Posts by Miles3

9

What do you think?

by rip van winkle in

jw
friends

have we denied jesus by our non-participation of the bread and wine at the memorial?.

Miles3

What I think we have denied all those years is the cheese.

You slave in commiseration and self pity,

Peace off,

Miles

26

A Real and Authentic Letter from a Jehovah's Witness Mother to Her Son

by God_Delusion in

i found this letter on dave reekie's blog and asked him if i could write a piece about it.

i am glad that he accepted.. it's so rare to find a real, authentic handwritten letter from a jehovah's witness parent to their disfellowshipped child, so we hope you can read it and show it to any apologists that claim the watchtower society doesn't condone shunning.. you can read the article here.. .

warm regards,.

Miles3

Sorry Sulla, TTATT="The Truth About The Truth(TM)" aka The Truth About The Lie.

26

A Real and Authentic Letter from a Jehovah's Witness Mother to Her Son

by God_Delusion in

i found this letter on dave reekie's blog and asked him if i could write a piece about it.

i am glad that he accepted.. it's so rare to find a real, authentic handwritten letter from a jehovah's witness parent to their disfellowshipped child, so we hope you can read it and show it to any apologists that claim the watchtower society doesn't condone shunning.. you can read the article here.. .

warm regards,.

Miles3

I know that at the time I was in, I would have accepted blood if I had been presented the evidence about the flip-flops for vaccinations and organ transplants, and even more if the WT had explained clearly the accepted fractions (which is, once the situation is clearly presented to you, so ludicrous there's no way the WT will ever make it clear - people would leave in droves). Some on the forums have said that it's what has woken them up, so I don't think you can affirm that the choice we would have made _before_ having had full information was our informed choice. And as a JW raised and indoctrinated from childhood, I don't agree I had a choice to accept it.

It's the same for disfelowshipping. When people realise TTATT, they stop shunning the ones they shunned before.

And witnesses, like all cult members, are _fed_ misleading information. Information control is the prefered method for manipulators, because it does work. Remove the blinders, and people take radically different decisions.

If you're not convinced by books about cults like Steve Hassan's, videos from ex-cult members are also really instructive. While inside, the behavior and the hazards are the same as those someone with a manipulative spouse. I used to read a lot about manipulative personnalities at work or in the family while in the Borg, and once I realised TTATT, the similarities in the manipulated one's behaviors are striking.

People that study with the witnesses are subjected to manipulation too. Nothing is ever presented clearly to them, and bait-and-switch is a manipulation method.

26

A Real and Authentic Letter from a Jehovah's Witness Mother to Her Son

by God_Delusion in

i found this letter on dave reekie's blog and asked him if i could write a piece about it.

i am glad that he accepted.. it's so rare to find a real, authentic handwritten letter from a jehovah's witness parent to their disfellowshipped child, so we hope you can read it and show it to any apologists that claim the watchtower society doesn't condone shunning.. you can read the article here.. .

warm regards,.

Miles3

You don't have informed choice when people don't have all information in hands, or, as is the case here, where they've been deliberately fed misleading information.

People tend to overlook the power of manipulators. To think that the manipulated person is making anything close to a choice doesn't reflect what I've read in other manipulation cases (ex apocalyptic cult members, for example the ones that escaped collective "suicide" due to a fluke).

Edit: functionning member of society? A JW, really? I was one, and wasn't, nor was anybody I knew. Nobody contributed anything meaningful to society, worse some people with highly qualified jobs dropped out and did menial jobs sprinkled with social security benefits.

37

JWTALK.NET: 'Apostates are having a field day with this child abuse case'.

by Joliette in

boo!.

some of the utterly ridiculous comments that i've read on jwtalk.net:.

'i pray fevently jehovah will sanctify his name.

Miles3

snare, belief in evolution is not a df offense (according to the WT, evolution happened after the flood, going from a fiew dozen species to thousands). You don't even have to believe in God, as long as you believe the GB is the sole channel of God on Earth (good luck making sense of that one).

7

What do you think that a Christian will occasionally buy a scratch ticket?

by wolfman85 in

...because i have done that a couple times and won $38!!!

.

Miles3

I won a scratch ticket with my first 5$ try, so I've kept at it all those years. Why stop when I'm on a winning streak?

23

Proof that humankind existed at least 28,000 years ago

by The Oracle in

i wonder how jws will react to this recent evidence that intelligent man existed at least 22,000 years before adam and eve arrived on the scene?.

it looks like membership will continue to decline as far as intelligent jws are concerned.

i'm sure there will be plenty of society's bottom feeders who will continue to find their way on to the jw publisher lists.

Miles3

While we appreciate the advances science has provided us, we are also aware that science often makes mistakes. The atomic bomb, the machine gun, the atomic bomb, the machine gun are all examples of what can happen when man trust science.

The evolutionist and datation expert Mitt Romney recently said: "Science has many problems and should not be taken for face value. Plus, tonight was cooler than yesterday's afternoon. I will implement a long-term solution with Senate to address this issue".

Evidently, if even experts in their field reject their own results, are we not to listen to this wise Bible counsel: "The faithfull drone watches his steps, because the bull will leave its dejections at his doorstep".

Logically, what would we trust more, the perfect and unfailible saying of God, or the failible saying of men that reject Jehovah and his glorious Governing Body? True Christians(TM) know that in the new world soon to come about, they will recieve answers far more fulfilling than the flickering "knowledge" available today.

63

What Some Loyal JW's Are Saying About The Oakland Case.

by Bangalore in

jw
friends

form the pro-jw site jwtalk.

this is such a ronald mcdonald court case.

i can't believe what i am reading.. lie: "the lawsuit alleged that watchtower had a policy that instructed elders in its jehovah's witnesses congregations to keep reports of child sex abusers within the religious group secret to avoid lawsuits.".

Miles3

Bobjohnrob, i do think even minor child sexual abuse offenders should not be able to enter an association or an organisation that cares for children, nor should they be allowed to work with or near children.

I think that's part of the issue here, though I haven't read all the court documents. But that issue was also raised in previous pedophile cases involving the Watchctower. The fact that pedophiles (minor or not) are required by policy to engage in door-to-door ministry is an issue, and should certainly not be allowed unless he was supervised at all times by an elder. Also, since preaching is organised by the congregation and by the Society, and local elders are the one overseeing it (that's how the Organised book shows it), both have a responsibility in ensuring children engaging in that organised activity do not get into contact with pedophiles. Think about it like a church organised activity, whether Sunday school, or some church-organised sport or game.

The fact is, the way preaching is organised, there is no way to prevent a pedophile access to children unless you warn each and every member about it. While elders are overseeing it, they are far from attending all service groups - yet the Legal Department forbids them to even give instructions to the ministerial servant or group conductor about not sending the pedophile with kids, or in a group with kids. Worse, in the past elders that were part of a pedophile's JC have sent the pedophile with a single mom and her kids (if you know how it goes, there's always the single sister with kids nobody wants to preach with, and the akward pedophile is the default choice...), or with a kid alone. The congregation and the Society bear responsability, because the Society consider warning the pedophile about paying attention with kids suffisant. It is not, and it's for that policy, which is still in effect, that the Watchtower is being fined with punitive damages. There can be no real protection for kids until the Society repels that policy, and the jury seems to have understood that. I do not believe Conti's advocate has misrepresented the Society's policy, because it really reflects the reality of the situation. Not just the reality in the 90s - sadly, the problem remains the same in 2012, and you know that each years in the US alone it's at least dozens of kids being raped that could have been avoided. Changing that will protect more kids thant attacking one pedophile.

I also do believe that on a human level the elders not warning the parents, even if some like you would consider his previous act a minor offense (it's never minor when it involves kids), it horrendous and inhumane. The Society's policy, by forbiding the elders to do so, is even more at fault.

As for the pedophile, and as much as we'd all like hime behind bars, at least the congregation is now aware not to let any kids near him, and his sex offender status is a matter of public record. If he is convicted in a criminal court, that would be good news, but he could be convicted and still get out of it with few consequences (a few years in prison at most). i don't think I'm qualified to judge if the government is too lenient - I believe it is, but on the other hand psychiatrists have a different opinion, and they know those cases better. In a perfect world, we'd be able to cut all those people from children access, contributing to society, while not filling the already overcrowded US prison system.

25

Reduction of Announcements

by wisdomfrombelow in

starting the week of september 3rd they will cease having local announcement as part of the service meeting.

is there going to be a much reduction of the letters sent to the congregation?

will everyone be expected to read the bulletin board to know what is going on?

Miles3

They eliminated announcements as a part of the Service Meeting (...) due to the decreasing number of Ministerial Servants. - Billy

Billy, I suspect you're spot on. Having done the planning back in the day, it gets a pain when you're not supposed to give more than 1 assignments per meeting to each brother. People in big congregations didn't have this problem, but if you have been serving in a congregation where there where few appointed brothers (or in a congregation where the COBE has pet peeves against most MS and prevent them even from giving announcments "till they improve their teaching abilities"), the task gets impossible.

They're preparing for the day when, even in 100+ publisher congregations, each of the appointed brothers has to do a part in each meeting (so 2 parts a week, 8 part a month), and two parts when someone is on holiday or sick.

I don't know if Elderelite is already starting to feel it in his congregation, but it would be great when elders still in inform us it's become the case. It's only going to get worse and worse, and I know we had this problem years ago (though a smaller congregation with an abusive COBE).

BTW, even when I was in, since I was a kid the only interesting part of the Tuesday meeting was the announcements. No one in any of the congs I've been in ever listen to the School, even the school servant, and the talks in the Service meetings are designe to make you sick, especially the ones based on a random old Watchtower article where the speaker makes no effort to hide he's just reading the article (for the first time to boot...).

Did people here ever listen or like a part of the Tuesday meeting (except for the mandatory raise your hand part for those that wanted to get appointed)?

4

Perfection........

by criticalwitness in

what exactly is perfection?

for instance jesus had to learn things like being a carpenter learning how to read with learning comes mistakes.

if put him on a golf coarse he would not auttomatically sink a hole in one everytime.

Miles3

Perfection is a concept created by people that can't stand life and reality, and need to believe the problem is not in their depressed mind, but in a humanity that has "sinned", "fallen from grace" and need to be "saved". Don't judge them, at the time, they didn't have antidepressants nor LSD, and booze was scarce. You make do with what you have at hand, and trust me, crazy isn't a bad option when you're out of wine and can't remember that fancy trick with the water.

It's a certainty, people's little voice in the head is going to make everything better someday, promise! Except for animals that will keep dying, because they don't deserve it, after all we humans are so much supperiors, even though we share 98,8% of our DNA with chimpanzees. They get to keep dying though they can have sex everyday with whoever they want, male or female; we get to live forever with the arrogant pricks our species keeps producing at a steady rate, you tell me who's got the better deal.

Imagine it, being stuck in an endless forum thread of people congratulating themselves they all have a little voice that speak to them.

Guess it's time to go back to the zoo after all. But feel free to chose perfection, at least you get to spend your entire life feeling like a failure!