Maybe, just maybe, this is the “light at the end of the tunnel” we’ve all been hoping and praying for. Details here:
Quendi
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Maybe, just maybe, this is the “light at the end of the tunnel” we’ve all been hoping and praying for. Details here:
Quendi
no one will take my intent to da or df seriously.
they called me again (three brothers this time) and asked me to meet with them.
i had no intention of doing so....simply told them there was nothing to talk about.. .
I’ve shared this George Eliot quote before and will do so again, magotan: “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” You are now starting your real life and can be what you should be. You have my unfading and unqualified support and rest assured you have God’s love as well.
Quendi
after today's watchtower study which was basically a mind controlling article about shunning your loved disfellowshipped ones, i've come to see just how sick, twisted, vile, rotten, repulsive, disgusting, and just plain evil you all are.
so i stormed out.
i don't know if i'll ever come back to your meetings again.
I wanted to share this quote which I found in the book Uncommon Dissent: Intellectuals Who Find Darwinism Unconvincing. Even though the source of this quote was speaking about science, I believe it applies with equal force to religion, particularly the religion of the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society. In the 7 April 2003 edition of the Harvard Crimson, Richard T. Holvorson, then an undergraduate at Harvard, wrote: “We must refuse to bow to our culture’s false idols….We must reject intellectual excommunication as a valid form of dealing with criticism: the most important question for any society to ask is the one that is forbidden.”
The WTS is guilty of this crime and the root of its guilt is its fear of the forbidden question: Is the WTS the sole channel of communication God is using to impart truth to humanity? Even a cursory examination of its history as well as the development of its dogmas and doctrines would convince an impartial investigator that the answer is no. The WTS and its ruling coterie believe otherwise and will not tolerate any who dissent no matter how mildly they may do so. By use of its printed organs as well as its appointed officers, the organization is trying to stamp out opposition as well as purge its followers of those who won’t knuckle under to its dictatorship.
I believe that by doing this it is hastening its own end. The organization is facing a crisis of faith and management. Its Governing Body does not know how to deal with this crisis and has resorted to the time-honored practice that all dictatorships do by cracking down on the rank-and-file. It won’t work, and like other tyrannical regimes have seen, the end of the line will come with striking force.
Quendi
after today's watchtower study which was basically a mind controlling article about shunning your loved disfellowshipped ones, i've come to see just how sick, twisted, vile, rotten, repulsive, disgusting, and just plain evil you all are.
so i stormed out.
i don't know if i'll ever come back to your meetings again.
The Watchtower Study conductor who heard raymond frantz comments was unable to censure him since the source of his remarks was the WTS publications themselves! I wish I could have been at that particular meeting just to see his reaction. But I’ll bet it will be a long time before raymond frantz gets the chance to comment again, and I don’t doubt that the Study conductor has already “marked” him.
The WTS knows that many of its older publications are available without cost on the Internet. It has created its own “library” with publications that only go back to the year 2000 in a vain effort to counteract the accessibility of its older publications elsewhere in cyberspace. I only hope that its captives will take advantage of this and do the same kind of research many of us already have. If they do so, they will see that the WTS has only a “form of godly devotion” and are proving themselves to be the false prophets Christ warned against.
Quendi
after today's watchtower study which was basically a mind controlling article about shunning your loved disfellowshipped ones, i've come to see just how sick, twisted, vile, rotten, repulsive, disgusting, and just plain evil you all are.
so i stormed out.
i don't know if i'll ever come back to your meetings again.
You’re right to point out Jehovah’s readiness to forgive, piztjw, and that is something I meant to say in my post. It is the organization (as represented by its officers) which has no idea what the words forgiveness, love, mercy and kindness really mean. If it did, it never would have instituted the shunning practice in the first place. The elder whose words you quoted perfectly represents how twisted and perverted this organization really is. As far as I’m concerned the only word that adequately sums up its quality is one others have used: EVIL. And as OneDayillBeFree says, I hope to live to see the day of its demise.
Quendi
after today's watchtower study which was basically a mind controlling article about shunning your loved disfellowshipped ones, i've come to see just how sick, twisted, vile, rotten, repulsive, disgusting, and just plain evil you all are.
so i stormed out.
i don't know if i'll ever come back to your meetings again.
So, The Watchtower tries to sugar coat its hateful message of shunning friends and family by stating that “Each year, many wrongdoers repent and come back to Jehovah’s organization. Jehovah does not begrudge their repentance. On the contrary, he is ‘ready to forgive.’ ” We all know that is a lie.
When I was disfellowshipped, my judicial committee led me to believe that reinstatement would be quick and relatively painless. It took me five years of jumping through hoops to see through their hypocrisy and do what the majority of those who are disfellowshipped do: turn my back on this cult and refuse to return at all. The magazine does not tell its readers that only one-third of those who leave the cult ever return and that most who do so eventually “fade” anyway. They come back to recover their friends and family not because they are convinced the cult is “God’s organization.”
I pointed this fact out to my judicial committee and followed it up with the question of how could this arrangement be divinely sanctioned if the attrition rate was so high and the recovery rate so low? The silence I got in reply was deafening, and if looks could kill I would have been carried out of the room in a coffin. I’ll never set foot in a kingdom hall or any gathering of Witnesses again for as long as I live.
Quendi
i was baptised --1963. left in 1978. fifteen years.
pre-baptism, another 5 years.
baptized in 1976
disfellowshipped in 2005
quit seeking reinstatement and attended my last meeting in 2010
Quendi
dear friends:.
forty-five years ago i was out in service with an elder, and we came upon a house where the owners kindly received us.
this was not so unusual as the family was jehovah's witnesses.
Dear Mike,
I want you to know that you have all my best wishes and affection as you continue on your life’s journey. I know that CoCo’s friendship will also sustain you and I wanted to add my support to his and all the other friends who have your best interests at heart.
Quendi
in a nutshell: i think that (and i do not enjoy thinking about this)...i think that the crazies within the religion (who range from just low level people to co elder do and up) have won so many battles at this point (over the more balanced people/ideas)......that the people who tend to think in a more balanced fashion (whether they themselves be low level or higher up) are getting to be the real minority.
i think this dynamic, will be what finally sinks the ship.. as we see with any organization (corporate or otherwise), many times there are reports that make you wonder (how is this thing alive or prospering?
), and upon closer scrutiny, there are strong people in the background holding the walls up (who themselves get little attention).
When the USSR collapsed in 1991, its fifteen constituent republics all became independent and went their separate ways for the most part. The largest one, Russia, remains a player on the world stage while all the others are getting by as best they can. I can see something similar happening to the WTS with one group assuming control over most of its assets and the others scrambling for the crumbs.
But I do believe that this cult is heading for a fall. This is one of the last surviving millennial movements from the nineteenth century. That very millennialism may prove its ultimate undoing. People are burning out. Like the dry bones in Ezekiel’s vision, more are saying, if only to themselves, ‘Our bones have become dry; our hopes have perished; we have been severed off to ourselves.’
All the developments they were taught to look for have failed to come to pass. There is no cry of ‘Peace and Security!’ There aren’t hundreds of thousands streaming into the organization. World governments aren’t on the brink of collapse. The UN is making no move to curtail, let alone destroy, “the world empire of false religion.” Even attendance at the yearly Memorial is dropping off. And despite all the warnings to the contrary, the Internet is influencing more Witnesses to take a closer look at their religion and questioning its validity.
Twenty-five years ago, both the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union stood secure. Any talk of a swift and irremediable collapse would have been viewed as madness. Both are now gone when forces beyond the control of their guardians brought them down swiftly and irreparably. It wouldn’t surprise me to see the same thing happen to the WTS.
Quendi
so about a week ago, i showed my cousin & her husband [an elder in our congregation] the picture on pg 29 of our 4/15/2013 study wt and asked, "if jesus is head of the congregation then where is he?".
after several minutes of searching, dead silence.. i then asked if they had heard the part on the 2012 summer district conv the part about "our spiritual mother, where the c.o said that "the bible by itself does not shine thru as life-giving truths just by itself.
" they were shocked and said that i must have misheard it because that would be apostasy.
What an experience! I have to tell you how much I admire and respect you, Newly Enlightened. I appreciate your boldness and firm determination to stand up to this execrable cult and its minions. And thank you for venting as well. It did my heart good to read your thoughts. I also appreciate all the more how any contact with this organization is hazardous. The last time I had any was in January when I made it clear to a friend of 25 years that I would never set foot in a kingdom hall again. The silence which has followed has been deafening, but I can only hope that he’ll come to his senses in time.
I wish you and your husband all the best as you move forward. You are not alone and I have every confidence in you. Breaking free has already paid you dividends and I’m sure more will follow. Please keep us apprised about any further developments. I’m sure I won’t be the only one eager to read them.
Quendi