Posts by JeffT

31

The REAL reason for the elder and ms appointment change......

by EndofMysteries in

as seen in recent posts, beginning later this year appointments and deletions of elders and ms will only happen through the circuit overseer.

this means that individual congregations and elders have no say anymore.

if the gb want only certain people in or out, they tell the co and he makes it happen.

JeffT

As I said on another thread, I don't think this relieves the corporation of liability.

22

the watchtower arranged to have a letter read announcing that elders would now be apponted by circuit overseers.. any elders on this forum know how this will be different from the current arrangement for appointing elders.. it would be nice to see a schematic with boxes showing how it used to be and how it will be in the future..

JeffT

I would be interested in hearing from BOTR on this. I don't think this relieves them of organizational responibilty in a court of law. They might not appoint the guy, but they are still responsible for what he does on the job. I've seen big corporations sued for something done by a manager in the field when nobody at corporate even knew the individual.

27

What if Everyone Demaded Answers About Where the Money is and What it is Used For?

by TTATTelder in

what if right in the middle of rolling out their latest money-grabbing scheme, there was an uprising demanding financial transparency?.

i thought jehovah was a god of organization and numbers.

isn't that why we report time and have all these annual reports?.

JeffT

Kate, unless they've changed their methods since I left, the financial reports at a KH are not transparent nor are they complete. It may just be that they're dumbed down so the window washers can figure out how to fill them out, or it's possible they're designed to obscure the money trail.

27

What if Everyone Demaded Answers About Where the Money is and What it is Used For?

by TTATTelder in

what if right in the middle of rolling out their latest money-grabbing scheme, there was an uprising demanding financial transparency?.

i thought jehovah was a god of organization and numbers.

isn't that why we report time and have all these annual reports?.

JeffT

This is standard operating procedure in mainstream churches. The financial sheet was posted in the church so anyone could read it. They also had a financial committee open to all members. The problem was that lay people had no idea how to read a financial statement.

The WT would be transparent if all members demanded it. We are taught that we are not good enough to even review something.

A few years ago my wife and I attended a large non-denominational church, my wife directed and taught in their preschool. They had a "fair" where all the various ministries set up tables to show what they did. I spotted the church CFO sitting behind a table containing several copies of the most recent audited financial statements. Nobody was looking at the reports. I picked one up and the first thing I did was look at the auditors statement to see who had done the audit, it was a Big 6 firm. I then started reading the report. At that point the CFO says "your're an accountant, aren't you." I said yes, and he said he could tell because nobody else attempted to read the report.

That's too bad, because the fact that the financial statements are out there signals a higher degree of transparency. And learning how to read them isn't that hard. (If anybody wants to learn, PM me I used to teach non-accountant mangers how to do it, I think I still have my notes.)

The fact that the WTBS goes out of its way to hide this information leads me to believe there is stuff there they don't want any one to know about.

26

I skipped the meeting again!! Wife gives me a look I have never seen...

by DATA-DOG in

i had a rough day of physical work and was tired and cold.

i decided to stay home and rest.

when my wife found out, a very strange look swept over her face for just an instant.

JeffT

Stories like this make me realize how fotunate I am that my wife and I left together, and apparently what a rare occurance this is.

16

Authority in the Witnesses

by Band on the Run in

jw
friends

now that pastor russell is persona non grata, i was wondering how this movement ever started.

i always find it surprising that educated people refuse to read the bible.

they will just follow someone.

JeffT

Russell did not operate in a vacuum. His thoughts grew out of two larger movements: Adventism and the "Great Revivial" that occured ealier in Amecian religious thought. In light of the times, his writings were not quite as bizarre as they now seem. Adventism worked off a simple assumption: all those days, times, seasons, prophetic monsters etc in the Bible must mean SOMETHING. Therefore one had only to find the key to unlock the mystery. "The Gentile Times Reconsidered" by Carl Olof Johnson has tables of some of the interpretations floating around using the "year for a day" method and who proposed them. He lists 36 each for the 1260 year and 2520 year prophecies. Most of these (particularly the second group) were advanced in the 19th Century.

In other words, the audience for his work already existed.

28

One step closer to a possible JW blood transfusion solution

by sir82 in

see the article here:.

http://www.slate.com/blogs/future_tense/2014/04/18/the_wellcome_trust_is_funding_research_to_make_human_blood_from_stem_cells.html.

blood could become much less scarce if a british research group succeeds in bringing a version made from stem cells to human trials, and eventually to market.

JeffT

JW reasoning is impervious to logic or facts. I lean toward the idea that they will use this as a convenient way to dump their blood problem, but you never know.

Having watched scientific progress at close range, I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for this treatment to become common place. It may take years to work the bugs out of large scale production.

17