i just read this article in the chicago sun times.
when i started reading the parents were religious and then saw home-schooling, i had a gut feeling they were jw's.
i read on and found out i was right.
I'm just wondering how different this is from not allowing your child to have a blood transfusion? Basically if you administor physical punishment because you think you are doing what the Bible says (and the kid dies).............. or you deny a child blood, because you think you are doing what the Bible says (and the kid dies), then how can the courts accuse you of murder for one and not the other?? It's all the same in my book. Screw balls let loose on innocent kids.
Marilyn
ok all you ex's, be honest.
do you ever have that little voice pop in your head and say "what if - just what if they're right?".
it happens to me on occasion and i've been totally out for years.
Chappy, I don't have that thought at all. I think I may have done in the beginning but what I've seen since I left, with my JW family and their lack of love and natural affection for each other has demonstrated to me what they are really like. After Sept 11th, I thought things were looking like the long talked about "end time", but my thoughts were still, that if JWs have the truth, I would totally prefer to be dead! I would not want to live for eternity with that bunch of phonies! Any God who sets up a system like the JW must have rocks in his head!
Marilyn
today i found out that an old friend had da'd themselves because they were molested/raped by their parent-elder(this happened some time ago)....i thought that the person left just because...which is fine with me because i'm here on this website, and obviously not a dub.. it's just shocking how the pr unit of the dub army can control everything.
it makes me sick to my stomach.
and, of course, everyone has abandoned this person.
There's a book called "Sex in the Sect", written by an Australian exjw - which tell the same story as your old friend. The book is a fabulous read because the author has an irrepressible sense of humor and she expanded on other aspects of growing up in a dub family, with all the meetings, poverty, and senseless activities. I'm not sure if this book is available overseas - but I could give you more details if you want. At least it's good for you to know that the Society doesn't get away scott free every time.
Marilyn
no moaning for me today.. what i want to know is the positive side of your life that you got from being a witness.. yes there are some, honest.. well i'll start off ,.
1. i met my wife.
2. lots of friends.
Well on the surface I learned nothing worthwhile at all at the KH. However many people tell me that the years in the Organisation and the awakening to reality and the struggle to leave and the subsequent growth thru the eyes of someone who has experienced the above have formed the person I am now. I am probably slightly wiser than I would ahve been without the JW experience. But then who can say?
Marilyn
went over to a disassociated witnesses house the other night,.
former org hatchet man,now as violently opposed to the org as he was, once, enslaved by them.. hes talkin "raymond franz says this...franz says that" all night.. it made me sick to my guts.. franz was pure borg heirachy, born and bred to power.. now hes opposed (if he aint dead by now)and these ex borg mind slaves are still listening to the guy like hes a repository of truth.. im not attacking ray franz,hes probably a nice guy,im just floating an idea.
what is a free mind?.
Of course it's those who were closest to cults (and their leaders) who write the best material against them. Who the hell besides those who've been dupped by them gives a rats arse about them?
By your reasoning, practising JWs shouldn't listen to people who've left the Organization, because we're still slaves to it. ?????
I've always been curious about how JW leaders denounce in the media anything said by ex members - because they are "disgruntled or have an axe to grind". Mmmm, yes, so? They may be a little jaundice, but they're bound to have the best dirt associated with those in the know!!!
Marilyn
i'm hoping you all can help.. an active jehovah's witness joined us in chat tonight and was dismayed that this site slams witnesses for trying to follow the bible in matters such as disfellowshipping.
this chatter feels that many people here complain about the society's policies without offering evidence that the policies are without scriptural backing.. i must be at work very early monday morning, so i could not stay in chat as long as i wished.
i told the chatter i would start this thread so that s/he could gather information and opinions from several sources.. in chat i was trying to present a point that i remembered from in search of christian freedom, about how disfellowshipping was meant to be a personal choice, not a decision forced on the congregation by a small committee.
I've been "out" too long to remember what scriptures they use to justify their actions. "Quit touching the unclean thing"? - could mean anything. Would the chatter be kind enough to refresh us on the scriptures the WTS uses to disfellowship. I also thought there was something about "Expell the wicked one from amongst yourselves". ????
I would like to point out that I am disfellowshipped and my circumstances were that my husband and I left the congregation quietly. We'd lost faith. After 2 yrs of not associating with the congregation we were approached and accused of apostasy. We were moral, upstanding young parents who no longer believed in any religion of any sort. How does this qualify us to be called "wicked"? (I ask you to employ commonsense when answering this!!)
I would also like to ask the chatter how it is that there is great inequality in practising disfellowshipping in the Organisation. In many congregations, people have been allowed to slip away from the congregation without being disfellowshipped. It's even spoken of in the WT magazine that people CAN leave quietly. Some appear to be disfellowshipped whilst others are left alone. What scripture is used to explain this?
I would also like to ask how any JW can claim at doors that they do not break up families? Disfellowhipping is now ramped in the Organisation causing family break ups in the thousands. Yet when I was a practising JW, we vehemently denied that we broke up families.
Marilyn
has the label apostasy been stretched by the wts to fit a multitude of sins in recent years or am i just imagining it?
aren't people either disfellowshipped for adultery, fornication, or apostasy now days?
or is conduct unbefitting a christian still in vogue?.
Well in MY day (geez I'm getting old!) we knew of some people who'd been Witnesses and had later gone over to another religion. That was rare and very weird to us. They were called apostate and it was virtually unheard of - this was the early 70's. Joining another religion after Jehovah's Witnesses was usually what was referred to as apostate.
I think my husband and I were apostate in the true sense of the word, but I don't think the elders really appreciated that. We didn't know of, or read "apostate" literature. We just got weak in the *truth* and eventually we stopped believing in God. I don't think they would have disfellowshipped us for apostasy if it hadn't been for Ray Franz et al. We left in 1979 and they came after us in 1981!
Since then there has been a derth of disfellowshippings for apostasy - I'd love to know the percentage increase. There'd be quite a spike on a graph I should think.
Marilyn
has the label apostasy been stretched by the wts to fit a multitude of sins in recent years or am i just imagining it?
aren't people either disfellowshipped for adultery, fornication, or apostasy now days?
or is conduct unbefitting a christian still in vogue?.
Has the label apostasy been stretched by the WTS to fit a multitude of sins in recent years or am I just imagining it? ARen't people either disfellowshipped for adultery, fornication, or apostasy now days? Or is conduct unbefitting a christian still in vogue?
Marilyn
damn!
i missed them because i was out, but my wife answered the door.
she told the two older gentlemen that her husband was a jw for twelve years and decided to leave.
Naaaa, they probably think your wife got it wrong. What JW leaves THE TRUTH becasue they want a different lifestyle? It's not in their realm of comprehension or phrases. Materialist, ambition, fornication, adultery, apostasy - though apostatsy has been greatly expanded in recent years to cover a multitude of wt sins. In fact acquiring a different lifestyle is apostasy - least that's what they called it when we did it!!!
Marilyn
ps last time they called I was on the phone to my jw parents - and had to tell them I was busy. DANG!!!
i realise some still retain a bit of a superstitious fear in certain areas where watchtower dogma has been drummed into you such as birthdays and christmas.
how do you feel about voting today?
especially in light of the fact that here in oz voting is compulsory and that doing so would demonstrate "subjection to the superior authorities" (rom.
I can't believe i actually watched it on tv Bruce. I thought it would send me to sleep, but it didn't. My sleeping problem must be serious!!
Maz
