haha - qwerty - i thought you were posting under two different names or something. that clears it up! :)
rem
Posts by rem
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8Disengaged Thanks!
by qwerty indisengaged.
in some respects i should be flattered that you used my animations (sorry the animations i have personally chosen) for your post.
come on there are loads of animation sites, please use something different as your permanent animation.. i feel that once we've found a pic or animation and no doubt other will agree, that they become personal to us, plus other posters recognize us by them.. .
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rem
Thanks for the heads up on this link, Intro. It would be cool to meet some of you guys in person. I've got to have solid dates, otherwise my wife will book all of our weekends up! :)
rem
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rem
San Francisco bay area, California.
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A Good Article I Found! Subject:Organized Religion
by Big Jim inthe truth about organized religion.
christians and theists often state that without religion people would resort to barbarism and anarchy.
in reality however some of the greatest acts of cruelty have come from organized religion, such as: .
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rem
Pretty sad, Yeru.
I'm an atheist and I have no urge to murder anyone or steal anything. By your comment you'd expect the prisons would be filled to the brim with atheists. Not so. Actually, the majority of inmates are.... well - I'll stop there, it's too easy.
rem
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When Reinstated...NO APPLAUSE!
by Disengaged inthe other evening a young person was reinstated and the jerk-water elder making the announcement went out of his way to remind "the friends" that applauding would not be proper.
what mind control, bunk, dribble, bull................ they are so loving aren't they?
i shoulda applauded anyway.
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rem
Disengaged,
As far as I know, nothing was said. This happened when the rule had just come out and people didn't really know if it was official or not yet. There was a lot of tension because so many people knew the brothers went too far with my brother's situation. Everyone was relieved that he was back, and in record time. I was not actually there when he was reinstated - I was in a different congregation at the time. My mother related the story to me after it happened.
I was a selfrighteous MS prick at the time. If the Society said not to clap, then I would not have clapped back then even if I wanted to! :)
I would not actually recommend it nowdays since the rule is pretty much observed as official procedure now. I would imagine clapping would prompt a little talk with the elders after the meeting these days.
On another note - Has anyone noticed that the Society seems to have really loosened up on the whole "dignity of the occasion" BS during the baptism? It went from free-for-all, to strict, somber observance with plenty of warnings not to be overly expressive (to presever the dignity). The last couple of assemblies it seems that they have not made the same announcements. Seems like they've cooled off on that a bit.
rem
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32
When Reinstated...NO APPLAUSE!
by Disengaged inthe other evening a young person was reinstated and the jerk-water elder making the announcement went out of his way to remind "the friends" that applauding would not be proper.
what mind control, bunk, dribble, bull................ they are so loving aren't they?
i shoulda applauded anyway.
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rem
Sam,
The point is that the Society is saying that NOBODY can clap. No one is saying that anyone should be obligated to applaud a reinstated one. If someone feels it is inappropriate, it is his business. If someone wants to express his happiness by clapping, then by god he should have the right to do so.
The fact is that there are many cases of disfellowshipping that do not involve other "victims" in the congregation. Blanket policies like this tend to stifle genuine expression in many cases in which it is not necessary. My own brother was disfellowshipped for underage drinking. There were many people who knew of the situation and who were actually involved. Of the 10 or 15 brothers and sisters directly involved (they were also drinking underage), my brother was the only one disfellowshipped. Everyone knew it was a farce, but it happened. He was reinstated just a few months later, to everyone's delight. Even though the elder making the announcement cautioned the congregation not to clap, the brothers and sisters did anyway. This example just goes to show that there are just as many valid circumstances in which there is no victim, thus a blanket policy would only stifle genuine expression in many such cases.
Even though I don't believe in disfellowshipping at all, I do believe that if they Society is going to continue the practice, they should let the congregation know why the person is being disfellowshipped. That way people can make an informed decision (first of all whether or not they want to continue association with the disfellowshipped person - but that is just a pipe dream) on how they choose to welcome the disfellowshipped person back. If people knew that the person was a pedophile, then there would probably be more love shown to the victim, or at least more caution when the person is reinstated. If the person is a smoker, then again - it's a victimless sin and it would be completely acceptable for people to express their joy through applause. Anyway, I digress.
So to sum up: if you want to clap, then clap. If not, then don't. Everyone has their own reasons for their decision. This expression of genuine happiness should not be legislated by the thought police up in Brooklyn. It's like the brother in the prodigal son parable saying that there should be no party since he was offended. Well, if he's offended, then he doesn't need to join the festivities, but he should have no right to stifle the genuine expressions of others.
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Organized religion, no religion, agnostic
by cnn77 ini am new here trying to figure my way around...... i would appreciate it if you could say which of these fits you..... 1. still a jw.
2. if you dont agree with the jw doctrines any longer do you belong to another religious organization now?
3. are still religious and have no religious affiliation.
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Please Respond To Survey! 25 more needed please.
by Big Jim init seems like to me the majority of people who are in the truth, are were in the truth was a result of either a family member are a friend witnessing to them and not many seem to have been found in the door to door work.. from my years of associating with the borg i cannot recall many coming in the truth from the door to door work.. how were you sucked in?
for me it was my aunt who has now even though i am not disfellowshipped decided to write me out of her will to the tune of about $150,000.00 (maybe i should hang around a couple more years)dont think i will.. please respond .
thanks.
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rem
My wife and I were born into it. My Father is a 2'nd generation JW. My mother came in through a JW workmate or something. My wife's parents were hippies in the '70's and I'm not sure how they became indoctrinated. My father-in-law witnessed to his family and now almost all of them are Witnesses.
My wife and I are the first to leave the witnesses in our families. Also, now my mom and sister, along with her husband has left. My brother no longer believes it's the truth, but is still in to keep his marriage together. One of my wife's sisters is now DF'd, and I'm not sure if she will ever go back.
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The JW's like any other religion?
by mommy ini had long talk with my mom the other day, she called me and wanted to discuss the org and the things i didn't believe in.
i will spare you most of the convo, but a few things "clicked" as i spoke to her.
maybe i have been away for so long i can't clearly remember all of the teachings, but she did agree with a few things i brought up.
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rem
Wendy,
Thank you for posting your experience. I know how frustrating it is; most of us do. It's difficult, at least for me, because even though my beliefs are completely different than my former friends and they have rejected me, I still love them very much. The pain is still fresh and it's like pouring salt on a wound whenever I think about it.
I guess I had hoped, and still hope, that my friendship was worth so much more. I wish that there was more to our relationships than just our common belief in the Society and Jehovah. I miss my old friends. I miss their personalities, their whole persons. My friendship with them was not based on their loyalty to an organization. I wonder if they miss me at all? Probably not. But I still hope they think about me once in a while like I think about them. And if they do, I hope they think about how I used to make them laugh and how we used to have good times instead of how I'm a worthless apostate now.
It is also dificult for me to argue against the Jehovah's Witness religion well when they bring up points about the Soul, Trinity, etc. The main reason for me is that I'm no longer a Christian, so such beliefs mean nothing to me. I can do a bit better if we stick to the (in)errancy of the Bible and certain strange Chronologies and prophecies of the WT, but those doctrines (Soul, Trinity, etc.) were never what kept me a Witness in the first place, so I guess I just don't understand why they are used as the defining factor of a true religion.
Anyway, I hope your relationship with your mom improves over time. Maybe you've given her some food for thought. If she ever does question the org, your relationship could be better than ever! That is one thing that helps me - to think that if one day any of my former friends leave the org, I'll be there with open arms to comfort them and be their friend again. Then maybe our relationship can be based on a more solid foundation.
rem
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The Good, The Bad and Evolution
by Defender inin the bible account of genesis, there we were told that adam and eve ate from the forbidden tree of knowledge of good and bad and thus, like god, they started to know good and bad.
these few words and actions apparently changed the course of humanity.
even if we assume that this account is just a fable and did not actually happen, a number of questions and issues come up namely;.
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rem
Patio,
Here is a little chart taken from the book "African Exodus" that shows the DNA relationships between apes and humans:
human - chimpanzee = 1.2% difference (in DNA)
human - gorilla = 1.4%
human - orangutan = 2.4 %
chimpanzee - gorilla = 1.2%
chimpanzee - orangutan = 1.8%
gorilla - orangutan = 2.4%I'm not sure of the differences between other animals, but I have read that the difference between humans and chimps is smaller than the difference between rats and mice or zebras and horses. It is now believed that humans and african apes diverged from a common ancestor around 5 million years ago. I'm not sure of how much debate there still is on the subject, but from what I've read so far it seems that modern humans started spreading throughout the world from Africa around 100,000 years ago.
rem