In the end what really happened with the Australian investigation? Besides some bad news that JWs won’t believe anyway, not much, they moved the money out of the the international branches, did they even pay a fine or have anyone arrested? No, they got a few angry letters from some bureaucrat and that was that.
Anony Mous
JoinedPosts by Anony Mous
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Jehovah's Witness' bid to be excluded from abuse inquiry dismissed
by Tahoe inlink to article.
a legal bid by the jehovah's witness church to get out of being part of the royal commission of inquiry into abuse in care has been dismissed by the high court in wellington.. after nearly three years of behind-the-scenes legal wrangling to avoid scrutiny from the inquiry, the church applied for a judicial review in june.. at a hearing, held earlier this month it argued it was beyond the inquiry's scope because it did not operate institutions that cared for children or vulnerable people and the inquiry had uncovered no evidence of abuse in that context.. lawyers representing the inquiry argued that jehovah's witness elders - equivalent to ministers or pastors - exercised a level of control over the congregation that allowed them access to children.. the inquiry informed abuse survivors who gave evidence to the inquiry in relation to the jehovah's witnesses of the news this afternoon.. "we have received advice from the high court that none of the causes of action brought by the jehovah's witnesses has succeeded and the application for judicial review has been dismissed.
the judge's reasons are not yet available, but are expected in the near future," the email to survivors, seen by rnz, said.. the church was the only faith-based institution in the country to legally challenge its involvement in the inquiry, although it had attempted to challenge its status in other countries where similar inquiries have also been carried out.. the inquiry said, in a statement, that the dismissal "means the royal commission can continue to investigate the jehovah's witnesses, and all other faiths, in accordance with the pastoral care approach we have been applying since 2019".. "reasons for the high court's judgment are not yet available but are expected in the near future.
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Interesting story in todays New York Times that gives some insight into the religious soup of the 1800s that Watchtower arose from.
by Balaamsass2 intodays nyt.
fascinating read and background of new york state in the 1800s.
this community welcomes mediums, but first you have to prove yourself.
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Anony Mous
@ray as far as I can see the only connection is that the same geographic region also kickstarted Mormonism and Millerism, Miller’s Great Disappointment being the influence for Russell and his swindle operation and the calculations of 1914. To that effect, many of the calculations both Miller and Russell and others used to calculate the end of the world have their roots or at least carry great resemblance to certain beliefs within the Spiritism movements. The idea within Mormonism of many levels of hell and heaven likely comes from Mesmer (a Spiritist). So they all kind of influenced each other.
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Steve Lett doesn’t look well
by Teddnzo inas soon as you see steve letts talk at the agm you think to yourself “oh my, what’s happened to him?.
his hand has plasters and his skin doesn’t look healthy, like he has inflammation or something serious going on.. he had put on weight and is all bloated and puffy .
his skin really doesn’t look good, the kind of inflammation many people notice after the experimental covid vaccines.. there have been very high numbers of people reported inflammation after the experimental covid vaccines.
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Anony Mous
Warning, pictures of medical issues: https://dermnetnz.org/topics/cutaneous-adverse-effects-of-alcohol
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How Much of Russell and Rutherford is Left?
by NotFormer inrussell is kind of acknowledged as the founder, but rutherford is the one who really made the wt what it is, or at least laid the foundations for what it came to be, today.
how much would someone from that era recognise in the wt today?
what are the big changes that they would see?.
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Anony Mous
A lot of the 'basic' doctrine is actually pre-Russell. Jehovah's Witnesses originated out of Adventists of the Millerite branch. The emphasis on the imminent (or invisible) second coming, annihiliationism (Armageddon stuff), claims of spiritistic influence on leadership, prophecy that keeps moving around to fit modern events is not at all unique to JWs.
The core doctrines of Russellism specifically are still around:
- Non-existence of Hell and the 144,000
- (Lack of) the Divinity of Christ - although that seems to be even more emphasized today with the GB replacing Jesus.
- The (lack of) personhood in the Holy Spirit - again, something the GB seems to be laying more emphasis that THEY are solely influenced by Holy Spirit
- The non-belief in the trinityWhat has been completely rejected since are the pyramid teachings and the pro-zionist teachings. Russell went as far as telling Jews they should not convert to Christianity since they were a special people already.
As far as Rutherford, Rutherford didn't teach anything specifically other than the complete opposition to other religions and the state. Those ideals seem to have weakened in more modern times, having the WTBTS join UN etc. The other thing I think Rutherford introduced was the idea that Jesus didn't die on a cross but on a stake. Although Rutherford rejected the Russell interpretation that Russell was the "Faithful and Discreet Slave" which is an idea the WTBTS has taken up again since.
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JWs and Conscription/ Military Service
by NotFormer inmatthew 5:41 (nwt) "...and if someone in authority compels you into service for a mile,* go with him two miles.".
a member of the roman occupying forces could command a local to carry their pack for a mile.
the local was thus pressed into a form of military service.
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Anony Mous
@Earnest: That’s anal? No, that’s fact, read the Elder handbook. The WTBTS wanted to get a more corporate friendly image, they implemented lots of rules that copied other large corporations in the 90s and quickly wanted to forget the image they had built for themselves in the 1940s-1980s. Having former criminals which were already seen in the community as traitors as their leaders, they feared would ‘bring reproach’ on the organization.
Note that people in Mexico were actually allowed to bribe the officials, which was another debacle that came to light later.
You claim the principles have not changed, I challenge you to explain that, the principle before was that you could not do any demanded service for government either in service of the military or in civilian duties except if you voluntarily went into civilian service. Now it is a matter of personal decision. How is ‘NO’ to ‘do as you please’ not a change in principle? It was clearly claimed to be a matter of scriptural mandate, you can read the articles that told people not to do it, then later, as you correctly say, the WTBTS blamed these men that made the sacrifice for ‘misunderstanding’ them. I lived in that time in a country that still had mandatory service, I was trained from a young boy to refuse and go to jail, with articles from the WT publications and scripture, this would be a matter that was brought up during ‘local matters’ and people were disfellowshipped for not going to jail.
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How to stirr up the poor into digital online business
by Gorb inhttps://www.jw.org/en/library/magazines/watchtower-study-november-2023/hulda-reached-her-goal/.
what about this watchtower article?
in my jw time i felt not comfortable about this kind of "devine education".. poor sister works above her self to get a device.. jw.org hypocrisy for going full digital.. g..
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Anony Mous
@NotFormer: yea, you can go back about a decade and find various threads about this. At that point they said print would remain available for the elderly and poor, it seems more and more they want to go digital only and save money.
As I said before, you can run this org with a skeleton crew of 100-200 people in New York and a dozen or so in every country, altogether maybe 1000 people. Their entire website is already ran by a third party, lots of the video production as well. Now they have 1000s still dedicated to print and distribution, get rid of that and it doesn’t matter they’re losing half the people, they just need a core of 1M or so people donating just $10/month to stay solvent.
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Jehovah's Witnesses and Tattoos
by NotFormer ini was wondering about the jw attitude towards getting tattoos.. redditors suggest that the only jws who have them would have got them before they were baptised.. jw.org gives a meally-mouthed "true christians wouldn't" response.. but no-one (that i've seen so far) answers the question i'm actually asking: is getting a tattoo after being baptised a disfellowshipping offence?.
if not disfellowshipable, how would a typical jw congregation treat someone who got a tattoo after baptism?
would they really treat it like it is a conscience issue?.
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Anony Mous
@Destin, the article you quote clearly indicates it is not acceptable. Would you get disfellowshipped for it, maybe not, but someone who intentionally establish independence, drawing attention, identity or control over their body, it is clearly implied they do not see that as acceptable. You would be reproved and considered an immature Christian according to other articles in the WTLIB.
As a CO once told me, if the GB says they give you a suggestion, you should take it as an order.
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With no reporting necessary do they still need a territory guy?
by carla innow that they no longer have to report hours do they still need a territory guy?
maps?
etc...?.
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Anony Mous
Territory maps? I thought these were phased out over 10 years ago, as government privacy concerns mounted. I know we stopped having them where I was for various legal reasons, the maps were handed out to individuals after removing them from their plastic folders with the Watchtower logo.
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'They knew and let it happen!' What's your propaganda meter showing?
by was a new boy inremember the spotlight movie?.
https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/ae250e9e-8f1a-45bb-b757-47c0149cafb3.
as a kid mum told me usa was warned about the coming pearl harbor attack.. 9/11 and covid-19, history repeating.
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Anony Mous
The reason Israel wasn’t ‘ready’ is because they have seen significant international pressure to leave those areas. The UN and left-wing US Presidents have consistently pressured Israel to give Hamas more and more leeway. Just look at what the Biden admin tweeted while these terrorists were murdering civilians, Biden government stooges tweeted against Israel to do any retaliatory strikes.
Even as Biden is funding the Iranians, the US and the left wing parties even in Israel’s government have been claiming for the past 20 or so years that Muslims in Palestine have on average moderated against significant military action - see for example this Princeton article https://dataspace.princeton.edu/handle/88435/dsp018p58ph03z and other left wing outlets have been saying this lie repeatedly https://carnegieendowment.org/2012/11/18/long-road-to-moderate-hamas-pub-50068
That is why there were such protests lately in Israel against the government, nobody had seen any serious actions from the terrorists for decades, yet the government wanted to keep readiness like mandatory military service, while the left wing groups in the government were saying amongst other things this was not promoting for peace and discriminatory against LGBT (you know, you might get some real men if you give young men a purpose).
Moreover, this was predicted would happen when Biden released 15B to Iran in the last few weeks. They just weren’t expecting Iran to be so quick and bold about it, because this attack will now be pushed back and hopefully Israel will finally rid the entire West Bank and Gaza Strip of terrorists and reclaim its territory. Not sure what Iran’s goals were here, they weren’t ready to take on the Israeli military, they just wanted it to be symbolic for religious reasons.
People will have to learn, groups like Muslims, like JWs and other extremist religions will never moderate, they will change their tactics, but the underlying problem remains, the drug of control too powerful for their leadership to give up.
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JWs and Conscription/ Military Service
by NotFormer inmatthew 5:41 (nwt) "...and if someone in authority compels you into service for a mile,* go with him two miles.".
a member of the roman occupying forces could command a local to carry their pack for a mile.
the local was thus pressed into a form of military service.
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Anony Mous
@Earnest: I think the point being made here is that the JW cult leaders have on various occasions had various prescriptions about this conscientious objector thing. In my lifetime you initially couldn’t do anything including civil government service, you had to go to jail regardless of the options offered, even though government employment separately from a conscription alternative was permitted. It made no sense, but I know people that were in jail for anywhere from 1-10 years until it was eventually declared in the 90s that JWs could do work for governments in lieu of military services, this had the effect that people were serving in jail while the JW policy had changed, and they were then side-stepped for various duties because they couldn’t do certain things (eg. be the accounts elder) with a criminal record due to newer guidance from WTBTS.
And then before I left in the 2000-2010s you were permitted to accept a full time job in civilian service for police/military units as long as you didn’t carry a weapon. Those people that served hard time and got a record for the rest of their lives were very bitter about these changes.
The question is about the fact that ‘no light’ declared various things when Jesus/Paul was pretty clear that you could be conscripted into aiding the government.
IMHO everything you do for government from paying taxes to conscription into the military is a form of government aid. Money is fungible, most of your income tax money does not go toward helping other people or building roads, there are separate (road and fuel) taxes for that so the idea that somehow it’s okay to pay your taxes but not aid in the military is backwards.