyYoung in

i listen to rush most days for entertainment.

i agree with him on some issues and disagree on others.

but today he said something i believe is an out and out lie.

Juan Viejo2

I get my annual flu shots at my local Rite-Aid store. They always check with my primary physician and my cardiologist before approving it. I usually wander around the store for a few minutes while they check and then they call my name. It takes about 15-20 minutes altogether and the shots are covered by my medical insurance.

Most of the time the annual flu shots are combinations that cover all the common and expected strains for the coming year. Some are just boosters that extend the coverage for shots you had the previous season.

Because I have heart issues, my regular physician will always check with my cardiologist it she thinks that a new version might have consequences. So far I've not encountered any problems getting any annual new or booster shots. I've not suffered any major colds or flues over the past 15 years thanks to my doctors and Rite-Aid being on top of this.

I am hopeful that our current scientists and doctors will come up with a flu shot or combination shot that will reduce the chance that we get the Corona strain later this year and in future years. Remember that they have to get a broad sample of antibodies from prior flu survivors in order to create a preventive injection mix that can be counted on to work for most people.

I used to listen to Rush Limbaugh way back in the day and thought he was on the mark most of the time. But in those days he was more of a general reporter and commentator on the news. When he began to swing far to the right because he was carried by mostly uber-Republican leaning radio stations and he was trying to prove that the "left-wingers" were trying to take him down in order to cover up his drug abuse and other indiscretions.

Recently, I had to make a car trip from my home on the west coast to Colorado to visit with my brother prior to his passing. One of the few radio stations I could get out in the wide-open spaces in Utah and Colorado was Rush's show. I was shocked at how far to right he had actually gone since I last listened to him. It was almost like his script and talking points were written by our most high President Trump himself. Even some of the word combinations did not sound like Rush at all, but rather by something dictated directly by Trump.

My comments are not party related as I have been both a registered Republican (Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan x 2) and have tended to lean conservative most of my adult life, but have also voted Democrat at times when I thought the candidate was more in line with my thinking. But our current President's approach to voting rights and dealing with the Corona virus are inexplicable and can not be supported. That has nothing to do with his party or whether he is favored by Rush Limbaugh or not. His positions on health issues are just dangerious.

17

Are the JWs are doing field service while corona?

by iliketreasure in

hey guys,.

i'm out of the jws for 12 years now and stopped thinking about the whole thing a long time ago.. but recently, i wondered how jws deal with corona?

i've read on the forums that they suspended meetings and tried to hold them online.. but are they still doing field service?.

Juan Viejo2

I have Arlo security cameras all around my home in Oregon. They have been up for almost 4 years. Two cameras cover the front of my home and our street. The cameras have been active 24 hours a day since installation.

Four years ago, right after the installation of the camera system, it captured an SUV that parked across the street from my home. There were 5 people in that vehicle. Apparently there was a second vehicle a block or so to the east of my house and out of the range of my cameras.

The cameras recorded the SUV while it was parked around 11 AM. About 20 minutes later two men finally got out of the vehicle. One went to a home across the street. Another fellow crossed the street toward my house. He stood there and looked at the front of my house for about 5 minutes and then walked to the southeast and disappeared. A couple of minutes later my camera recorded him climbing back into the vehicle.

About ten minutes later, a young JW woman and an elderly man appeared in front of my house. He wanted to come to knock on my door, but she told him not to try. She was looking at a notebook at the time. They then proceeded to the other house next door. While my camera did not film them, it heard the young lady tell the older man not to knock - but only leave a pamphlet at the other house. They then walked back past my home and disappeared. Five minutes later, the first SUV full of JWs drove past my house and disappeared up the next street. I did not see the other car leave the neighborhood in that direction.

That was the last time any JWs have ever come near my home. Four years - nothing - not even an invitation to the Memorial or to a local assembly at our state fairgrounds held every year. There is clearly not a lot of door-to-door preaching going on anymore - at least not in this region.

JV

23

need input: Asked my wife to show me in the bible where Christ became King in 1914

by goingthruthemotions in

so my wife is so diluted and brainwashed.

during this time she is having so much anxiety, mainly because me and my son's want nothing to do with the religion.. so the discussion was, i told her will never go back because they go way beyond what the bible teaches all the time.

i brought up overlapping generation, 607 and then i told her...show me where in the bible that jesus returned invisbly in 1914 and started ruling?

Juan Viejo2

It was sometime in the fall of 1964 (my memory is disappearing, but I think that is about right) that my wife (converted to JW the year before [raised a Catholic]) and I (an active JW since the age of eight) met a nice couple while doing door-to-door preaching in Riverside, California. (You like that long and convoluted sentence?)

After our normal presentation and answering a few questions offered up by the wife at the door. She seemed to be in awe of my quick responses. Her husband joined the conversation shortly afterward and invited us into their apartment. We did not sit down, but he quickly asked me a couple of softball questions. I don't remember what they were, but I seemed to have provided quick and credible answers that appeared to really impress him. He invited us back one night later that week to have a "Bible Study" with him and his wife.

We selected the current study book and focused on the first two chapters. We underlined significant parts that we wanted to emphasize during our new Bible study. This would be the first time my wife had been engaged in a field Bible study with me.

[Those of you who were JWs in that era probably experienced the same format that we all used when conducting "Bible studies with householders." JWs from that era will likely recognize our situation and the set-up. Newbies may not realize that in those days the whole "home Bible Study" process was very scripted. Any deviation was frowned upon by the "Kingdom Hall servants" and the "society."]

So we showed up at the appointed time. I was wearing a suit and tie; my wife was in a very nice dress and heels. We were prepared and ready to make two new converts to Jehovah's "number one favorite religion." [Yeah, that one...]

After sitting down at their dinner table, I suggested that I lead the four of us in prayer. [After all, I was the "senior" Bible expert among the group.] Instead, the wife suggested that since we were guests in their home, her husband should say the prayer. [Oh, oh!?!] He agreed and immediately began to pray. We all bowed our heads and clasped each others' hands as the prayer progressed.

While I do not remember anything specific about his prayer, I do recall that it was relatively short and to the point and included pleas to God to "enlighten us all "and not restrict us to any particular subject, but rather to have all of us to group together with "open minds." I was impressed [and intimidated a bit] after his prayer was finished.

The man's wife asked mine how long she had been a JW. "About a year. I was raised a Catholic," she responded. The husband asked me the same question. I replied, "Ten years." That's the way the rest of the evening went. The two of them turned our static "Bible Study" into a face-to-face question and answer exercise.

Most Jehovah's Witnesses (both past and present) would simply have stopped what they were doing and try to exit as quickly as possible and just write the evening off as a failed attempt - but more like having been set up by the couple. My wife and I decided to stick it out and see what happened.

What happened was that I never again looked at being a JW the same way after that evening. My wife actually became more active than I over the next year or two. I slowly began to rethink things and reconsider spending the rest of my life as an active JW. I realized how formal and unnatural the whole JW Bible Study process was (and still is). I realized how difficult it was to really explain and support JW teachings about 1914, the 144,000 going to heaven, "life everlasting in a paradise earth."

I do remember a set of questions that the fellow asked me during our "Bible Study" and it has stuck with me ever since...

"OK - 144,000 are sucked up into heaven. What do they do up there? Why would they want to go up there? Does God need Jesus, his angels, and also 144,000 more newbies all worshipping him constantly to keep his ego boosted? What about those who live in the new world? After they turn the earth into a paradise and their kids grow up - do they still preach to each other? Spend most of their free time petting lions and tigers? Spend most of the day praying to Jehovah? Do they ask for forgiveness of their sins - when they no longer commit sins? Going to Yellowstone Park is a real pleasure for a short vacation, but would I want to live in that environment for eternity? How boring would that be?"

Let's just say that my wife and I tossed and turned in our beds for the rest of that week. We were really shaken by the experience. We had long conversations about what happened and how helpless we were to answer those questions posed by our hosts. It took all of my zeal for door-to-door service and conducting Bible Studies and just flushed them out of my system.

While we both continued as active JWs for a while (I was totally out about a year later; she left five or six years later after our divorce (I was DF'd three years later for inactivity and failure to attend meetings.)

But I can trace everything that changed my life from being a dedicated JW back to that experience. I found real personal and mental freedom thanks to that second "Bible Study" visit with a young, bright, and engaging young couple who wouldn't let me conduct a boring, static, one-sided attempt to convert them and change their lives.

"Juan V"

8

Help please

by PhillipThomas in

jw
friends

hello...been baptized for about a year and a half...just aware now...they are watching me...possibly even now...help me!!

!i'm too afraid to say too much here...they could even be here disguised as ex-jw's to watch for people like me...how do i get help??

who do i trust?

Juan Viejo2

Phillip Thomas - Just walk away. Say nothing. Move to a new area of town or to another city and just disappear. Eventually, they will all forget you ever existed and will move on.

The "truth" is that none of the Witnesses really give a damn about you. After you have disappeared for a few months they will forget about you and they will forget your name. If they do cross your path at a store or other venue and say something to you, just speak to them as you would a neighbor or casual acquaintance. Acknowledge them, wish them well, say good-bye, and then move on and do your business. Don't engage them in a long conversation or any kind of debate.

The reality is that you will be better off and feel relief within just a few months. Visting here and watching ex-JW videos on YouTube will bolster your confidence. Just think of your time as a JW as an event like having a disease when you were a kid. You missed some school for a few days or a couple of weeks...Your friends and other classmates avoid you for a few days because you've been ill and maybe have "cooties." Then they just ignore you and eventually you just become another person they pass in the hallways. You are nothing to them - and they are nothing to you.

I found it interesting that a few years later when I did cross paths with old JW friends they were often friendly at first and ask about me and my family. Conversations were as they would be with any other past friend or acquaintance. If they ask you what Kingdom Hall you go to, just say "I don't go any longer. It was nice running into you - but I need to move along. Hopefully, we can chat again someday." They will actually appreciate that you did that because that does not force them to challenge you - because they really do not know your actual status. Maybe you were just in a hurry.

On the other hand, some ex-JWs take the opportunity to explain ("give a witness") to someone who they come across. They will often say something about their leaving and let their old friends know that they "finally came to realize that the Watchtower was not what it claimed to be - and "the Truth" is not really "the truth." And then just move on down the road. You might plant a seed in their damaged brains that could lead to them reappraising their own situation later on.

JV

21

Those Who Can't get the OXYGEN Episodes

by Newly Enlightened in

someone has uploaded both episodes to google drive.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1l0ubvtriw6ytinnenmsmxpefotphconi/view.

Juan Viejo2

I watched both episodes on an Oxygen repeat version on my local Xfinity service. Good video, but audio was out of sync with the video. Not to mention commercials every ten minutes. But still an excellent documentary that features Trey Bundy at his best. He is such a pro - and yet is very relaxed and well organized in his approach to reporting.

JV

55

Unique JW Phrases 101

by Solzhenitsyn in

what unique to jws phrases do you remember?

something fun for those of us taught to speak an entirely unique and pure language.

there have been posts in the past in this forum but perhaps some have new ones after having kept up with jehovah's chariot as the light gets brighter.

Juan Viejo2

"The Truth" as a reference name for the Watchtower (the organization). That is the equivalent to "The Church" as used by Catholics. The phrase used to describe the religious organization does relate directly to the teachings of the religion because "old truth" and "new truth" are all-encompassing terms referring to what was published in Jehovah's Witnesses' books, magazines, convention speeches, and audio-video productions. "Old Truth" is what they taught for some years and that was eventually replaced with "New Truth" in new printed publications or in video productions.

If what they are teaching is clearly false or outdated (i.e., "Armageddon coming in 1975" replaced by "we don't know when it is coming, but Jehovah's punishment of old systems of things, non-believers, apostates, and JWs who are not 100% dedicated to the preaching work as directed and taught by the Watchtower, is clearly on the horizon." Please note that the horizon(s) never changes if you are not moving. But if you are consistently changing your position or going in the wrong direction - then the effective horizon changes with you.

So the more the Watchtower "adjusts" its policies and teachings - then that JW horizon just keeps on moving and changing - and so does JW "truth." That results in their "truth" being always in a state of change - and therefore unreliable.

JV

24

Jehovah's Witnesses Came to My Neighborhood

by Juan Viejo2 in

for nearly two years i have not seen any jehovah's witnesses going door to door in my neighborhood.

that was not the case when my wife and i first moved here (north central oregon).

in fact, our neighborhood was visited at least once every 4 to 5 months - even in the coldest winter months.

Juan Viejo2

nowwhat? ----

I drop by every so often, but most of the time I am busy painting the walls and carrying out the trash at WatchtowerDocuments.org and helping Barbara Anderson with an occasional YouTube video. I pop in here to see if there are any exciting conversations going on. I do my best to not regenerate any negative feedback if possible.

But thanks for asking. I always enjoy a brief visit here just to catch up. Currently, I am working on a couple of Kindle books about (1) my growing up as a JW kid, and (2) a look back at the Menlo Park Kingdom Hall takeover scandal.

Life is good and I'm not really interested in being in the middle of a lot of argumentive blather.

Hope all is well with you, nowwhat - and for everyone else that visits here as well.

JV

24

Jehovah's Witnesses Came to My Neighborhood

by Juan Viejo2 in

for nearly two years i have not seen any jehovah's witnesses going door to door in my neighborhood.

that was not the case when my wife and i first moved here (north central oregon).

in fact, our neighborhood was visited at least once every 4 to 5 months - even in the coldest winter months.

Juan Viejo2

For nearly two years I have not seen any Jehovah's Witnesses going door to door in my neighborhood. That was not the case when my wife and I first moved here (north central Oregon). In fact, our neighborhood was visited at least once every 4 to 5 months - even in the coldest winter months. As far as I can tell, Jehovah's Witnesses seem to have gone out of business in our city.

At one time there were at least four (and maybe 5) active Kingdom Halls with multiple congregations assigned to each location. The primary hall is still located in the southwest area of our city. At one time there were at least 4 congregations using that hall and there was a co-located residence used by either a circuit overseer or a district overseer (or both) located at one corner of the property.

There were also at least three other Kingdom Halls located in the city. I attended a Memorial meeting about ten years ago when my wife was out of town visiting her ill parents. The Kingdom Hall I visited was new and located in the northwest part of town (most distant from my home). The night I visited that hall and attended the early Memorial service the hall was quite crowded (my guess is about 125-150 people). Right after that meeting the Hall was cleared because a Spanish language congregation was taking over and would celebrate the Memorial - so the parking lot had to be cleared quickly to make room. My guess is that 250-300 people attended the Memorial at that hall that night. And this was not the main hall for our city. My guess is that three Memorial meetings were held at the main Hall mentioned in the previous paragraph. Two other Halls also existed at the time - but they mostly served foreign language congregations (Spanish - Asian).

Now there are only two Kingdom Halls left in this city. The primary one described above appears to have two English and one foreign language congregations. The Circuit overseers' house is gone and some of the property has been sold and transferred to attached neighbors. The parking lot is notably smaller. The other Kingdom Hall is still located in the northeast sector and serves an English congregation and (apparently) a south Pacific foreign language congregation (small - 25 - 40 members).

The last time my neighborhood was visited by JWs was the spring of 2017. The only reason I know that is because my Arlo security cameras recorded a white SUV with about 5 people inside passing by at least ten times one morning around 11 AM. A couple of times the vehicle would stop across the street or a few houses down and just sit there for 5 to 10 minutes and then proceed. No one got in or out of the vehicle during that time. Then the vehicle would leave the area only to return again about 10 or 20 minutes later.

Finally, after just sitting at the curb across the street from my home, two JWs got out and crossed over to my side of the street. About 5 minutes later a young woman in her early 20s and an older man in his 60s got out of the vehicle and crossed over to my driveway. Then they stood there talking to each other for about 10 minutes before going to my neighbor's house to the east (he is a Lutheran minister). A few minutes later they returned to my driveway and looked at my house for a few minutes. The young woman checked her notes and apparently saw that my house was marked as problematic in some way. She told the older gentleman that they should skip my house and go to the one at the end of the block next to mine.

The older gentleman followed the young lady to my other neighbor. My camera recorded their knocking and some of the conversation (unintelligible). No one answered the door - but they remained there for about 8 minutes. Then they returned and passed by my house. The older gentleman suddenly turned to go up my driveway. The young woman immediately reminded him that they should not go to my home because it was on their list to avoid. He was clearly confused and made another attempt to come to my door. But she grabbed his coat sleeve and led him back to the waiting SUV (with three inactive JWs sitting inside). The vehicle just sat there for about 10 minutes before finally pulling away. About 15 minutes later the vehicle once again passed by my house.

This was a classic case of current JWs putting in their time by completely wasting away the clock. Maybe Witnesses have given up on the door to door ministry in recent years as they do not seem to engage with anyone at all anymore. I have watched them downtown fold up their displays and pack their bags as soon as anyone tries to engage them in a meaningful conversation.

My observations seem to prove the point that all of the energy and enthusiasm for the preaching work has left the members and maybe the organization. I don't even get invitations to the circuit and district assemblies that are held every year at our local fairgrounds each September.

All in all, I find this to be a good trend. But I am also surprised that modern JWs have mostly decided to wimp-out and either avoid (or fake) any real or meaningful preaching work. And that would appear to include full and part-time "pioneers" (do they even call them that anymore?) that are supposed to be putting in 70-120 hours a month. How do they get their hours?

I've heard rumors that many "full-time" ministers count their study hours, their Kingdom Hall meeting hours, and time spent sending letters and making phone calls during winter months. If I had been able to count all of those hours when I was a teenaged JW I would have had over 150 hours every month and still worked part-time at a job or going to school.

Bottom line is this: The current versions of the Watchtower and Jehovah's Witnesses are in general are empty and unenthusiastic about their own religion. The whole concept is now a sham and a total waste of time.

19

Quick Story

by APieceOfShitNamedTate in

so one night i'm at a meeting.

it's the beginning of the meeting and a brother is up on stage introducing the parts for the night.

he's going through the parts and then he says, "...and apieceofshitnamedtate will be handling our bible highlights.".

Juan Viejo2

I gave my first "Sunday" talk when I was still 15 years old - filling in for my father who was scheduled to give the talk but became ill earlier that day. In those days (1959) you would have a fairly complete outline of the scheduled talk, but you would be expected to use your own phrases and expand on it. My father would make some notes and then hand them to me with the standard outline. I typed it all up for him on my typewriter and then underlined sentences and phrases that he should emphasize.

Dad mostly read his speeches. He'd read the first part of a sentence and then look up at the audience and finish. That made for some interesting comments afterward by some of the visitors who were not used to his style. My approach, even at 15, was a lot more polished - or at least I thought so. In those days, Sunday public talks were almost an hour long and could be quite exciting or boring as hell. (Then there was a 15-20 minute break and then we'd do the Watchtower study for most of another hour.)

But there was a problem with my notes. I had the original outline with me, but I had 4 pages of notes and text that I would actually be using for the speech. You can imagine my panic when I realized that Dad had given me only 3 pages of notes AFTER I arrived at the podium. So I had to grab the outline and slip into the "slot" where the missing page would have been. But my typed text was full sized and all caps - and the outline was fairly small print and hard to read - plus I'd have to figure out where on the page I was where the missing section would have been. To say I was in meltdown through most of the talk would be a reasonable assumption.

In those days most Witnesses seemed to be more friendly and understanding - except for some of the old timers who claimed to be "of the Anointed." They tended to be less forgiving and mostly critical of someone in my situation. I often wondered if "love for your brother" didn't leak out them as they got older and closer to their big move uphill to the streets paved with gold that led to Jehovah's castle in the sky. Needless to say, I received some rather scornful looks from several of the older members.

But I survived that experience. When I turned 19 and was newly married, I was assigned to the "exchange" group and was tasked with giving Sunday talks at other Kingdom Halls in our circuit. By that time I had recovered from the disaster that was my first public talk and my reputation and ego had recovered. I was actually pretty good by then and had given enough talks that I could grab an outline, refresh my memory a bit by looking over and highlighting the "important" points where I would gesture with my right hand and carefully, but forcefully emphasize parts whenever I saw the audience begin to doze or seem inattentive.

Thank goodness that those days are far behind me. Even though I could breeze through a talk like those with just a half page of notes now - I simply can not imagine getting up on stage and spending 30 minutes telling lies and total BS. If I could go back in time and undo all of that totally wasted presentation of BS - I would.

Anyone have a spare "time machine" in your garage?

Juan Viejo

519

Tony Morris video footage of him buying a dozen bottles of scotch

by UnshackleTheChains in

i was howling watching cedars latest video of tm111 buying a dozen bottles of scotch ((maccallans scotch).

you can't write this stuff.

right, i'm now off to buy a bottle of maccallans 😂..

Juan Viejo2

An old friend of mine, Richard Kelly, served at Bethel in the 1960s shortly after graduating from high school. In 2008, he wrote an autobiography of his early life growing up as a young Jehovah's Witness and his experiences as a volunteer and resident at the Brooklyn Bethel facilities.

In his autobiography, "Growing Up in Mama's Club" (Third Edition March 2008), he describes one of the first tasks assigned to him on his second day at Bethel:

"After lunch, I went to the Bethel home office and was told that I would be assigned a full-time job within the next few days. In the meantime, I could help with several odd jobs. They sent me to work right away breaking beer, wine, and hard liquor bottles into unrecognizable shards. This was done so that the worldly people who picked up the trash wouldn't see how much alcohol was consumed at Bethel, which was significant. It was explained to me that nothing should be done to bring reproach upon Jehovah's organization."

"By mid-afternoon, with the sounds of breaking glass still reverberating in my head, I was escorted to a nearby five-story brownstone. Here my job was to clean the apartment on the second floor...I realized I was cleaning Hayden Covington's home. He was the Clubs's attorney and a key-note speaker at the international assemblies in 1953 and 1958. But that day, in the presence of his redheaded wife and small children, Covington wore a suit that he must have slept in the night before, looked like he had been drinking, and rattled off expletives ... This was my first exposure to the double standards for the Club's top officials."

Randy Watters, a long time critic of the Watchtower and a publisher of books and websites critiquing Jehovah's Witnesses, also served at the Bethel facilities in the print factory around that same time as Kelly was living there. He too reported that drinking and alcoholism amongst Bethelite at all levels - but especially among the top management - was a major problem.

Even among local congregations, you could see such hypocrisy on display. As I was growing up in the 1950s and '60s, I noticed that for the Memorial service, elders would have a full case of Mogen David Wine (usually 8, 9 or 12 bottles) on hand on "Passover" night. Even in those days when there were a lot more "partakers" because so many of the older members had been JWs going back to the Judge Rutherford days - a single bottle - two at the most - would have met the needs of the those actually claiming to be "anointed" and qualified to partake. Even as a young child and a teenager, I knew that most of that wine was going to be split between the "Servants" [what elders were called in those days] and taken home for private usage. My father even came home one night with three bottles of cheap Mogen David dark red wine and he was the lowest level "servant." among our congregation (assistant magazine and territory servant).

So yes, Rutherford and Covington were known alcoholics, but every Kingdom Hall and every Bethel facility was well-stocked to keep everyone happy and calm. After all, being a JW servant/elder could be a very stressful job.

JV