Then god said *sigh* FINE!!!!
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JoinedPosts by fade_away
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Discussion Topic God's Sudden Personality Change as Seen in the Bible
by charlie brown jr. inok i'm sure this has been talked to death... but since we have a thread saying we're missing a good debate here we go..... when the bible meant something to me way back when .....even then i pondered.... god starts off as this vengeful being..."listen to me or i'll lay your soul to waste".
to his enemies ....keep your distance or you will feel the wrath of yahweh or if i want what you have ....best leave now unless any of you men wanna die.
then overnight.. he is patient, loving, kind, his son says love they neighbor.
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Discussion Topic God's Sudden Personality Change as Seen in the Bible
by charlie brown jr. inok i'm sure this has been talked to death... but since we have a thread saying we're missing a good debate here we go..... when the bible meant something to me way back when .....even then i pondered.... god starts off as this vengeful being..."listen to me or i'll lay your soul to waste".
to his enemies ....keep your distance or you will feel the wrath of yahweh or if i want what you have ....best leave now unless any of you men wanna die.
then overnight.. he is patient, loving, kind, his son says love they neighbor.
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NomadSoul, when I heard that line in the movie I thought the exact same thing! I love that line!
Anyway, I think after god went crazy killing people, Jesus told him "okay, relax bro. I got this. Just sit down, take a breath and let me make you look good again. When Armaggedon comes, you can be as violent as you want again....but only if you promise to give them 1,000 years to clean up the mess you made."
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JWs and Infant Weddings - Marry as young as legally possible
by doubtful init sickens me to hear the venemous propoganda against the evils of higher education.
they talk so much about how it consumes valuable time during one's youth - how it takes away time from pursuing spiritual goals like pioneer service, missionary service, mts, bethel, etc..that's one of their biggest talking points in their argument against a college education.
their other point is that we shouldn't be preparing for a long stay in this system, so why the need to prepare for a lucrative and satisfying career by attending college for 4 years, when time is running out, and the big a is literally right around the corner...it shows a lack of faith in jah's promises and a materialistic attitude..etc.. yet..they never say anything about the countless thousands of teenage or near-teenage weddings!
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Here's a secret of mine I feel confident in saying here. I fornicated before marriage! No one ever found out and we as a couple never felt guilty! LOL! But yeah, there are many different reasons why JWs get married so soon. Sexual frustration is one of them. It's all the rules that force kids into getting married so early. I married in my mid twenties but I broke some rules to make that happen.
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What drove you? Love or Fear?
by fade_away inthis has probably been discussed here before, but i'm new so sue me.. i think the religion of jehovah's witnesses has been an amazing but tragic social experiment proving that the mind is most vulnerable to brainwashing when it's in an unhealthy state.
it seems to attract the bipolar, schizophrenic, depressive, and the paranoid.
it preys on negative emotions like sorrow and fear.
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This has probably been discussed here before, but I'm new so sue me.
I think the religion of Jehovah's Witnesses has been an amazing but tragic social experiment proving that the mind is most vulnerable to brainwashing when it's in an unhealthy state. It seems to attract the bipolar, schizophrenic, depressive, and the paranoid. It preys on negative emotions like sorrow and fear. In my 25 years of being a witness, I've met as many people with mental disorders as a psychiatrist does in his whole career! Have you guys noticed this? Kingdom Halls are close to being asylums!
On service, the people who actually listen at the doors and accept a study are the ones going through some hardships at the moment. How many times have you heard a JW recalling an experience of knocking on the door of a man about to commit suicide? Gun in the mouth ready to pull the trigger when the doorbell rings. Followed by "That man is now a baptized pioneer"....another man with serious issues and mental disorders becoming a witness and everyone applauding.
So many people I've met are in this religion cause of a desire to see a dead loved one, fear of the current world events, fear of death at armaggedon, fear of being shunned, a desire to rid themselves of an illness, or sometimes they're there for the juicy gossip. My father is driven by the sorrow of his dead mother, my brother has had several medical near death experiences and is driven by the fear of death, and my mother's fear of aging keeps her going.
Wasn't it the love for Jehovah that was supposed to make us serve him? It's not love, it's fear and sorrow. Manipulate the weakened minds to make them do what we want them to...kinda like a sociopath (Which is a disorder in itself). Maybe that's why this religion doesn't seem to work well on people with healthy minds and/or above average IQ's. (That's why education is of the Devil) Has anyone here noticed the same?
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Your wedding day belongs to the elders
by fade_away ingetting married means you get your own special day.
a day where the couple getting married gets to call the shots and decide who is gonna be invited, who is gonna be the maid of honor, who is gonna be the best man, how you want everything to look and what music you want to play.....unless of course you're a j-dub.. i got married last year, and no matter how hard i tried, i couldn't decide anything on that day.
i have an amazing friend who has always been there for me and my family.
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Getting married means you get your own special day. A day where the couple getting married gets to call the shots and decide who is gonna be invited, who is gonna be the maid of honor, who is gonna be the best man, how you want everything to look and what music you want to play.....unless of course you're a J-dub.
I got married last year, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't decide anything on that day. I have an amazing friend who has always been there for me and my family. He helped us move, he bought us things when we never asked him to, and if there's any financial trouble he always insists on helping me out even when I tell him not to bother. So I figured who better than him as the best man for my wedding? I told him he could be the best man and he found it a privilege and an honor and he couldn't stop thanking me. But then the presiding elder took notice that this friend of mine wasn't baptized and rarely attended meetings. Now he suddenly wasn't an option. I broke the news to him and he was dissapointed.
I sat with the elders and explained to them what great friend he's been to me and how humble he is. I tried my hardest to make him realize that this was the least I could do for him after everything he's done for me and my family. This was the chance for me to express that gratitude I owed him. Everything I said fell on the elder's deaf ears if he's not baptized. That is the only thing he can see. He was blind to everything else. If I chose him anyway, I wouldn't have been allowed to get married at the hall. I shouldn't have let that intimidate me.
I was forced to choose someone else. My friend may not have been baptized, but he was a better person than any of the elders were. Hell, a better person than any other friend I made at the hall. They made a lot of decisions for us on our day. Anyway, that friend of mine gave us a thousand bucks as a gift and later bought us two concert tickets for Avenged Sevenfold and Disturbed (heavy metal). Which later became a small issue when JWs saw the pics on facebook.
That's the control I'm breaking away from. I'm at a point where I'm gonna do what I want and post it on fb so everyone can see, cause I don't care anymore.
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The classic features of a JW wedding are:
by highdose infirstly a wedding/sales talk that mostly features heavily on how the woman should behave (hint, doormat) and lightly brushes over the fact of the husbands bevhaviour ( oh yeah he should treat her well).
the reception normaly at some crummy comunity hall with yellowed ceilings and chucks of damp plaster falling off the walls.
the seats normaly arranged facing eachother all around the edge, so that theres a huge unused space in the middle and everyone is climbing over everyone elses legs to get to their chair.. a big spread donated by everyone, normaly an ode to food poisoning.
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I got married last July the 3rd. The presiding elder didn't let us decorate the hall at all. Just two lousy flower bases on the platform. He didn't let us put bows on the chairs on the first two rows where our family would sit, he didn't let us roll out a carpet to walk on, and he didn't let me choose the best man. The best man I had in mind was someone who wasn't baptized, so I had to choose someone else I didn't really want.
The reception was nice though.
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What was your most embarassing WTF experience with a fanatical witness??
by Reality79 inwe've all known those fanatical witnesses who are guilty of pdf (public display of faith) and always have to make a big song and dance to the whole world and let everyone and their dog know they're a faithful witness of jay hoover!.
1) when my mother first came in 'da troooof' this wacky, over zealous 'sister' was studying with her - you know the type.
this woman was one of those not so subtle individuals who would always talk loud in conversation and say the name jehovah a million times even when the conversation could have been about basketball.
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I have a good one. I went with a pioneer forty something year old sister to give a study she had. I was around 14 years old. I wasn't baptized yet but she still felt like she needed to put some rag or something on her head since she was with me (a not-yet-official-brother). Since she didn't have one, she asked her study to get her something for her head. She said a paper towel will do. She put the damn thing on flat on her head! Now she is sitting up-right trying to balance this paper towel that would occasionally fall off. She eventually decided to hold it in place with her left hand the entire study (which was the longest hour of my life!)
Meanwhile, the study (who was a gorgeous girl around my age by the way), was on the verge of laughing and I was red as a tomato and humiliated beyond belief. What must've this girl been thinking at the time? I'm sure she must've been saying "what a f#%$ed up religion!!!!" Anyway, believe it or not, it gets worse. I had never done a public prayer at the time, and she decided to let me do the closing prayer. I panicked, stuttered, and repeated the same sentences several times. All the while the beautiful girl was holding her laughter. At one point she laughed but tried to make it come off as a cough. I stopped half way through and let the sister finish my prayer.
That should've been enough to scare me from getting baptized, but no. Like an idiot I still got baptized at 17, cause "everybody was doing it". I hope it was enough to scare that study away.
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Epic drama is imminent
by fade_away insoap opera style drama unfolds at the smallest irrelevant actions a j-dub takes.
for example, just last year when i was still in, my soon-to-be wife fiance and i decided to start sitting together at the meetings.
we figured "we might as well, since we're about to marry".
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Soap opera style drama unfolds at the smallest irrelevant actions a j-dub takes. For example, just last year when I was still in, my soon-to-be wife fiance and I decided to start sitting together at the meetings. We figured "we might as well, since we're about to marry". Of course this did not go unnoticed by the members of the congregation, especially by the elders. The meetings (and their lives) must be so boring for people that they focus on everyone else instead. As soon as we started sitting together, the elders decided to talk to us both about the appropiate way to sit. I swear to god all we did was hold hands the entire time, but the elders told us that we shouldn't be putting our arms around each other during the meeting, around the waist during the songs, and especially during the prayer cause it "just might stumble someone."
My guess is that someone saw us holding hands and decided to run to the elders and exaggerate what they saw to the point of saying we were cuddling or something. Even more gossip came up when we decided to talk outside in the parking lot after the meetings. Seriously? What, are we gonna have premarital sex on the hood of a car or something? But no, it "just might stumble someone". Then one day I was talking to her in the parking lot with her brother as a chaperone and guess what? The next meeting I found myself in the back room with two morons elders lecturing me about how "I need to be careful". By that point I stopped agreeing and smiling and just kinda rolled my eyes. I was pissed on the inside.
Me being the son of an elder and having burdens priviliges in the congregation, made me a target for gossip and surveillance. I was barely able to look her way without people noticing. My fiance was just as angry. Well, now we're married and both happily out. But like I said: Epic drama is imminent. Soon, the three day convention will be here and everyone will notice that my wife and I will be absent on all three days. My mom has already asked me if I reserved hotels and I said not yet. They will eventually find out of our innactivity which will result in more drama than a spanish soap opera.
I'm out but not 100% free. I'm still under surveillance by some friends and family in facebook. Everything I write is carefully read to make sure I'm not saying things I shouldn't. Every picture, comment, and friend I make is examined by retards our fellow brothers and sisters who are eager to run to the elders with dirt on us. I posted pictures of a metal concert I went with my wife and I was told it "just might stumble someone". I'll eventually just officially DA myself so they can shun me. I'm happy now but I'm happier left alone.
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Finally out!
by fade_away ini've been loggin in to this site for about 3 or 4 months on an almost daily basis.
i decided to finally make an account cause i just have to vent and connect with those who have been in my shoes.
"worldly" people don't understand completely when i talk to them about the hardship of being born into a religion/cult, growing up with people making decisions for me, and having them choose my future, goals, and dreams; all the while sacrificing normal childhood joys and replacing them with study, service hours, and 5 minute talks.
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Yeah, you're right Mat. That's a generalization. Maybe, not "no matter what". I meant most don't meddle in your affairs and base their friendship on something so trivial as for example, what you celebrate.
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Finally out!
by fade_away ini've been loggin in to this site for about 3 or 4 months on an almost daily basis.
i decided to finally make an account cause i just have to vent and connect with those who have been in my shoes.
"worldly" people don't understand completely when i talk to them about the hardship of being born into a religion/cult, growing up with people making decisions for me, and having them choose my future, goals, and dreams; all the while sacrificing normal childhood joys and replacing them with study, service hours, and 5 minute talks.
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I've been loggin in to this site for about 3 or 4 months on an almost daily basis. I decided to finally make an account cause I just have to vent and connect with those who have been in my shoes. "Worldly" people don't understand completely when I talk to them about the hardship of being born into a religion/cult, growing up with people making decisions for me, and having them choose my future, goals, and dreams; all the while sacrificing normal childhood joys and replacing them with study, service hours, and 5 minute talks.
My wife also joined this site recently. Her and I met in our congregation and we got married almost a year ago. Her as well as I had been through the same thing. We were both born in JWs who never in our lives had the choice wether to be in this religion or not. We also secretly wanted out, but we both put on a fake smile to blend in. As soon as we got married we moved to a congregation about an hour away from our parents congregation. Now her and I had the opportunity to leave....but my dad is an elder in our last congregation and he would find out if we became members of our new one or not. So we officially became members and immediately started the fade away process.
It's been about 5 months since we've gone to a meeting and its been even longer (about 8 months) since we went on service. I have honestly felt happier since then. Finally no more dealing with stress and most of all anxiety that giving parts, public prayer, and door to door service brought along. I still believe in god and I'm not sure how I sit with him. Maybe he loves me, maybe not. But my wife and I are very happy to be out and I'm thankful for that happiness either way. I'm free of anxiety and I can finally live in joy instead of fear of death. One small problem remains though: my parents know I've slowed down but they don't know I've slowed down to a halt. They don't know I haven't been in service for 8 months or gone to the meetings in 5 months. That would break their hearts especially my mother's. It would make her cry and I hate it when she cries cause of me. Their happiness matters but mine matters too. It's just a matter of time before they find out, and when they do I have to be prepared. I've been in this religion for 25 years and now I'm out. Too much gossip, too many vague explinations to questions they don't know, too many ridiculous and absurd rules and regulations on what to do, how to think, what to watch (Avatar is now bad for example), what to say and what to wear. They are extremely meddling and nosy.
So called friends will follow orders to stab you in the back and throw you under the bus for dumb insignificant things like giving some one a birthday gift at work. The list of things go on forever. Meanwhile, worldly friends couldn't care less what you wear, how you think, what you believe, what you watch and what you do. They will be your friends no matter what. Still the society prints out magazines and books with a friend-making guide insisting that the best friends you'll find are in the organization. 25 years have told me that's BS. True, there are really nice people in the religion, but it's a conditional friendship.
I have much more to say and many experiences to tell, but I'll leave it for future posts. Glad to join the forum!