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ó Why do Jehovah’s witnesses so strongly condemn other religions? Do they not believe that there are good people in all faiths?
What Jehovah’s Christian witnesses say about the religions of this world is not for the purpose of condemning people. They are making known what God himself has set forth in his Word. Their exposure of religious error, hypocrisy and bloodguilt serves to help honesthearted people to forsake the world empire of false religion, “Babylon the Great,” and to escape God’s adverse judgment. This exposure is in harmony with the Bible command: “Get out of her, my people, if you do not want to share with her in her sins, and if you do not want to receive part of her plagues. For her sins have massed together clear up to heaven, and God has called her acts of injustice to mind.”—Rev. 18:4, 5.
Hence, in pointing out the failures and sins of false religions, Jehovah’s Christian witnesses are working for the eternal interests of sincere people. Jehovah’s witnesses are also imitating Jesus Christ. Note the strong words that he directed against Jewish religious leaders because of their wrong practices and false teachings: “You have made the word of God invalid because of your tradition. You hypocrites, Isaiah aptly prophesied about you, when he said, ‘This people honors me with their lips, yet their heart is far removed from me.’” (Matt. 15:6-8) “Look out for the scribes who desire to walk around in robes and like greetings in the marketplaces and front seats in the synagogues and most prominent places at evening meals, and who devour the houses of the widows and for a pretext make long prayers.” (Luke 20:46, 47) “They bind up heavy loads and put them upon the shoulders of men, but they themselves are not willing to budge them with their finger.” (Matt. 23:4) “Outwardly indeed [you scribes and Pharisees], appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.”—Matt. 23:28.
Like their Exemplar Jesus Christ, Jehovah’s witnesses call attention to unscriptural religious traditions and teachings, hypocritical actions and religious exploitation and oppression. At the same time, deep love for their fellowmen moves them to point all to the way of salvation, a way that includes cutting off association with “Babylon the Great” so as not to share with her in her sins and her disastrous end.
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in darkness mentally include many religious leaders of Christendom who support such worldly standards. Rather than encouraging people to practice truth, they acquiesce in the pressures of the nations and the people in high station who condone wrong conduct. To support this statement, consider what a Protestant chaplain of a college in the United States said about adultery: ‘A full life can best be achieved when a man—and his wife, too—are free to engage in extramarital affairs [adultery], not secretly, but with each other’s knowledge and consent.’ Said a San Francisco clergyman in a weekly Episcopal Church magazine: “There is no sex act which in itself is sinful. . . . I also believe that two people of the same sex can express love and deepen that love by sexual intercourse [homosexuality].
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12 The apostle Paul well described this type of individual in his letter to the Romans who lived under similar conditions nineteen hundred years ago. He said: “Therefore God, in keeping with the desires of their hearts, gave them up to uncleanness, that their bodies might be dishonored among them, even those who exchanged the truth of God for the lie and venerated and rendered sacred service to the creation rather than the One who created, who is blessed forever. . . . That is why God gave them up to disgraceful sexual appetites, for both their females changed the natural use of themselves into one contrary to nature; and likewise even the males left the natural use of the female and became violently inflamed in their lust toward one another, males with males, working what is obscene and receiving in themselves the full recompense, which was due for their error.”—Rom. 1:24-27.
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15 These types of people—and this earth is filled with such because of the influence of the ‘authority of the darkness’—are not “practicing the truth,” as spoken of by the apostle John, but are ‘practicing things deserving of death.’ The problem facing those who want to walk in the light, to be in union with the Source of light and his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, in short, to practice the truth, is how to keep the proper mental balance in the midst of this darkness surrounding them and not be enticed away from the pathway of light. What, then, is required of one to keep the proper mental balance, so as not to be so enticed
*** w83 6/15 15 Jehovah's Standards Help Us ***
God’s standards help Jehovah’s Witnesses in ever so many other ways. In marriage they encourage love, respect and unity at a time when moral laxity and calls for liberation are leading to high divorce rates. Jehovah’s standards help Christian children to accept parental direction, not being quick to rebel as is the case with many of their schoolmates. Rather than showing resentment for parental authority and leaving home early, youths who appreciate God’s standards are pleased to benefit from the Bible-based counsel and help that Christian parents can provide.—Colossians 3:18-21.