Posts by fulano

20

Reddit thread Warning young JWs that ‘Spiritual Goals’ are Not a Career!

by LongHairGal in

jw
friends

as somebody who worked full-time when i was in the witness religion, this topic naturally caught my eye.. many of the responses are heartfelt.

there are about 90 at this point.

from what i read so far.. many are people who woke up before they got old but even these are resentful over their life being derailed with wasted time pursuing spiritual goals and having to start over at a later age getting an education/job.. i imagine born-in young jws would be most susceptible to this.. in today’s world, a ‘career’ is something that earns you a living.. as many of the responses there will say: anybody who pursues ‘spiritual goals’ only will end up with wasted time in the end with no money and no retirement plan… i couldn’t agree more.. it would be a shame if this happens to yet more jws..

fulano

LonghairGal.

” From what I read so far.. many are people who woke up before they got old but even these are resentful over their life being derailed with wasted time pursuing spiritual goals and having to start over at a later age getting an education/job.”

Absolutely! I hate my time spent in service. I am approaching 66 now and due to 9 years and something missionary-service I have a gap of 18% in my Dutch state pension. Luckily I moved to Belgium in 2004 and institutions are helping me trying to fix it.

At the end you can only blame yourself.

40

The Governing Body is Restructuring the Org.and encouranging young ones to REACH OUT!

by liam in

the governing body just doesn't let up on encouraging the young children to reach out to do free labor for the organization.

so another generation of young people with ruined lives.

another generation of young people that will get old and wake up in their 50s to realize they were in a religious doomsday cult.. and they are getting rid of some old workers that ran the branches of the organization, and giving them different assignments or maybe they are just sending them home, who knows.

fulano

“ The special pioneer thing is just a stipend much like CO but less. A local congregation is supposed to pay for your housing and most other costs, the stipend was about $100/month back in the day for special pioneer, $300 for retired COs and maybe $500-1000 for COs ”

In my days as a SP in the Netherlands in the late eighties, we had about $ 600 a month. We had to pay our own rent, lights, water and food. So I had to work on top of the 140 hours requirement. The allowance for the CO was the same as for Bethelites. When we went in missionary-service I felt really poor. We needed a car but we had no money and nobody to help, so we had to use third world public transportation, …four on the back in an old Corolla. Allowance was next to nothing.

28

Hotel Bossert, a storied hotel on Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights, was sold

by Balaamsass2 in

memories..... a 1970s-1980s meetup location to grab a ride to local trips on the subway...or a bite on montague st.. brooklyn heights hotel to be turned into homes.

the hotel bossert, a storied hotel on montague street in brooklyn heights, was sold to someraroad, a new york city and nashville-based real estate investment and development firm.. bk reader staffmay 31, 2025 10:00 amjun 2, 2025 9:20 am.

photo: supplied/jim.henderson via wikimedia commonslisten to this article00:01:23. .

fulano

I lived there for half a year when we came from our missionary assignment. On the second floor. What drove me mad were the garbage trucks driving around all night long. The liquor store next door has made a lot of money. Every time I entered I found G Lösch, buying his schnapps.

22

Self control fruits of the spirit. Fat GB seem to lack it

by JohnR1975 in

fruits of the spirit would surely be required to be gb members?

yet some of them seem to lack self control when it comes to eating.

br herd, mark sanderson and br jackson in these are all very obese.. if they travel to poor places wearing their rolex watches and gold pinky rings the brothers there will surely wonder why they are so fat.. there are many scriptures talking about not being greedy and not gluttonous for food.. if they were really chosen by god as his channel on earth then why can’t they show the fruits of the spirit and show self control when it comes to being gluttonous?.

fulano

A sedentary life, three times a day all you can eat, what can you expect?Wrong kind of food for elderly people, fat a lot of starch.

22

Even after many years out, why can't you stop thinking about them.

by liam in

there is a lot of exjws who have been out 10-20-30-50 years, but for some reason, when they see a group of jehovah's witnesses, sitting by their carts, drinking coffee, scrolling through phones, laughing, something inside happens.

most can't explain it.

some say it makes their blood boil.

fulano

I hate the cult so much I can’t even talk to them friendly. The other day they visited our house and my daughter, who I brought up with manners was too polite to close the conversation. The minute I noticed that they were JW I went to the front door and told them to get off my property. My daughter was surprised by my reaction.

i really hate my dead grandfather who brought the misery in our family starting “studying” with the JW in 1931. My mother was born in the cult and is now 90 years old. All in vane.

22

Self control fruits of the spirit. Fat GB seem to lack it

by JohnR1975 in

fruits of the spirit would surely be required to be gb members?

yet some of them seem to lack self control when it comes to eating.

br herd, mark sanderson and br jackson in these are all very obese.. if they travel to poor places wearing their rolex watches and gold pinky rings the brothers there will surely wonder why they are so fat.. there are many scriptures talking about not being greedy and not gluttonous for food.. if they were really chosen by god as his channel on earth then why can’t they show the fruits of the spirit and show self control when it comes to being gluttonous?.

fulano

“

Rattigan3508 hours ago

Seabreeze - The Governing body members are not the leaders of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Jesus is the leader. The GB are just overseers of the worldwide congregation.

Why do people focus on these men so much?”

Because they are the ones that ruined, and ruin, people’s life. Not JC.

26

Green Handshakes - Taxable income in Australia

by Listener in

i was doing some research on the taxable status of money being gifted to co’s and travelling missionaries and was surprised with what i found.

i had assumed that it was not taxable income in australia.. it is taxable income in australia and it‘s likely that the same rules apply in some other countries.. a registered religious institution only receives tax free status on donations because they have been endorsed by the australian tax office.

travelling overseas and missionaries are not in this category.. there’s a tax ruling that goes into great detail.

fulano

@Notformer

”Would it be $100 here and there per congregation, or would it be multiple envelopes stuffed with cash?”

it all depends on when and where. In our assignment in a third world country you would get nothing at all, besides from some family abroad.

When back to an international assembly in your home country paid by the society the folks would invite you to their congregations to tell experiences. Sometimes we would leave the meeting with 200 US in the pocket.

Then we were invited to work at Brooklyn on a temporary basis. Some brothers wanted us at their meetings for talks or experiences. I felt ashamed when at a congregation with mostly African American brothers and sisters, the most kind, warm and friendly I had ever met, I went home stuffed with dollars.

26

Green Handshakes - Taxable income in Australia

by Listener in

i was doing some research on the taxable status of money being gifted to co’s and travelling missionaries and was surprised with what i found.

i had assumed that it was not taxable income in australia.. it is taxable income in australia and it‘s likely that the same rules apply in some other countries.. a registered religious institution only receives tax free status on donations because they have been endorsed by the australian tax office.

travelling overseas and missionaries are not in this category.. there’s a tax ruling that goes into great detail.

fulano

“ But the consensus in this thread seems to be that all these "gifts" end up being under the table, "black economy"”

I think you are right. In all my years in full-time service I never met a missionary, CO or bethelite that even would think of declaring gifts.

26

Green Handshakes - Taxable income in Australia

by Listener in

i was doing some research on the taxable status of money being gifted to co’s and travelling missionaries and was surprised with what i found.

i had assumed that it was not taxable income in australia.. it is taxable income in australia and it‘s likely that the same rules apply in some other countries.. a registered religious institution only receives tax free status on donations because they have been endorsed by the australian tax office.

travelling overseas and missionaries are not in this category.. there’s a tax ruling that goes into great detail.

fulano

Once you become a missionary you are supposed to officially leave your homeland. We did so in 1991 and when receiving money from brothers, which was seldom, sometimes from visitors to our missionary-home, or when back at your home-country for holidays, you didn’t even think of declaring it.

Third-world countries don’t tax people on this.

16

The Curious Case of Cameroon in Africa in the World Report

by LaFrancia in

we know that in africa warwick/watchtower is adopting a policy of more congregations with fewer publishers in each congregation.

this explains the growth of congregations in the 2024 world report.. cameroon world report 2019 vs. 2024.. with the same number of publishers the congregations grew by about 13%.. will there be many more curious cases out there?.

fulano

@Careful.

Almost every Cameroon citizen speaks French, or English. So I don’t think the other languages have much to do with it.

” French and English are the official languages of Cameroon. Eight out of the ten regions of the nation, housing 83% of the population of Cameroon, are francophones. The remaining two regions, representing 17% of Cameroon’s population are mainly anglophones. However, the proportion of anglophones in the country is gradually decreasing.”

https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-languages-are-spoken-in-cameroon.html