isn't this a double standard?
the wt leaders forbids or at least strongly discourages higher education, main reason being the risk of getting influenced by worldly thought and associations.
then how come the wt leaders permit jw's to have fulltime employment with worldly companies??
That isn't the real reason.
The WTBTS wants a large pool of honest, hard working, UNDEDUCATED young people to provide willing workers for their slave labor camps (Bethel, farm, etc, etc) and for companies run by elders and ministerial servants.
I was stupid enough to work for "brothers" when I was a young adult. They treated you like you were a serf. And paid far less than the market rate. And if you complained they accused you of being "disloyal".
It is part of their money making scheme.
found this article by some guy named john w scott that says jw's are not a cult.. .
http://ezinearticles.com/?how-jehovahs-witnesses-differ-from-cults&id=3237332.
bangalore.
I didn't read the article. I don't need to. An organization based on TRUTH has nothing to fear. Imagine if you KNEW that you were the communications channel for the ruler of the universe, what a self confidence that would give you. The WTBTS claims to be such a channel. Yet, they are terrified of TRUTH. Why is that?
I will give just one example. The WTBTS tells its members that they are not to read the writings of the founder of the organization, Charles Taze Russel, that these writings are now "apostate" and anyone promoting those writings would be guilty fo "apostasy".
Huh?
Forget that Russel's writings are far more entertaining than the modern day writings of the WTBTS, what would purveyors of the TRUTH directly from the ruler of the universe have to fear from their own writings?
That in and of itself proves to me that the WTBTS is a cult.
meaning... on this website, no longer a jw or at least no longer beliving anymore?
i never did, even 18 months ago it would have seemed impossible, unthinkable.
even though looking back the seeds of doubt had been sown for some time, i just never allowed myself to think about them... vvv dangerous thing to do!.
It still breaks my heart.
From that day, when I was 14, and the drug deal which went bad, and the guns blazed, and I staggered home looking up at heaven crying my eyes out "God, how did I get HERE, how did I turn into this. PLEASE, God", and I just couldn't take it any more and I put my gun up to my head and pulled the trigger, but my hand was shaking and the gun recoiled and the bullet hit my head at a strange angle and richoched off, and I just had a terrible headache. A piece of the bone was shot away, I still have a wierd depression at the base of my skull, and I blacked out.
When I came to, I ran home and on the coffee table was an invitation to the Memorial, so I hitchhiked to the Kingdom Hall.
And in my army jacket with the confederate flag on the right shoulder, with my hair longer than any of the girls in the hall, still carrying a gun, still holding drugs, I walked into the wrong door and came right out on the stage. And it was a black congregation. LOL. And one of the brothers took me to sit in the front row and a kindly elderly sister shared her song book with me. And the love I felt. I KNEW I had found God. I was crying through the entire meeting.
And I ran home and dug a hole in the woods behind my house and buried the jacket and buried my guns and my knives and the drugs and I died that day, to the way I had been. The next day I got a hair cut and bought a suit and carried a bible in my pocket everywhere I went. And I witnessed to the entire school. The principal let me give a witness to the entire student body at a school assembly.
And later I learned it was all lies. And it broke my heart. And it still does. And I hate the Governing Boyd and the WTBTS.
having read ray franz's " crisis of conscience " 3 years ago -before i read steve hassan's 2 books on mind control - my wife and i thought it would be good to re-read ray's " crisis " book again now that we know more about the workings of " cult mind control".
we just finished chapter 2 and i noticed striking similarities i thought i would share.. notice this quote in " crisis of conscience " on pg.
28 & 29 by franz , " thus numerous factors that are relatively common knowledge in many religious organizations are known only vaguely , if at all, by the vast majority of jehovah's witnesses.
Why is so much stock put into what this Franz character says? He knowingly took part in a criminal consipracy for many years which told lies, hid wrongdoing by influential members, etc. NOW Franz claims that he isn't "like them" etc etc etc.
Personally, I think the man has an agenda now, which is to deflect his share of the guilt from himself.
How do you know that you can put faith in what this man says, since the Governing Body has knowingly told lie after lie after lie for decades, and Franz went along with it?
I don't trust him.
mine is rugby union the sport of kings lol.
the new zealand all blacks.
the hurricanes.
I'm not sure what this sport is called. It was the most incredible thing I have ever seen.
Tall, long legged women wearing high heel shoes and teeny eeny mini bikinis riding big wheels.
OH MY GAWD it was awesome.
for the first time today, when my boss asked what i'm going to be doing for thanksgiving, i didn't have to go into this awkward explaination of why i don't celebrate it.
i simply said that i'm going over my aunt's.
it may sound trivial but it feels great!
I LOVE Christmas. I am not a Christian, I do not believe that Christ is what the religionists claim. When I celebrate Christmas I am celebrating the fact that I have the friends and family that I have and life is joyous.
there have been several threads about music the last few days, so i decided to start another.. this song absolutely makes me tear up every time i hear it.. .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cq_3byxasmm.
I don't have a link to it. But here are the lyrics. This song makes my heart break.
You light me up and then I fall for you
you lay me down and then I call for you
stumbling on reasons that are far and few
I'd let it all come down and then some for you
Pretty baby don't you leave me
I have been saving smiles for you
pretty baby why can't you see
you're the one that I belong to
I'll be the embrace that keeps you warm
for you're the sun that breaks the storm
I'll be alright and I'll sleep sound
as long as you keep comin' around, oh pretty baby
And I know things can't last forever
but there are lessons that you'll never learn
oh just the scent of you it makes me hurt
so how's it you that makes me better
Pretty baby don't you leave me
I have been saving smiles for you
pretty baby why can't you see
you're the one that I belong to
I'll be the embrace that keeps you warm
for you're the sun that breaks the storm
I'll be alright and I'll sleep sound
as long as you keep comin' around, oh pretty baby
Why can't you hold me and never let go
when you touch me it is me that you own
pretty baby oh the place that you hold in my heart
would you break it apart again... oh pretty baby
Pretty baby don't you leave me
I have been saving smiles for you
pretty baby why can't you see
you're the one that I belong to
I'll be the embrace that keeps you warm
for you're the sun that breaks the storm
I'll be alright and I'll sleep sound
as long as you keep comin' around, oh pretty baby
i haven't been to a meeting for at least 3years.
my wife and i have been married before and we have been married for about 9 months.
since we got married my wife has been going to the meetings to get reinstated (she wants to have a relationship with her kids and with mine as we have both had grandkids now).
The elders are not god, even though they think they are. I'm not sure why you have to address this question at all. Accompany your wife to the meetings, support her in every way possible and let your actions do the talking. Tell the elders that this is a private matter between you and God and you expect your wife to be treated with love, mercy, compassion, and understanding.
I don't see how your talking to them can make things easier for your wife? How does that affect your wife's relationship with God. I would like to hear the answer to that one.
They won't have any power over you unless you let them. The Witnesses like to set themselves up as the final arbiters of everything. The Bible says otherwise. I went through this all the time with those a-holes. Like one time I went to the Carolina coast to help with hurricane relief and they take us out to a "brother's" mansion to pick up felled trees on his 40 acres. No, I'm not making this up. I said, "I didn't come 200 miles to be a ranch hand on the Ponderosa, I came here to help people in need". Can you believe it, the a-hole "elders" tried to tell me that I couldn't leave! So, I walked until I came to an area where there were people really in need and helped get a tree out of an old ladies living room. When I caught up with the "Brothers" a few days later they tried to "scold" me for not keeping with the "arrangement". I just said "you people are under the false impression that you have power over me, you don't".
God did not give these people power over you. They make a lot of assumptions.
for the first time today, when my boss asked what i'm going to be doing for thanksgiving, i didn't have to go into this awkward explaination of why i don't celebrate it.
i simply said that i'm going over my aunt's.
it may sound trivial but it feels great!
I live in Mississippi and today one of my friends told me that one of the nice southern ladies at his work asked a guy from France "how do ya'll celebrate Thanksgiving in France"?
I just love southern people. (I'm southern!)
so yesterday, my husband gets out of bed and eats breakfast.
then, he comes back over to me and at this point, he doesn't even tell me to get out of bed and get ready for the meeting anymore.
instead, he asked me if i wanted to go.
doublelife,
I don't know if you still love God or not, I know my leaving the WTBTS was about not believing them anymore, not doubting that I loved God. One thing that I saw crystal clear is that the way the WTBTS tells us to "study" is very damaging. The WTBTS literature is gloomy, pessimistic, arrogant, etc, etc, etc. Reading the New Testament with an open heart and mind is a totally different experience.
One thing you might suggest to your husband is that you study the BIBLE together, not the WTBTS literature. If he objects you can point out the the WTBTS tells us NOT to read the Bible on our own and you can point out how controlling that is. Suggest that you continue your family study but study THE BIBLE instead of the dammm Watchtower.
When you compare what Jesus actually says and does to what the WTBTS says and claims that God will do, the distinction is quite stark.
One example, for an Orthodox Jew (which Jesus was one) to touch a leper made the Jew unclean physically, morally, spiritually, and legally. The person could not participate in ANY aspects of normal life without going through a gruelling "cleansing" process. Yet, when the leper made his way through to crowd to touch Jesus and said "LORD, if you but want to you can make me clean" and Jesus replied "I WANT TO, be made clean" with tears running down his face and touching the leper while saying it. Now the law that Jesus was under told him to RUN AWAY from the leper. Any other Orthodox Jew would have done so.
Contrast that person with the nit picking, bureaucratic,, doctrine squabbling WTBTS leadership.
