Thanks MLE for your observations. In your talk on education, did they introduce the term "supplemental education"? They were using that term in ours to describe education beyond high school that was shorter than than "higher educations" 4+ years.
Posts by pirata
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139Some observations from the KM Elder School I wanted to share with you.
by miseryloveselders inmy school was a couple weeks back, and it was interesting to a degree.
to be honest with you, it reminded me of a police crime scene investigation with yellow tape.
what i mean is, in one respect it was business as usual.
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Observation -- Posters Don't Seem Clueless
by Band on the Run ini'm impressed with sophisticated thinking on this site.
after all it is an ex-witness site.
i wonder what changed in the former witnesses.
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pirata
Just a born-in, but...
A lot of people seem to convert to JWs at a vulnerable period in their lives when they are at a period of re-evaluation. We often learn at the service meeting to keep preaching to people who aren't interested because their circumstance change.
I read in Steve Hassan's book "Releasing the Bonds", that a therapist who helps people out of cults had to remove himself from a cult recruitment seminar (went there for the experience) because he felt himself starting to get pulled in. Persuasion can be a powerful tool.
As well, JWs are trained to be masters at shelving doubts (ie. wait on Jehovah = Don't think about it or question it).
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An Elder That Helped Me
by dontplaceliterature inhas anyone in this forum ever had an elder in the organization discuss "apostate" teachings with them in a non-threatening, mutually enlightening way?
obviously, there are many of you who have talked with elders about "apostate" ideas, and have been disfellowshipped/disciplined for it.
that's not really what i'm interested in hearing about in this thread, no offense.
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pirata
I thought there was an elder I could talk to, he certainly seemed to be aware of the issues. However, anytime I tried to bring up anything remotely off the beaten dub path, he'd come up with a though-stopping comment like "Jehovah will clarify matters in his own time". So I stopped while I was still ahead.
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Is the faithful slave hiding something
by bobld insee new 2010 wt cd-rom.ex past wt's not all info included compared to the bound volumes.. b.
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pirata
Awesome!
The alleged data files are: WT.76, A-77
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Is the faithful slave hiding something
by bobld insee new 2010 wt cd-rom.ex past wt's not all info included compared to the bound volumes.. b.
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pirata
If only they didn't encrypt the data files, we could do a quick diff to compare.
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I'm feeling disappointed now
by Nobleheart ini've been in this board for 2 months now, and have read and researched enough to know that what i thought was the one and only true religion isn't actually true.
finding out real facts has brought me severe disillusion and sadness.
as a jw i was taught that we were special in view of john 6:44 "no man can come to me unless the father, who sent me, draws him; and i will resurrect him in the last day.".
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pirata
My first post on this board was asking others if they prayed to God to help them to know if the JWs were they right religion, and if not, who was.
No one, who replied, felt that they got an answer. I don't feel I have had an answer. I don't know why, if God wants us to worship him in this way or that way, there are a hundreds of Christian groups (not to mention other religions), that all disagree with each other, yet feel that their way is the right way. This has led me to the conclusion that they're all pretty much giving their best guesses like the Governing Body is. Is the instructions manual not clear enough? Possibly.
In terms of Christianity, tight now I'm learning towards what I call the "independent Christianity" model, where there are good Christians in all regligions, Christians are personally responsible to God, not some organization's standards, which includes interpreting the Bible for oneself (instead of letting some other humans do it for you). This view has been shaped by the excellent book, "In Search of Christian Freedom" by Ray Franz, and by some of the other Christians in this board.
In parallel I am starting to put the Bible through the same anlalysis as I have the Jehovah's Witness beliefs and find myself learning towards agnosticism and/or humanism.
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Is the faithful slave hiding something
by bobld insee new 2010 wt cd-rom.ex past wt's not all info included compared to the bound volumes.. b.
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pirata
I only know of ONE instance, mentioned above, where the Watchtower was changed from the magazine to the bound volumes. I cannot identify one CD-ROM article that was changed when compared to the bound volume.
Can you provide a reference (ie. year/month/page/paragraph) to compare? It would be interesting if there was.
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76
My Story Part I - My Parents
by Farkel inpart 1 - my parents.
it's a funny thing, time.
notwithstanding einstein's relativity, time means vastly different things throughout life.
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pirata
Thank you Farkel. looking forward to chapter 2!
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Introduction
by dontplaceliterature inbefore i begin my introductory post, i would like to mention that a number of my initial comments here may be viewed by several of you as watchtower apologist or as sympathetic to the views of the jehovahs witnesses.
the last thing i want to do is incite a flame war regarding my legitimacy or intentions in joining this forum.
mostly, i would describe myself as on the fence.
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pirata
Welcome! Glad to have you on board!
The term "rank and file" is used to indicate members of an organization, exclusive of it's leadership. I don't think it's a derogatory term. Some examples:
*** w94 8/15 p. 11 par. 2 This Good News Must Be Preached First ***
Perhaps some religious groups send some “missionaries” for a two-year stint into certain areas, but their rank-and-file members do not participate in any such ministry.*** w92 12/1 p. 7 par. 1 The Blessing of Jehovah Makes Rich ***
In 1992 even the affluent West experienced a recession, and executives as well as rank-and-file workers found themselves out of work.*** w86 9/1 p. 28 Must You Be in the Limelight? ***
Some individuals are used quite prominently, but others play rather inconspicuous roles as rank-and-file publishers of the Kingdom message. -
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WTBTS Elder & Ministerial Servant Problems
by JW GoneBad ini attended a recent ministerial servant k m school on the east coast and the main school instructor mentioned among other things (part entitled: 'objective of the km school course') that the total number of ministerial servants is seriously less than it should be.
in times past the ratio of m ss to elders was much more than it is today.. in the u.s. apparently the total number of elders is 88,500+ as opposed to m ss 65,000. the numbers show & numbers don't lie: the society is running out of spiritual men.
the instructor stated that this is a new downward trend that has (in so many words) the society worried.. the next speaker (part entitled: 'why we must be spiritual men') added that in his years as a traveling servant the pool of m ss has always been much, much larger than it is today.
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pirata
I don't think it's suprising that we have more elders. I'm actulaly suprised that the ratio is not higher.
If a man spends an average of 10 years as a M.S. (ie. age 20-30) and an average of 50 years as an elder )ie. age 30-80) you'd expect a settling rate of about 5:1 ratio.
Or maybe my math is completely messed up, in which case corrections welcome.