i am currently preparing for the public talk on sunday and as i was looking through the outline some these thoughts just keep popping up my mind that in the face of several allegations and numerous scandal, wbts has not stopped claiming to be god's organisation, i am wondering if they will ever realise that their strategies are no longer appealing to the general public.
regrettably, they keep on publishing and printing using victims of mind control hazards to the detriment of over 7 million rank and file members and spiritual illiterates in the society.
i keep on pondering on how long this malicious activity would continue.
That is rough, The last public talk I gave was about a year ago. I sanitized the heck out of it by removing anything that my conscience wouldn't let me teach. Its funny many people came up to me after the meeting and said "what a wonderful upbuilding talk".
Welcome to the Board, and we look forward to your posts.
SIAM
that it's "jewel-ry"... and not "joo-lery" (may you all have peace!)?
i know, i know... very small potatoes in the grand scheme of things.
but, dang, if you're gonna host a television jewelry show, shouldn't you at least be able to say "jewelry"?
Flustrated
instead of frustrated.
I give you three days before you have two elders at your door. They will try to get you to explain what you meant in the email. At that point you will have to either back off or blow the bridge.
SIAM
So here is a question that I would ask if I was the Elder....
If you are a MS why do you have access to the Flock book?
SIAM
i remember one time when i was about 17 years old, i wanted to arrange a costume party for the young brothers in the congo around my age.
i suggested it to one of my friends and was told that the elders had advised against it because it could be construed as pagan and masks have their roots in demonism.
of course, i was never shown any biblical proof of this but just that response took the wind out of my sails and i decided to just not go through with it.
Only a baptized brother could spiral bind the new elder book in the presence of the Elder.
if you are an elder or an ex-elder please add a comment.
i hope that the governing body will see this.
it is too bad it has to be on an anonymous forum.
I agree about with you about being hypocritical. That is why I resigned as an elder. I couldn't live with myself and teach something that I did not believe. I couldn't disfellowship someone when I thought the whole arrangement was unloving. I couldn't set the example in the ministry when I felt it was a bloody waste of time. I couldn't give public talks when I felt like the things I was teaching the congregation were wrong. The scriptures talk about teachers bearing a heavier judgement. You had better be convinced of something yourself if you are going to teach others.
So to minimize my own hypocrisy and to live with myself as a human being I quit. I don't feel like a hypocrite anymore because I am actively fading, no longer go in service, and do not support the WTBS in any way, except for attendance at the meetings. My honesty with my wife as to why I resigned as an elder has caused her to re-examine the things she was taught from infancy. Within a year we will be out and inactive, we will still have contact with our families and will start our new life. Its a process. We all have different methods when it comes to maintaining our personal integrity. Some methods work for some, and other methods work for others. The end result is the important thing.
SIAM
if you are an elder or an ex-elder please add a comment.
i hope that the governing body will see this.
it is too bad it has to be on an anonymous forum.
Thanks Daniel,
I came to a similar realization to what you just described and wrote a post about the situation some of us are in. http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/211018/1/The-Watchtower-Penitentiary
It is nice to have your perspective on the board. I agree that some of the GB may be just as trapped. However they need to stop pretending to be the voice of God. Its a process for many of us to break the chains that bind.
SIAM
for me, a jehovah's witness does not have a real life!
jw's are like trained soldiers.
they could be fervent or lax or happy or unhappy in their role but they are trained to drone on like stepford wives.. what an utter waste of an existence being a jehovah's witness!.
You can't leave without trauma.
SIAM
after reading sabastious post on when did you lose your confidence.
i started thinking about what it was like in the early 70's when large groups of people were coming into the wt cult because of the 1975 teaching.
talking with these people they whould tell me how hard it was for them to become a jw.
Great post Nugget.
It is hard to say since none of us have ever walked in the others shoes.
I was a born in, and as I slowly exit the org I can tell you it is tremendously hard. Everyone you know is a Witness, all of your friends, many of your family and sometimes even your employer. When you are born into the cult you have an identity that is forced upon you that is hard to change. You have hundreds of people looking fondly at you as a good example of someone who did things right and since they are all you have you don't want to let them down. As a born in you missed out on many things that make life fun growing up. You have never been able to think freely because you were trained with a cult mentality. You look at everyone in the world with suspicion and assume automatically that their sole purpose is to corrupt you. You never have real friends because of the WTS rules and controls. Even now there are very few people that I can tell my true feelings about the organization to. As a born in you are surrounded by a "great crowd" of acquaintances but still remain tremendously lonely. Bottom line is, as a born in you don't have any other point of reference to compare to.
I am glad that I was a born in though, because it caused me to meet my wife and have my kids. I learned things that helped me to gain my current employment. I learned how to talk to people. I will never allow my kids to fall into the same situation that I did though.
SIAM
i've always felt that its only a matter of time before the watchtower cracks down on football (american, although soccer seems like its also referenced).
its been one of the few things jw's can do, which means it has slipped under the radar since as we know, there are very few things that are not frowned upon or banned in watchtower world.
we know that almost 99% of movies are wrong according to the standards of the watchower, and this is again mentioned in this article, but it seems like also football is in the cross hairs.
I wonder if this will be studied during the playoffs? Guess I will have to cancel my superbowl party. I wonder if a sport like curling is appropriate for Christians?
