Excellant thread, and observations Gary.
In Matthew 7:1-5, Jesus admonishes his followers not to judge others, yet that's exactly what JWs do when they don't allow individuals or groups to come to another reasonable conclusion that differs from the WT's doctrines. It's always their way or the highway, and I hate to say it, but they're actually in harmony with Paul's thoughts at 2 Tim 3:3 where he says that in the last days people will "have no natural affection, and not open to any agreement." To break up a family, to shun a family member because they no longer agree with the WT falls in line with Paul's words on a lack of natural love and affection, and being so unreasonable that no agreement can ever be made. When Carl Jonsson and Ray Franz came to diffferent conclusions, rather than the WT say, "we'll just have to agree to disagree", they had to slander and destroy their characters, and they've been doing that same devious crap to families and individuals for years now. If the latest WT articles that have generated several threads on here recently are any indication, they're going to maintain that hardline stance. To hell with your loved ones.
I'll never understand it as I've never been the type of guy that hates someone else because they don't agree with me. I'm not going to lose sleep because you disagree with me over something doctrinal. We can agree to disagree, but the WT just can't have that for some reason. It really speaks volumes to their control freak nature, and lack of self esteem. When I look at the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses, I see several men who probably got beat up as kids, and have had a chip on theiir shoulder ever since. Kind of like people who become police officers for all the wrong reasons. When I saw and heard David Mercante for the first time, I couldn't help but think he was a closet homosexual with tremendous self esteem issues. Believe me, that guy and people like him is why the WT will NEVER change. They're about themselves, and their way of living, and will not tolerate anything that could potentially jeopardize it. To hell with your families, friends, or your way of making a living. If it affects the WT heavyweight's health insurance, their ability to be treated like gods at the branches and assemblies, their ability to travel around the country and the world,.....if it affects anything that can threaten any of that, it must be eradicated with prejudice. They could care less about unity, they're only concerned with outward uniformity at the expense of individual's lives, and families.
Another thing that bugs me is, Mark 9:40, Jesus tells his disciples that, "he who is not against us, is for us." The WT loves talking about how everyone hates JWs because they're no part of the world, and I hated seeing the incidents in Bulgaria, Georgia, and Russia because it reinforces that persecution complex. The average person doesn't care about JWs. JWs aren't even on the radar, until we show up uninvited on a Saturday morning and disturb someones peaceful morning. Yet let the WT tell it, its because the world hates us, which couldn't be farther from the truth. The truth being the world doesn't give a hoot about us. That being said, why the WT wastes so much paper badmouthing every other religion and differing opinion is beyond me. The average Christian or other faith is not against JWs, so in harmony with Mark 9:40, the WT needs to stop worrying about everybody else.
Have you ever notice that the literature doesn't really spend as much time on encouragement as they spend reiterating the necessity of the peculiar repetitious formalities that we as JWs perform? Every magazine, every book, is about badmouthing everybody else, field service and meetings. It's rarely encouraging, but quite often scornful towards nonJWs, and demanding of active JWs. This is a religion that demands and encites hatred, not a religion that encourages. If you're looking for encouragement, well you go find the nice little Unitarian church down the street. If you're looking for rigidity, repetition, and a complex, become a Jehovah's Witnesses.
