what have you done so far as to convince them they are misled?
what has worked for you.. it is inconceivable to me, that if my mother or father showed me proof of why the wt org is false, that i wouldn't take them seriously, after all they are older and should know better, but it seems there are some of you who have the opposite outcome, where your children think you are misled and senile, and grandparents are surely labeled as senile.
one would reason then, if this were truly the case, that you are 'senile' or demented, then wouldn't that be taken into consideration when having loving contact with your parents?
I suspect that my two daughters still regard me as misled - but not quite as misled as they once thought I was. The elder one never did adhere to the WTS's more extreme demands about shunning, while in more recent times, the younger of my two daughters has also shown herself to no longer be bound by such extremism. Both my wife and I still entertain hopes that the penny will finally drop!
Bill.
this topic has been on my mind lately.
i have been looking around at jws and wondering how many truly believe the end is as near as they are told.
from my personal experience, i know that my parents fully believe the end is imminent and may come any time now.
There are those, perhaps the majority, who hang on to "The Truth" more as an insurance policy than anything else:
- just in case that Group of 7 Madmen in New York have got it right after all.
Otherwise, they plan for the long haul "In This System".
Certainly, my daughter and son in law (both in their mid-thirties) are talking retirement and pensions - whereas myself at the same age would have still subscribed to the idea "waste of time, that (elusive!) New System is going to be here before then."
Bill
was reading a poster's experience with custody, and the info in wts child custody packet.. children are prepped to present themselves as normal, with school friendships, hobbies, activities, etc.
and not to mention that their life-goal is to pioneer.. the school brochure (1983) contains this gem:.
"they [witness families] also travel several times each year to attend larger gatherings called circuit assemblies and district conventions.
My father was under strong pressure from his newly-converted JW mother to bring us kids up " In the Truth". Luckily for myself and my two sisters, he resisted that. JW children having a "normal" childhood? As much chance of that as the existence of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy and Unicorns!
Bill.
one time, i heard a father in a meeting with married couples say `i sometimes have to smack my children a bit, but never in the face so as to not humiliate them.how beautiful!
he knows the sense of dignity!
he has to punish them but does it justly and moves on.
After the beating, my parents would hug me and say they loved me.
Oh, yes - similar to the old lie " It is hurting me more than it is hurting you", said as he administers a flogging.
I regret to have to say that I am very familiar with that one!
Bill.
yes, i'm not kidding!.
this gem was stated today in the talk!
(shortly before i walked out).
Further extension of the story they used to tell "that "Christendom has been reading the Bible for centuries, and it hasn't done them much good!
Bill
the awake!
january 1 1989 contains the quote on page 12 "he was laying a foundation for a work that would be completed in our 20th century.
" this was later changed in the bound volume and on the cd library to "in our day.".
Marked
i've always suspected this was the wt society's view when i was in the jehovah's witness organization - but never knew the head of the writing committee karl adams had written a letter to nathan knorr ( then wt president ) recommending a change regarding reporting field service time as it wrongly emphasized jw members being seen as mainly being approved due to field service statistics - instead of emphasizing christian qualities of love, kindness, peace, etc.. karl adams had been personally handpicked by nathan knorr to be the head of the writing department.
in 1971 he wrote a letter to knorr which he wanted shared with the entire governing body as well .
i'll share the main parts of that letter.. on pg.
There is a certain poetic justice at work, and which has become particularly evident in recent years. Here we have a religious group that always placed numerical increase ahead of the welfare of its rank and file members, but which now is not even getting that all-important increase in numbers. You could say that any religious organisation prepared to sacrifice the welfare of its members for whatever other ends justly deserves everything that subsequently goes wrong with it.
Bill
a woman has been shot dead by a 2-year-old in a wal-mart store in idaho.. .
the 29-year-old was shopping with four children in the store in hayden, when the two-year-old reached into her handbag and fired the weapon, shooting her dead.. initial reports suggested the woman was the boy's mother, but the police have said that this is as yet unclear how they are related.. source; http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/toddler-accidentally-shoots-woman-in-idaho-walmart-9950847.html.
i've nothing to add to my past comments on americas psychotic relationship with guns.
after training goes back home with his full auto rifle
Interestingly, though, the Swiss militia are not permitted to take any ammunition home with them (not since 2009, anyway - and even before that, the packet of 50 rounds previously kept by each member of the militia could only be opened after an order for general mobilisation had been issued). When Switzerland is brought into any debates about guns, the first thing that to be remembered is that its 420,000-odd militia members who are permitted to keep their issue rifles at home are subject to strict army discipline.
I myself am a firearm owner, with rifle shooting being one of my hobbies. This is strictly target shooting though - while previously a hunter, I am no longer interested in that activity (these days, I do my "hunting" with a camera!) However, I am with Simon 100%, in that mandatory courses in firearm safety for all would-be firearm owners is a "no-brainer." Furthermore, I would add to the list of no-brainers mandatory requirements for the safe storage of firearms. Those requirements are only the same as what firearm owners in this country (Australia) have had to comply with since 1996, and in my experience, create very little inconvenience - let alone infringement of anybody's "rights."
In saying this, I am not sure exactly where this places me in the Liberal versus whatever-their-opponents-are- called debate - and frankly, I couldn't care less!
the movie american sniper is breaking box office records and of course there is some irony that a movie about a sniper is released on martin luther king day (who was shot by one).. but of course there is a world of difference between an assassin and a military sniper ... or is there?.
some are making a big stink about it and claiming that "snipers are cowards".
it seems unfair to me.
As for the not being rules in warfare ... yes, there are. There are standards - you cannot simply carpet bomb a city
Were I given to sarcasm, I would likely reply "Go tell that to the residents of Dresden!" However, sarcasm never was my scene, and I don't intend to start now.
Instead, Simon, I will ask you which set of international agreements (Geneva, The Hague, etc) prohibit the use of carpet bombing? Terror bombing of civilian targets was a central part of Allied air warfare strategy in World War Two - particularly that carried out by Britain's Royal Air Force. Also, the two atomic bombs were both exploded on civilian targets (the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki). Furthermore, no one was ever tried as a war criminal over any of those acts. Has there been a new set of international agreements drawn up in the 70 years since then that ban carpet the bombing of civilian targets? To the best of my knowledge, there have been none. (Throughout the Cold War, both sides had their strategic nuclear missiles trained on each others cities - i.e. civilian targets. This would tend to indicate that if any such international agreements had in fact been put in place, then nobody ever had any intention of taking a blind bit of notice of these!)
The work of a sniper, of course, is quite the opposite of that carried out by that of weapons of mass killing. Snipers seek out specific individual targets, usually enemy officers - the very antithesis of indiscriminate slaughter.
There are rules of warfare, which cover such things as the treatment of prisoners of war and the status of the wounded. These also prohibit the use of such ammunition as soft tipped / hollow tipped bullets, or the fitting of explosive charges into rounds of less than a certain calibre. Nowhere, though, are there any recognised rules of warfare that start even trying to specify what is "fair", "gentlemanly", "cowardly" or similar!
Bill.
PS: Before anybody starts sending a stream of tomatoes flying in my direction, I am in no way advocating the use of carpet bombing of civilian targets - just merely pointing out that no recognised rules of warfare prohibit its use.
couting time and, how to count time while doing as little service as possible is often a hot topic around witnesses.
i even overheard pioneers discussing about it.
they call it "creative time counting" (i translated that phrase from a different language so bear with me ;-).
As in everything, you get what you emphasize. In the case of the WTS, they make a big issue out of "hours" - so guess what, that is exactly what they receive! i.e. an impressive amount of "time", most of which is utterly meaningless. I would have to say that I was at least as innovative as anybody else when it came to making a day in "service" stretch out, so as to fill up the quota. Much of that sprang out of sheer resentment:
- I remember feeling "You B%$#&*d, you want hours, I'll give you bloody hours!"
Just as well "This System" is not really in its death throes, and its residents in need of an urgent warning of imminent destruction. Were that really to be the case, this lot would be failing miserably in issuing that "warning".
Bill.
