the committee assigned to build the new complex was called into a meeting with the governing body.
they were told " you finish this project by january 1 2017. we want the keys to the complex and will be headquartered there by that date, do you understand?".
when the brothers protested and said that it would take 6 years for the project to be complete and if they moved that fast there would be many mistakes, the gb responded, "we don't care, that is your deadline".
RFR Realty and Kushner Companies have agreed to acquire a six-property portfolio in Dumbo from the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York for $375 million
That's a lot of cake. Meme: YOU CAN'T GO TO COLLEGE--BUT I JUST MADE $375 MILLION
--sd-7
i was an elder until march 2012 until i resigned.
i then stopped going to meetings in october 2012 and have enjoyed 9 months of freedom that i have found to be jouful!
i loved learning ttatt and sites like this and jwfacts.com have been excellent.. i told the elders that i needed a break and that they should not contact me unless it was a social visit and true to their word they have done that.
They couldn't charge with me apostasy if you go by their own definition of apostasy...I am not a bitter person hellbent on getting people to leave Jehovah...nor have I sourced any material outside the WT...
It doesn't matter whether you actually want people to 'leave Jehovah' or source material outside the WT. Even quoting WT literature in a non-conventional way indicates you have had contact with apostate material. But as you said, the answer to the loyalty question is the difference between success and failure at the end, and I guess if you've got that figured out, why am I talking to you? You can just do whatever you feel like, 'cause you've got it covered.
--sd-7
my 20 year old niece and my mom are the only jw relatives i have.
her mom got kicked out for smoking and my brother ended the marriage because she was a bitch anyway.. but it's really unfortunate that my niece had to be dragged into the jws.
i really wish my brother would have put the brakes on it more.
Well, I'm not sure why this is such a big deal. Seems to me there's only trouble to be had with a young person who doesn't fully understand themselves or the power they wield to be dating someone. Especially with the JW mindset, marriage is sort of a thing that a young person can be tempted to shoehorn into their lives with the wrong person and far too soon, especially because it's the only way they feel they can experience sex. Or someone likes you and you're automatically thinking marriage. I guess this is an issue I have no frame of reference for except my own crap relationships that didn't turn out too well. "Only pain will you find," the way I see it.
It can be a painful process even if marriage isn't the endgame. Being single can mean a lot more freedom, money, and peace and quiet. And Blu-ray Combo Packs. Especially the Blu-ray Combo Packs.
--sd-7
essentially, the jw position regarding the end of the gentile times and the significance of 1914 revolve around a principal element, namely, that the "great war" (ww1) was an indication of the anger of the dragon, i.e satan, after being cast out of heaven per revelation 12:7-9 and the start of the sign of the last days.
this has always been a sticky point for the organization....why?.
because, based on their chronology, the gentile times ended in october 3/4 of 1914 with the last days commencing from that point on.
LOL @ Londo111!
--sd-7
sometimes we waste hours and hours debating a subject like the flood, and the impossible scientific and evolutionary consequences that it entails.
we go into great debates about how all of is is possible, what a "kind" means (species, obviously not)... etc.... but believers will not stop believing... so here is something even a child would think of more logically:if god is all powerful and love why would he have not just made the wicked drop dead, painlessly?
simply, humanly.
Well, once you get used to killing, it's not enough to just condemn people to eat bread until they gradually grow old and die. You've gotta be a little more vicious than that. I can only assume he enjoys the killing or else he'd find a more humane way to go about it. I mean, he does have a God Complex, after all, so dealing with the defiant in as horrific a way possible is kind of in line with that....
--sd-7
the following is an excerpt from edmund gruss' "the four presidents," a book that consists of interviews with former high-level officials in the brooklyn headquarters of the watch tower society in brooklyn, who spent years working with the members of the governing body and presidents of the watch tower society.their true identities will be kept hidden likely until they pass on due to family connections still within the wt, but peter gregerson, barbara anderson, ed gruss, and dozens of others including myself personally know these interviewees and can attest to the truthfulness of what they say, based on total harmony with our own experiences which often overlapped.. .
what is a "star chamber?
"wikipedia defines it thusly:.
I found that just reading Paul's letters was a great place to start and really undo a lot of the incorrect notions the WTS has put out there. As I was making my transition out of the WT, that was a real comfort to me. Seeing verses in context really makes it so much clearer.
--sd-7
the main premise of the bible is that satan challenged jehovahs authority and humans fell for the lie so god then gave man / satan a chance to rule to "prove" that they needed him and couldn't do it themselves.
this was for the benefit of the angels watching who are presumably easily swayed too.. not really believable and some stunning gaps of logic but let's go with it for now.. what happened next in the bible?
well, man was doing pretty good.
I imagine the plans God is referring to here are... oh.. curing all those diseases he created... discovering sanitation and inventing anti-bactericals to fight all the nasty bugs he created, coming to understand physics, chemistry, biology, etc....
What??? It's obvious that the fruit Eve ate fundamentally altered our DNA, making us vulnerable to various microorganisms we were not otherwise vulnerable to!
--sd-7
i was an elder until march 2012 until i resigned.
i then stopped going to meetings in october 2012 and have enjoyed 9 months of freedom that i have found to be jouful!
i loved learning ttatt and sites like this and jwfacts.com have been excellent.. i told the elders that i needed a break and that they should not contact me unless it was a social visit and true to their word they have done that.
Pretty much. The organ transplant ban was in 1967, then discontinued in 1980. Ironically the same reasoning could be used to make blood transfusions a conscience matter, if you read the 1980 QFR on this issue.
Absolutely, though not so much with logic in return, but with the weight of their authority, a full weight to be brought to bear against you should you bring this issue up with them. I went through this discussion myself, and one elder on my committee even went so far as to say he could care less about 1914. He lived through the 1975 thing and felt that it simply shouldn't stop him from 'serving God'. Apparently he felt no need to ask a lot of questions about it. They won't care about refuting your logic. They will want to pin you down to saying something that will allow them to DF you. That's what the entire framework of the discussion will be maneuvered towards. They are bound by duty to only engage you up to a certain point, and then ask the loyalty question. An excerpt from my own committee, posted on a thread here:
They asked one final time, "Do you recognize the faithful and discreet slave, and that there is an organization that God is using today?" "No," I said.
One of them said [behind closed doors, yelling at his fellow elders], "I can't be dealing with no apostates in the congregation!"
It was maybe 10-15 minutes before they called me back in to tell me I was to be disfellowshipped.
"Have you been talking to apostates? This sounds like apostate reasoning." This would be asked, of course, in a judicial hearing if you present a question like the above to them. If you manage to ask that question in front of two of them, it's possible that will count as proof warranting a judicial hearing. So if you're trying to stay on the inside, you would do well not to ask that question at all.
--sd-7
essentially, the jw position regarding the end of the gentile times and the significance of 1914 revolve around a principal element, namely, that the "great war" (ww1) was an indication of the anger of the dragon, i.e satan, after being cast out of heaven per revelation 12:7-9 and the start of the sign of the last days.
this has always been a sticky point for the organization....why?.
because, based on their chronology, the gentile times ended in october 3/4 of 1914 with the last days commencing from that point on.
Some folks say it was all a distraction so the world wouldn't "discern" Jesus' invisible presence. Because obviously, had there been no war, people would've paid rapt attention to Watchtower predictions, right? --sd-7
the main premise of the bible is that satan challenged jehovahs authority and humans fell for the lie so god then gave man / satan a chance to rule to "prove" that they needed him and couldn't do it themselves.
this was for the benefit of the angels watching who are presumably easily swayed too.. not really believable and some stunning gaps of logic but let's go with it for now.. what happened next in the bible?
well, man was doing pretty good.
basically plays age of empires for 4000 years
Yes! LOL! I can totally see YHWH with a headset on trading barbs with Satan over Divine FIOS.
YHWH: "Your Babylonians are done, Satan!"
Satan: "No! My moat!"
But clearly this demolishes the idea of sovereignty being the main theme of the Bible. If God did all this stuff, it says that he literally does not want man to progress as a race, and what kind of God is that? He gave man the ability to think and then punishes him everytime he decides to think or combine his thoughts with the thoughts of his fellowman? It would be kind of a sick thing to do...
--sd-7
