Mazza

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Posts by Mazza

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  20

  I Want My Money Back!

  by Beck_Melbourne in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  do you remember the donation box on a stand at the back of the kingdom hall, or sitting on the coffee table in the centre of the room at the book study?

  since i was a little kid i remember my grandmother giving me a few coins to put in the box for the world wide preaching work fund...and then as i grew older...i was given a note or two...this time for a neighbouring kingdom hall fund.

  as time went by...an adult in my own right...i would discreetly put in a few notes for the kingdom hall utilities or to help with the costs of hiring a stadium for the district conventions etc...and sometimes for kingdom hall quick build projects.. i feel so ripped off when i reflect on the amount of money the wt has inherited from deceased estates...and the amount of money and real estate they have hoarded over the years.

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  Mazza

  Hi Beck, Is there any way you can let your G'ma know how well off the WTS is? Most people are pretty careful with their money and want it to go to a worthy cause that needs funds. If she knows how well off they are then maybe she will change her will.

  I think you have to get to her before she goes, coz I don't think you would have much success contesting it.

  Btw I'm in HK. I will get back on teh 23rd - so if you send an email to my Aussie address I will know what to do and where to go for the apostofest. K?

  Or you can use my hotmail address. [email protected] :-)))

  Marilyn
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  28

  I feel so guilty

  by Leander in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  these past few weeks i've spent a lot of time trying to decide how i want to proceed with the rest of my life.

  one of my first decisions to carry out is to break free from the wts.

  even though i've been a life long witness i feel no guilt or hesistation in leaving the only religion i've ever known.

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  Mazza

  They say you shouldn't make too many changes at once. I guess part of your problem is if you leave the troof only, then you have your wife's family to look disapprovingly upon you during those regular family gatherings. Not a small problem IMO. You certainly won't be bored for the first few weeks of dropping the bomb shell. You will have a lot of adrenalin flowing, dealing with questions and irrational reactions. What might surprise you is your wife's reaction. When I told my husband I had doubts, he came back at me with a whole bunch of his own. We left the dubs together and then we went to live overseas and have had a great life. He went on to get a Ph.D and fulfilled his dreams to be an educator and we raised our kids in the real world - which turned out to be uneventful - no bad probs etc. We are just about to celebrate 30 yrs married and the last 20 - since we left the dubs, have been way, way, way better than the first 10 (dubs). Why not see what your wife really thinks? She might be just as anxious as you to 'get a life'.

  Marilyn
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  48

  PRESS RELEASE

  by silentlambs in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  please distribute freely to press.. silentlambs.

  tuesday, may 7. .

  jehovah's witnesses begin excommunicating child sexual abuse whistleblowers .

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  Mazza

  ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;Last week we had a post on this board about someone who was DF'd because someone forged a critical letter (in her name) to the Canadian Watchtower branch. She was dismissed, not on the basis of two or three witnesses, but one piece of paper!

  KOOL!!!!!!!!! If we all wrote well thought out letters to the Society, with just the right amount of knowledge, assertiveness and a vague hint of disrespect, and sign it (forge it) with the names of one of our favorite loved ones still inside, we could help them fast track it back to reality. Once they disfed a whole bunch of innocent (as opposed to innocent) people, they would have to be a little more careful about how quickly they disfed. Can't be all bad!
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  48

  PRESS RELEASE

  by silentlambs in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  please distribute freely to press.. silentlambs.

  tuesday, may 7. .

  jehovah's witnesses begin excommunicating child sexual abuse whistleblowers .

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  Mazza

  Wow! Shouldn't the media be invited to follow these victims to their respective JC meetings? Of course there would be an very ugly scene where the elders turned the media away - but it would make them look bad in the eyes of the world - which I know they try to avoid at all cost. With most other churches admitting their problem, it would be great to show how JWs handle it. Kill the messanger and ignore the message. :-( Hope all you guys involved know how to play this situation to your advantage.

  Marilyn
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  25

  Who Told The First Lie: God or the Devil?

  by Dutchie in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  gen 2:17 - god says: eat from the tree of knowledge of good and bad and you will absolutely die!.

  gen 3:5 - satan says: god knows that in the very day of your eating from it your eyes are bound to be opened and you are bound to be like god knowing good and bad.. .

  so what happen?.

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  Mazza

  Dutchie, Adam didn't have experience or knowledge of how long a "day" was????????? He sure as hell didn't know what dying was either!!! Have you ever seen the Simpsons when Homer is talking to the dog? They superimpose what the dog hears. e.g. Don't tear up the furniture translates to bla bla bla bla bla bla bla bla. Seems to me that Adam's inexperience is important here. Don't eat of that fruit (can't remember the exact quote) translates to bla bla bla bla bla bla bla ...... the whole thing is absurd if taken on face value.

  Marilyn
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  3

  The Apostle AK's letter to the society...

  by TheApostleAK in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.

  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.

  xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.

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  Mazza

  Is there any sane reason for saying that this Greek word appears (“naos”) yet when you look up the Scripture’s in the
  Interlinear another Greek word appears and that is “hieron”? I desperately need an answer on this matter as I am currently
  doing a Greek language course.

  .......................................................................................................................................................................................

  Hi AK, Drop the attitude. e.g." Is there any sane reason for saying........." drop "sane". Also I would greatly appreciate an answer instead of I desperately need an answer.

  IMHO, I think it would be prudent to leave out the question about disfellowshipped persons accessing literature. Save it for a phone call to Bethel or write a seperate letter. I wouldn't mix up such interesting questions with a question about disfellowshipping arrangements. They won't be able to take you seriously. All they will see in your letter is APOSTASY APOSTASY APOSTASY. As you well know, or should know, they don't feel any obligation to answer questions from apostastes. Even asking questions is apostate. So keep your most excellent letter focused on the Biblical quesitons. Write dispassionately and with respect. Yeah - play their game. Even then, you may not get an answer, but you have far more chance of them reviewing your letter is you slurp up a bit and drop the attitude. Remember, words are cheap.

  good read though
  Marilyn
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  6

  Normal

  by forgetmenot in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  today we had a kind of family and friends get together.

  we went to the hog trough (i.e.

  im normal (as normal as a kid who grew up as a jw can ever be).

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  Mazza

  terafera you said:

  After going through kindergarten and seeing my 5 year old (at the time) not really know why he couldnt search for candy eggs in his class, I knew I had to rethink things.

  I am hoping to give him a wonderful childhood... hopefully with some wonderful memories.

  Yes we really did decide enough was enough because we suddenly grew up when we had kids on board. Of course raising kid is difficult full stop. Raising them as dubs is that much harder. I guess it would be alright if they really were going to live on a paradise earth for ever and ever, but given that that's highly unlikely (impossible) - we are forced to do the best for our kids in the real world.

  Allo the best with your plans.

  Marilyn
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  89

  What does everyone here DO anyway?

  by In_between_days in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  hi everyone,.

  i am a new poster who is putting off their own personal story of finding this site for a while..... i find alot of people here utterly fascinating, and would like to know..... exactly what is everyones professional field of work?.

  i would like to be a full time poster on this forum, but alas, the $$$$ are quite light in that field of work.. apologies if this has been asked before.. just curious.

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  Mazza

  My identity is defined by my husband who is also an exjw. He's an academic and works in HOng Kong. I fly back and forth to visit him every few weeks. The rest of the time I live in Australia and keep a vague eye on my two adult kids who refuse to leave the nest - or should I unlock the front door and allow them to fly free. Naaaaaaaaaa.....

  Marilyn
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  2

  Truth -- a Great Divider

  by teejay in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  all ex-jws everywhere share some similar traits, regardless of the immense diversity of cultures, races, nationalities, and social levels that exist among us.

  although at one point we called it and believed it to be the truthtm, the inescapable reality is that weve learned that virtually every single one of the teachings unique to the religion of the jehovah's witnesses is categorically untrue, mostly untrue, or at the very least not fully supportable by known facts.

  because of this, we eventually realize that these truths are unworthy of our confidence and so weve discarded them.

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  Mazza

  Next time, I will expound on the somewhat vague and amorphous concept of truth itself – its tendency to alter its appearance
  relative to where we are as individuals in the cosmic stream.

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  In the real world we don't have the luxury of debating what is truth - someone does a con job on you, your money is gone, no matter which way you wanna look at it. Or if you get lung cancer after smoking for 50 yrs, there's a good chance it was smoking that did it. It's only in the airy fairy subjects that we can sit around and contemplate what is truth. Let's see, are 5mil JWs gonna live on a paradise earth for ever? Mmmm. Are you gonna tell me that as long as they believe it then it's truth to them. How many of them would have joined up if they thought it was a self imposed snow job.

  Marilyn
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  6

  Normal

  by forgetmenot in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  today we had a kind of family and friends get together.

  we went to the hog trough (i.e.

  im normal (as normal as a kid who grew up as a jw can ever be).

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  Mazza

  I think it's interesting that your relative wants normalcy for her child. I think it's very significant. I don't know how spiritual this woman is, but to even say such a thing suggests to me, that she is thinking "outside the circle" in this instance. It would be a mine field to press her on this - but as you know - a regular person would be open to discuss what they ment by their comment, what their REAL hopes and desires are for their children and whether they are 100% comfortable with what is being provided so far.

  It's difficult though because dubs retreat into the rhetoric and what they should say and all the rest of it. I still think that her comment was a loaded statement. We left the Org when our kids were little - the prime motivator was to give them a normal life. At the time, we argued that it's all very well to play games with our lives, but now we had responsibilities to two new lives - we felt it was time to abandon the nonesense. So strong was our instinct to look after our young in a mature way, we gave up our ten yr JW habit.

  Marilyn