revelation 7:9nwt - after these things i saw, and, look!
a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of allnations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.. every year, as an adolescent witness, i would eagerly await the arrival of the annual "watchtower world report" issue to come out.
it had always bugged me that we were not in all the lands even though purporting to be the one and only "great crowd" decribed in the verse above.
"The discomfort felt by the poster and parents when statistics published by the wt itself contradicted belief in the effectiveness of the preaching work is a classic CD symptom."
The discomfort felt by the poster is a classic example of ignorance with regards the actual purpose of the preaching work. And that just goes along with what Teary mentioned about CD not needing to be grounded in any actual logic or facts.
revelation 7:9nwt - after these things i saw, and, look!
a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of allnations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.. every year, as an adolescent witness, i would eagerly await the arrival of the annual "watchtower world report" issue to come out.
it had always bugged me that we were not in all the lands even though purporting to be the one and only "great crowd" decribed in the verse above.
What an individual considers "impossible" is again, rather relative.
An atheist would consider all spiritual or religious belief to be logic defying and 'kooky,' while a theist would consider an atheist's complete reject of God to be logic defying.
As a famous television show once said: "One's perception of truth depends heavily on the narrow perspective from which they choose to view it."
revelation 7:9nwt - after these things i saw, and, look!
a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of allnations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.. every year, as an adolescent witness, i would eagerly await the arrival of the annual "watchtower world report" issue to come out.
it had always bugged me that we were not in all the lands even though purporting to be the one and only "great crowd" decribed in the verse above.
"There are various methods of doing this, but all involve not facing up to facts and reality."
You are still confused on the concept it seems. CD doesn't necessarily have to have anything to do with facts or reality. The only real qualifier is "conflicting."
Interestingly enough, both of the conflicting ideas could be completely irrational (or two different people with opposite views could have CD involving the ideas of the other person) -- it is more a matter of what the INDIVIDUAL feels is right than it is of what is logically true and factual in the real world.
revelation 7:9nwt - after these things i saw, and, look!
a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of allnations and tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.. every year, as an adolescent witness, i would eagerly await the arrival of the annual "watchtower world report" issue to come out.
it had always bugged me that we were not in all the lands even though purporting to be the one and only "great crowd" decribed in the verse above.
The curious thing about 'cognitive dissonace' (if it even exists, which Teary still debates with himself about), is that you can't really KNOW that you have it while you have it -- you can only know you had it or didn't have it in retrospect. It is like some quantum particles: once you realize that you have it you don't really have it anymore (or maybe it is like, if you know that you are crazy then you aren't really crazy). A Witness reading this thread might have CD about his current beleifs, but the OP of this thread might also have CD about his current set of beliefs and not even realize it.
The other thing to think about, is just how wide spread and common the phenomenon is. Is a rare thing that only effects this one tiny group of individuals that call themselves "Witnesses," or can it crop up in all kinds of places that we wouldn't normally associate CD with? What about normal churches, like Baptists or Lutherans? Are they somehow immune? What about atheists? Buddhists? Ex-Witnesses? If CD is merely discomfort because of "holding conflicting ideas simultaneously" caused by subconcious doubts about ones current set of ideas, then you would think that the theory could apply to just about all of humanity in every type of group and social construct.
Because remember also, CD says nothing about the truth or falsity of one's ideas -- it is more a feeling, or a value judgment, than it is a factual thing. A Protestant might experience CD because he subconciously feels his current set of beliefs are wrong and that Muslims beliefs are more logical, while a Muslim might experience CD because he subconciously feels that his current set of beliefs are wrong and that Protestant beliefs are more logical. So anybody anywhere could have CD so long as any doubt at all exists in their mind, regardless of whether those doubts are justified or not.
so in my continuing quest to find a church which accepts me and provides me some spiritual encouragement every sunday, i decided to drop the baptists and search elsewhere.
i went on the internet and searched for gay friendly churches.
we found a methodist church in nottingham and we decided to go today.. when we entered, everyone was so welcoming.
If you are going to ignore the Bible completely, then why even both with Christian churches? You could just try Budhism, or Wicca maybe?
in the continuing court battle in australia, the legal counsel for the witchtower babble and trash religion shocked witless onlookers by saying the there is.
"no christian congregation of jehovah's witnesses in the state of victoria," or indeed the whole of australia.. hahahhahahahaha!.
at least they are not perjuring themselves as any fool can see that their congregations are not "christian".. check this on barb andersons thread!.
"The WTBTS of Australia WAS included in the action. They were the ONLY entity with a lawyer in the previous hearings."
That is probably because the WTBTS of Australia was the ONLY rational, non-jurisdictionally challenged, non-symbolic party that Unthank called, so they didn't need more than one lawyer.
did any of you guys have these at your book study?.
Dictating when a congregation can have get-togethers and fun nights isn't the responsibility of the GB. That is more on the individuals in the congregations (and honestly, I am still fine with losing the treat night and extra book study night simply because it saved so many people so much gas from the extra trip).
But yeah, just losing a single treat night after the book study doesn't somehow make it impossible to still get-together and have fun. Teary's old congregation, even after the meeting consolidation, still had cook-outs at local parks, fish frys, basketball games, little parties after Sunday meetings, ect. I supposed you could technically even say that their thursday night schedule included a 'treat night' every week, because about 15 Witnesses (including me) would always end up going to Braum's to get ice cream after the meeting. Yum!
did any of you guys have these at your book study?.
Once a month in Teary's old congregation we would have pot luck treat nights. Yum! :D
in the continuing court battle in australia, the legal counsel for the witchtower babble and trash religion shocked witless onlookers by saying the there is.
"no christian congregation of jehovah's witnesses in the state of victoria," or indeed the whole of australia.. hahahhahahahaha!.
at least they are not perjuring themselves as any fool can see that their congregations are not "christian".. check this on barb andersons thread!.
On a side note, how do we even know that the specific legal entity known as CCJW actually did anything in Australia? Since it was created specificially to deal with U.S. congregations, wouldn't congregations in Australia be handled by one of the other legal entities?
in the continuing court battle in australia, the legal counsel for the witchtower babble and trash religion shocked witless onlookers by saying the there is.
"no christian congregation of jehovah's witnesses in the state of victoria," or indeed the whole of australia.. hahahhahahahaha!.
at least they are not perjuring themselves as any fool can see that their congregations are not "christian".. check this on barb andersons thread!.
I doubt any of the accused on that list are going to last very long, because some of them are ridiculous from a legal standpoint.
In the end (if this keeps going), it is probably going to boil down to just one or two defendents (and the rest will be dismissed or recieve summary judgment): The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Australia and maybe the Watchtower Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania if there aren't jurisdiction problems.
