Posts by Paulapollos

125

JWs Not Allowed to Post on Websites?

by StandFirm in

this seems to be a favorite topic to bring up to any witnesses who post on any website where there are any opposers, either here or topix or anywhere.. so, here is the one and only place i will be discussing it.

who can prove that witnesses are specifically told not to post on websites about them?.

Paulapollos

If the OP is representative of the average JW.......we certainly never imagined that the readers we wrote and translated for were so intellectually lacking that they would fail to comprehend what we had written.

"What is involved in avoiding false teachers? We do not receive them into our homes or greet them. We also refuse to read their literature, watch TV programs that feature them, examine their Web sites, or add our comments to their blogs."

If you read forms of literature, watch TV programs that feature, examine websites, or comment on the blogs of those who do not believe that the Watchtower and Bible Tract Society is God's organisation, and have been disfellowshipped, or dis-associated themselves, for these or similar actions, you are associating with false teachers willingly. This is a clear violation of the counsel given by God's organisation, and reflects, according to the Watchtower, a lack of love for Jehovah God.

If the OP cannot understand that, and is indeed representative of the average JW, then I must say, no wonder we spent so much time at Bethel wondering why we had to deal with constant calls from JW's in the field who were unable to understand what we thought were relatively simple, straightforward instructions.

PP

17

Does Jehovah Answer Prayers?

by Spade in

people here have a fundamentally different opinion of what identifies a religion as true or false.

most people leave christendom's churches because their prayers go unanswered and there's no evidence that god intervenes in their personal lives.

something that's never discussed here.

Paulapollos

"Most people leave Christendom's churches because their prayers go unanswered and there's no evidence that God intervenes in their personal lives. Something that's never discussed here. Just about all opposers exclude Jehovah from the picture when casting judgments."

I might have misunderstood this, but is the above statement by "Spade" a joke?

If not......what proof is there that "their prayers go unaswered and there's no evidence that God intervenes in their personal lives." Er.......and I suppose that is a scientific survey? Or the opinion of Jehovah's Witnesses, who of course are unbiased and have no axe to grind? There are hundreds of sects in India where disciples claim that they feel power and "spirit" flowing into them when they ask, enabling them to lie on beds of nails, to drink "poison", to handle snakes etc - is that God intervening? There are hundreds of people who state that in their religion, they broke free of addiction because God helped them, with power thru prayer, etc - or are there only drug/drink/gambling addicts in JW's? Let's be honest, thousands break free of addiction and make personality changes through the "power" of Alcoholics Anonymous - but that doesn't prove the AA is divine!

Come on, the next thing will be that only JW's produce magazines like the WT and Awake - try reading the "Good News" magazine - it like the sister publication of the WT, except it is produced by those pesky Christians..

Going further, how on earth does Spade's statement and the pasted article make any sense? There are stories in Mormonism, the Seventh Day Adventists, etc etc ad nauseam, where a person is praying for "help" and "the truth" and that specific religions "missionaries" or representatives knock on the door and it is interpreted as follows:

1 - Person who prays - "There is a God because he answered my prayer by sending a religious group to me, and the religion who knocked on the door/spoke to me at the shops etc, is the truth because God sent them to me

2 - Religious represntatives - "The fact we knocked on your SPECIFIC door after you asked that prayer is proof we are the right religion because God sent us to you, after you asked him for the "truth"

But how can any of the above be true, when all these religions have these stories? Are they ALL the right religion? Is God listening to all the prayers and operating thru ALL religions? If not, how do you explain they ALL have these stories? Are some lying? If so, what is the proof they are lying and YOUR SPECIFIC RELIGION is telling the truth?

I don't think "opposers" exclude Jehovah from the picture - maybe the fact that every religious group has these stories of "God's spirit helped me make changes in my personality, and I know because I FELT his power come over me when I asked" , as well as the ubiquitious "Annie Lennox/George Michael/Michael Jackson asked JW's/Mormons/Seventh Day Adventists, to leave their concert" as well as the "There was a spirit medium interviewed on Oprah/Montel/TenaPennyChatShowHost, and the host asked what the Devil and Demons are doing now, and the medium answered 'focusing on the children of JW's/Mormons/SDA/Disciples of the Cookie Monster, because they are the right religion'", means that people here just take these "God answers the prayers of JW's" stories with a pinch of salt.

PP

47

Jan Awake, stating JW's are only true religion

by lostsheep82 in

i haven't posted in a long time.

most trying to recover and still get my head straight, this religion when you find it's not the 'truth' is hard to move on sometimes.

my mom urgently needed to speak to me about a magazine that just came out.

Paulapollos

Lol,

I have 3 converts already.....WitnessMyFury, MrFreeze, and Zid........and Zid, yes, if it was good enough for good ol' Judge Rutherford, then it's good enough for us - break out the alcohol!

PP

47

Jan Awake, stating JW's are only true religion

by lostsheep82 in

i haven't posted in a long time.

most trying to recover and still get my head straight, this religion when you find it's not the 'truth' is hard to move on sometimes.

my mom urgently needed to speak to me about a magazine that just came out.

Paulapollos

Mr Freeze,

only you have responded, because only you have the right heart condition! I have much to share with you.....all you need to do is make the cheque out to C.ongregation of L.atterday A.nnointed P.eople of T.rue R.ighteous A.nnointed P.aulapollosians', and I will show you more sacred secrets....just remember MrFreeze, if anyone tries to convince you otherwise, ask yourself - do they have your best interests at heart like me?? I haven't even started showing you the truth......

"remember, we don't tell it all (just as Jesus didn't) because some it (sic) is still a sacred secret..that must be held in complete confidence , by the Cheiftain of the Temple, who eats Bread in the Very Presence of God". (www.yorww.com)

Looks like "God" is going to provide for me, I think I need to start looking for my new villa out in LA....to welcome all the holy men of old back of course, ahem....

PP

47

Jan Awake, stating JW's are only true religion

by lostsheep82 in

i haven't posted in a long time.

most trying to recover and still get my head straight, this religion when you find it's not the 'truth' is hard to move on sometimes.

my mom urgently needed to speak to me about a magazine that just came out.

Paulapollos

I wonder, if I could write something where I said, "I am special and unique and right and the only person trusted by God because.......I say I am." I wonder if I could get 7m people to give me some money too.....

PP

47

Jan Awake, stating JW's are only true religion

by lostsheep82 in

i haven't posted in a long time.

most trying to recover and still get my head straight, this religion when you find it's not the 'truth' is hard to move on sometimes.

my mom urgently needed to speak to me about a magazine that just came out.

Paulapollos

Hold on, JW's have been waiting for an article to come out that states that the Encyclopedia of Religion says they are "distinctive" because they claim "they base all their beliefs on “the authority of the Bible, which entirely supplants tradition.” ?

Oh, and "A paper published by the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine states that Jehovah’s Witnesses aim to overcome “racial, national, religious, social, and economical differences.” The study explains that Jehovah’s Witnesses do not engage in “anti-state activity” and are “law-abiding citizens of their country.” ?

JW's have been waiting for this?

If someone thinks that the EOR acknowledging that they don't have centuries of traditional interpretation to rely on, and that a Ukrainian organisation acknowledging that they try not be racist, classist and so on, and that they don't commit treason and sedition as a rule, and generally obey the law..........if a Witness reads that as "They are all saying we are the true religion".........oh dear!

I think even the Witnesses will find as they read the next paragraph, it's not these organisations "recognising" them as "the true religion"! It's the Awake writers who say: "Because they closely follow the pattern of first-century Christians, it could be said that Jehovah’s Witnesses have successfully reinstated the form of worship that was established by Christ and his apostles." Er, ok. Or.....it could be said....they haven't....?

If a JW used those quotes to say others recognised him as the true religion, i think perhaps kindly asking them to re-read the paragraph might help!

PP

112

Can anyone come up with a morally acceptable reason for waiting thousands of years to end wickedness?

by gubberningbody in

jw
friends

i can't.. some bar-bet between jehovah and satan balanced against all the evil allowed just doesn't wash..

Paulapollos

CyberJesus:

I think you were talking to me? If so, thanks.....I don't know if it's a change of heart as such.....more that I just am tired of people trying to make excuses for this God, this character who seems to have a lot of people on this planet who need to defend him.

Let's be honest here - JW's come up with some ridiculous "sovereignty" thing, which just sounds like a bunch of kids trying to justify why Daddy let the girl next door get raped instead of stopping it. Christans come up with various things like "If everyone accepted Jesus, we would all be like happy bunnies, but God is patiently waiting for us to convert" and so on.

Either way, whatever you believe, the facts are these - people are getting hurt every day, and we get told that it's all part of "God's mysterious plan". Ok, that's fine - but people who worship this God should not be surprised if others think this Biblical God is a complete and utter *******, and that we would all be better off without him. It's smacks of blinders when people try to make excuses for him. Don't these people think that perhaps the genocidal, legalistic, exacting God of the OT doesn't want them to make an excuse for him? Wouldn't he have made it a bit clearer if he did? Maybe this is the way he wants it? I don't know, it's like people have built an image of some cuddly Grandad, when the God of the Bible seems a pretty ruthless character to me...

I tend to agree with TheFinger: "

There is no way that this God has a morality even remotely resembling what a decent person would be considered morally upright......however it does argue strongly against every concept of God as represented by any organized religion."

Frankly, I think the God who has the morality displayed in the Bible doesn't really give a **** what we think. If that means you don't want to worship him/her/it, then God knows (in more ways than 1, I think!) where you are coming from.

PP

112

Can anyone come up with a morally acceptable reason for waiting thousands of years to end wickedness?

by gubberningbody in

jw
friends

i can't.. some bar-bet between jehovah and satan balanced against all the evil allowed just doesn't wash..

Paulapollos

How can there be a "morally acceptable" reason? I've used this before, and forgive the crudity of the example...

If I was an armed police officer, and I was walking past a woman being brutally gang-raped in the street, and I simply stopped and watched, and called out "I'm not stopping this because it will be good for you in the long run", what would you think of me?

Could I ever provide a "moral justifaction"? Could I ever say "Well, the reason I didn't step in, is that there is a chap down the road who bet me that if I didn't help this lady, she wouldn't be my friend afterwards." Is that really a moral justification?

I have to say that all the evidence points to a God who really does not give a flying monkey's about whether we think he is moral or not.No wonder people hate him - not that he seems to care about that either. It seems to me that the God of the Bible is exceedingly post-modern in his philosophy.

PP

144

Ray Franz Was Wrong

by Farkel in

jw
friends

god rest his soul.

although i never met him personally, he and i did correspond a number of times, and i have numerous friends who have not only met him, but stayed several days with he and cynthia at their home.

if nothing else, ray was kind, non-judging, and generous.

Paulapollos

Leolaia really hits the nail on the head.

I cannot say that I think that the GB are deliberate liars, that they have set out to deceive. I certainly don't think that they mis-quote and selectively choose information in the full knowledge that what they are presenting is a lie.

Lady Lee said they are "victims of their own delusions", and I must say that I can think of no better phrase. Here you have a group of men who have been reared on the stories of the organisation being the one true vehicle of God; an organisation that has been attacked mercilessly by Satan, slandered by religious opposers and so forth - and all because of, in the words of the Society, they are "seeking to discern Bible truth." This belief, this persecution and innocence complex is ingrained in these men.

As they have risen through the ranks of the organisation, they have had to face many challenges from without. Every time they have "won" a case at the ECHR, or in the US Supreme Court, their conviction has been bolstered that yes indeed, Jehovah the "God of their forefathers", Rutherford and Russell, is with them. They were taught that it was an irrefutable paradigm that if the organisation survived and grew, Jehovah was guiding them. And as it has indeed survived and prospered, so their conviction has grown.

When we talk about deliberate lying, the organisation don't see it like that. It is the same as the Abraham issue. When you read the WT that talks about Abraham lying about his wife, you notice it never states Abraham lied. Nor does the WT dealing with Rahab. Why? Because it is impossible for these men to conceive that these individuals, ostensibly approved by God, could have knowingly done wrong - so the justification, the whitewashing begins. And so it is with the organisation today. They simply cannot conceive that the approved servants of God, Rutherford, Russell, Knorr and so forth, lied or deceived or did anything with less than pure motives. And so it is presented like that in the WT.

Similarly, the current typical Witness has been raised on this view, and considers the present body to be a group of upstanding men with God's evident approval on them. When the GB say things that you and I would consider to be lies, I don;t think they ever see it like that. They assume that because God doesn't make mistakes, his servants who prophesised about impending Armageddon in 1914, 1925, 1975 and so on, did not do so, because that would mean a mistake was made. So, evidently, the WT writers back then did not mean it like that. And this is what they believe - that everyone who reads the other way has bad motives.

Similarly with the blood issue. They really genuinely believe they are doing God's will. While I'm not advocating belief in God or not, I think what Jesus said (paraphrased) is really spot-on: "There will come a time when they will kill you, and imagine they are rendering a sacred service to God." The GB really do believe they are doing God's will in all matters. They really are trying to be "conscientious Christians." They are doing everything they can to please this image of God they have. And when people think they are doing good.....well, that's when they hurt the most people.

Just like seeking to understand why a rapist commits the crime, does not mean we excuse the crime; so trying to understand why the GB acts like it does, does not mean we excuse their responsibility for their decisions. But I think the ultimate responsibility here lies in human nature - the ability to dogmatise and reinforce our own belief structure, to filter out contrary information, to believe we may even be the sole arbiters of truth. And that, I think, is a failing more pervasive than we like to admit.

PP

69

I feel ashamed of some of you

by Lady Lee in

jw
friends

i did not sleep well last night.

i tossed and turned until 4 am .

got up and decided to see what was going on.. i am so disappointed in some of you.. simon posted a thread requesting people not post links to the new shepherding book.

Paulapollos

Is it me, or is this "new" release just a very boring rehash of a very boring original? Certainly no great shakes.If it wasn't for the shocking child abuse instructions, it would hardly be worth the time.

PP