I was thinking the exact same thing in those few moments I looked up from reading "Reluctant Apostate" to see what tripe they are pushing this month. Perhaps they should start sending these videos out to householders so they know the appropriate responses to such situations.
Saethydd
JoinedPosts by Saethydd
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19
Stranger asks about your kids mental wellness. ..
by purrpurr inlast night at the meeting there was a suggested presentation about the new mags, which cover the issue of depression in minors.
the jw jumps straight from "hi how are ya" to "how is your kids mental well-being " and of course the hh is more than happy to discuss the inner workings of their child's mind with a stranger whose just knockedmon their door(!).
if it was me i'd be majorly creeper out!.
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15
Spiritual paradise or proverbial straitjacket?
by UnshackleTheChains innoas a current or past jehovah's witness, do you / or did you feel part of a spiritual paradise with full liberty in christ as the watchtower society/organisation describes?.
or do you / did you feel you were wearing a proverbial straitjacket in the sense you feel / felt restricted and controlled by the watchtower society / organisation?.
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Saethydd
I wouldn't call it a straight-jacket so much as a bubble. I was raised in my little bubble and told it was a paradise and no world worth seeing existed outside of it, and in fact, this bubble was in place for my on protection. As I aged I began to notice that parts of the things that existed in the bubble were pretty awful, but instead of doing anything to fix those awful parts I was taught to simply shrug my shoulders and say, "ah well, things outside the bubble are so much worse." I even managed to catch sight of things going on outside the bubble that seemed quite nice, but always managed to convince it couldn't have been so.
All of this changed however when I was forcibly ejected from the bubble, and instead of just sitting quietly outside the bubble I decided to take this as an opportunity to actually explore whether or not things out were as bad out here as I had been led to believe. I realized, of course, that they aren't. I mean it's far from perfect, but then again things inside the bubble were never perfect either, not for me anyway.
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Sparlock is making his rounds again
by stillin ini was at the meeting last night and the dreadful video about caleb and sparlock was forced upon the audience.
honestly, i had forgotten how bad it was.
the mother's manipulative over-reaction and caleb's acceptance that his toy was evil.
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Saethydd
Heh, coincidently I recently decided to go ahead and watch the Harry Potter movies. They are actually pretty great movies in my opinion.
Maybe someday someone will make a movie about young Caleb growing up, going to high school or college, waking up from the manipulative teachings of the JWs and finally getting to see whether all that interest in Sparlock was warranted by his classmates.
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12
Guilt as Motivator
by LifesNotOver ini've just come across this idea: i've been feeling guilty about not contributing more to this forum, given all the help i've received here.
i feel guilty that i haven't had it as bad as so many of you.
i feel guilty that i didn't have any jw family/friends that shunned me when i left.
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Saethydd
My best suggestion would be to try and find a qualified therapist, it sounds like you may have a form of clinical depression if guilt is a constant motivator in your life. It would most like be genetic, caused by childhood events, or a severe trauma in adulthood. Why the JW religion may not have necessarily caused it, I'm sure it didn't help.
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Making life and death/life altering decisions based on commands from someone you're not sure exists
by jambon1 instraight from the off, i will say that i'm 100% atheist.
i have no faith.
however, it occurred to me while thinking back over my involvement with the jw religion and especially when i take into account personal and family situations where people have made life altering choices due to being jw's, just how crazy it really is.
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Saethydd
Speaking as someone who has tried to debate this subject with people I concur with @sir82's assessment.
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5
Divine Punishment???
by Saethydd ini was recently at a sunday watchtower, reading one of the novels i have on my ipad to help me get through the dreadfully boring event.
every once in awhile though i'll glance at the article just in case anyone is peeking at my screen, and in the article, i noticed these paragraphs.. 3. how did exile in babylon differ from the slavery the israelites had experienced in egypt?.
3 what the prophets had foretold came to pass.
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Saethydd
@Diogenesister
Yeah, I remember having read that account and thinking how it seemed an incredibly cruel thing to kill people for looking upon or touching the Ark. (Which seems like ought to have been considered a "graven image" in the first place, but anyway...)
You've also reminded of another befuddling case of an unjust execution carried out by God. I don't remember the specific book it's from but it's an account about a prophet who is told not to eat anything in a land he is going into to prophesy. Anyway, some other guy who lives in that land comes up to the prophet and tell him that an angel told him to tell the prophet that God decided he could come and eat a meal with this man. (Kind of like God changed his command to Abraham about killing Isaac.) But as it turns out that man was lying. In any case, God kills that prophet even though he was deceived, but no punishment was recorded for the man who willfully deceived him.
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How much money people usually donate to WT ?
by Bardamu ini grew up in the org and never got baptised, however i was wondering recently about how much money my family and old friends are wasting in all that.
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i remember of course never talking in amounts, that it was important to give from what you can not what you have etc but i admit i have no clue how much the average witness gives (say in % of their income).. i'm sure it varies greatly, i'd love to hear what you guys have to say..
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Saethydd
It seems like my parents usually donate somewhere between $75.00-$125.00 a month.
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5
Divine Punishment???
by Saethydd ini was recently at a sunday watchtower, reading one of the novels i have on my ipad to help me get through the dreadfully boring event.
every once in awhile though i'll glance at the article just in case anyone is peeking at my screen, and in the article, i noticed these paragraphs.. 3. how did exile in babylon differ from the slavery the israelites had experienced in egypt?.
3 what the prophets had foretold came to pass.
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Saethydd
I was recently at a Sunday Watchtower, reading one of the novels I have on my iPad to help me get through the dreadfully boring event. Every once in awhile though I'll glance at the article just in case anyone is peeking at my screen, and in the article, I noticed these paragraphs.
3. How did exile in Babylon differ from the slavery the Israelites had experienced in Egypt?
3 What the prophets had foretold came to pass. Through Jeremiah, Jehovah advised the future exiles to accept their new situation and make the most of it. He said: “Build houses [in Babylon] and live in them. Plant gardens and eat their fruit. And seek the peace of the city to which I have exiled you, and pray in its behalf to Jehovah, for in its peace you will have peace.” (Jer. 29:5, 7) Those who submitted to the will of God lived a relatively normal life in Babylon. Their captors allowed them to administer their own affairs to some extent. The exiles even had freedom to move about the country. Babylon was a center of trade and commerce in the ancient world, and documents that have been unearthed indicate that many Jews learned the art of buying and selling there, while others became skilled craftsmen. Some Jews even became prosperous. Exile in Babylon was nothing like the slavery in Egypt that the Israelites had experienced centuries before.—Read Exodus 2:23-25.
4. Besides rebellious Israelites, who were affected by captivity in Babylon, and what limitations were placed on their ability to worship God acceptably?
4 Although the material needs of the exiled Jews were being met, what of their spiritual needs? Jehovah’s temple with its altar had been destroyed, and the priesthood was no longer functioning in an organized manner. Among the exiles were faithful servants of God who had done nothing deserving of punishment, but they had to suffer along with the rest of the nation. Nevertheless, they did what they could to observe God’s Law. For example, in Babylon, Daniel and three of his companions—Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego—abstained from foods that were forbidden to Jews. And we know that Daniel maintained regular communication with God in prayer. (Dan. 1:8; 6:10) Still, under a pagan administration, it was impossible for a God-fearing Jew to do everything the Law required.
Bear with me please as I try to follow this string of events. God creates the nation of Israel, the nation of Israel doesn't worship God according to rules he set up, God punishes the Israelites by removing them from an environment that allows them to follow all those rules he set up, but other than that they have their needs cared for.
So basically this punishment didn't adversely impact the people who were not worshiping Jehovah whole-souled, in fact, if the statements made in these paragraphs are accurate it was ONLY the people who continued to try and worship Jehovah that faced any large difficulty. Which means that God was, in essence, administering a form of punishment that primarily had a negative effect on his faithful servants.
Isn't that simply absurd? It would be like if one of your kids acted up, so you decided to punish them by taking a toy away from their sibling.
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Do you think I should get something for my wife for her birthday?
by schnell inmy wife is still nominally in, but only because it "makes me (her) happy".
there is nothing academic about her beliefs and when i try, she interprets me as negative.. but then she cusses like a sailor and watches certain movies with me.
her birthday is coming up and it's also right around valentine's day.
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Saethydd
Not to change the subject, but I recently gave someone a birthday present for the first time in my life. I gave my history instructor an apple on his birthday, by no means an extravagant gift, but he really seemed to appreciate that I remembered. It felt good. -
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Conditional Love
by Saethydd ini've noticed several posts recently claiming that jw friends and family members give out conditional love.
well, i'm not so sure that is entirely accurate, in fact, i would say they tend to be very steadfast in their love.
the issue is this, they have been taught a poor form of love.
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Saethydd
Everybody has a different situation, and perhaps I would view things differently had I been shunned for decades, but I would rather not get so wrapped up in my own pain that I start assuming motives that paint the people around me as cruel and vindictive. After all is that not what the WTBTS says about apostates? That they are wicked people who just want to drag you down with them.
I don't want to make that same mistake about the people I'll most probably have to leave behind. Where possible I like to believe the best about people until proven wrong, and all I'm trying to do here is offer another point of view.