Posts by Jofi

72

Not invited to congregation “get togethers”. They finally said it

by solomon in

jw
friends

we don’t get many invitations to congregational social gatherings.

we don’t attend midweek meetings and miss about 1/3 of sunday meetings.

we go in service at least once a month.

Jofi_Wofo

I went to a large gathering yesterday. It was good fun and good exercise. Around my parts, there is NOTHING else to do other than lock myself inside and read some books. As an introvert, that's more or less the only thing I really want out of life, but it can get real tedious if I have no means to switch it up once in a while.

One of the elders holds the gathering same time, same place every weekend. In a very hushed and serious tone, he told my wife and I that only certain people are allowed to come, and he trusts that we know whom, so we can invite whomever we want, so long as they fit the bill. Basically, no non-progressive studies, no inactive, no reproved, no faders, no non-JW relatives, and no-whoevers that don't belong.

It's rather weird being on this side of things for the moment. You can see how counterproductive it really is. Instead of weeding out the spiritually weak, it serves to keep the doubters and disbelievers right in the thick of things, hiding in plain site, since exiting comes at such a high cost.

14

Ever notice no pictures of any JW get togeathers?

by JimmyYoung in

i remember when i was a kid in the early 70s that we always had a baseball game or picnic where they would get together and bring a dish to pass.

every summer there was one or more.

we had canoe picnic parties and camp fires ect.

Jofi_Wofo

My congregation still has regular gatherings and dinners. Often times, I'm invited somewhere multiple times per week. This is in an area where there is no movie theater, bowling or even a park to visit. We just make our own fun, and I have to say, it's what has been keeping me sane while I'm stuck in my current situation. My old congregation (moved last year) was similar. This is the biggest thing I'll miss when I leave. It really felt like we were all in this together, even when I knew it was all wrong.

It would seem that many JWs are cautious about what social pics they post online due to not knowing how many people at the gatherings would be ok with it and due to extreme paranoia that someone, somewhere, is going to misunderstand something about the picture and get them in trouble.

There is a pretty stark distinction I've noticed between two different kinds of JW social media users. The first is the kind that you can follow for years and never know that they were a JW, because they do everything possible to hide it. The second is the kind you can follow for years and never know that they were anything but a JW, because they do everything possible to advertise it.

25

Ask yourself why you don't DESERVE "kindness" (A look a the Watchtower's struggle against "Grace."

by Terry in

graceyou won’t find any in the new world translation!no no no.you only find “undeserved kindness.”(ask yourself why you don't deserve kindness.

?isn’t kindness basic decency?

?if you are one of jehovah’s witnesses you have a reason.jehovah’s witnesses are never on firm standing with their god.

Jofi_Wofo

Interesting and insightful post. Thank you.

Re: celeb JWs, good luck finding two witnesses confirming any bad behavior by them. To be fair, they get away with a lot just by not being around other JWs very often and by not being in one place long enough to settle into a congregation that would hold them accountable.

38

Flood over everest

by road to nowhere in

meeting part comment on how the flood covered everest.

that is even more ignorant than mountains being pushed up and eroding in a few thousand years.

and it wasnt cold either.. i should have commented on the bristlecone in the awake that survived the flood.

Jofi_Wofo

Well, since we're piling on.

Paleontologists have discovered thousands of human dna samples from remains of varying levels of preservation that are dated 5000 or more years old. They have confirmed what fossils had already evidenced quite a long time ago- that human beings have remained almost entirely unchanged since WELL before the creationist (including WT, who misdefines creationism to disinclude themselves) chronology for when the flood supposedly occured. Ergo, absolutely no genetic explanation for why human lifespans before and just after the supposed flood were so much longer than contemporary humans. No record of humans becoming less and less resemblant of their perfect origins as the centuries roll on. While we're at it- not even a single fossil of a human being anywhere in the world that would be large enough to be considered a Nephilim.

Some here have pondered over how we could actually believe this stuff. I can speak for myself when I say I had some creative, and varyingly plausible explanations for why science didnt confirm any aspect of the flood account.

1) The chronology was wrong. The flood chronology, like much of Biblical chronology, follows a piecing together of the lifespans of patriarchs and kings who were recorded in the Bible's detailed geneologies. However, throughout the Bible, we quite often see the words father and son refer to relatives much more distant in ancestry. I reasoned that many generations could have been skipped at certain points, leaving room for the possibility that the flood happened much farther in the past.

2) The flood was not purported to be a natural event. It's purported to be a miracle. If it really was a miracle, then Jehovah had the limitless ability to make the result exactly how he willed the result , even if that result was nothing like we would expect in absense of divine intervention. To project naturalistic results from a miraculous event begins with a false premise and is therefore a strawman argument.

I'm not saying they're necessarily good rationalizations, but I think that they are better than anything WT ever printed. Which is a pretty sad pattern I've been noticing lately in reexamining why I believed for so long. Little old not-annointed and unassuming me always had better explanations than holy spirit ever gave the GB. Even when mine were wrong, their were always wronger.

16

Just one foot in...

by Jofi_Wofo in

...with one foot out.. *deep breath*.

from day one, i've felt like i was one foot out of this religion, but it took me until over a decade to reach the point where i am ready to move on.

i'm a newly registered user to this site.

Jofi_Wofo

Thank you for your support, everyone.

I'm feeling especially trapped this morning.

My current set of circumstances makes it next to impossible for me to just up and leave the organization cold turkey. I'm currently living in a remote area where the only social connections I have are through the congregation. The non-JWs in the area don't take especially kindly to people, like me, who weren't born and raised here, and there really is nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. My landlord is a JW, and my house is actually on the same property as his.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that my wife and I are moving in a few months. I have to figure out the right way to break the news to her. It WILL crush her. Unlike me, she was raised in the religion and not only is it the only thing she knows, it's the only thing she knows how to know.

When it comes to this morning, however... *sigh* I'm tired, have a slight cold and all I want to do is lay in my recliner, sip some tea and read an interesting book. Instead, I'm going out in service and might even be asked to lead the group.

How does it ever come to this? For a fully grown man who has always been a proponent of rational skepticism and has never liked anyone telling him what to do or what to believe. How did I ever get myself in this mess to begin with? How has it taken me this long to do something about it? How am I about to go out in the ministry right now, knowing that this isn't what I want to do, and that this isn't what I want to teach?

I'm ashamed to do it, but I'm also ashamed to NOT do it and see the whole world cave in around me while I'm stuck in this miserable place with little resources and no recourse.

It sucks.

4

Australian Royal Commission question looking back

by Aussie Oz in

after all the attention the royal commission focused on the wt and the damning report that came out, has anything changed at the congregational level or to wt policy?.

i am getting the sense from what i have found that really it accomplished little more than embarrassing the wt and upsetting the jws for a while.. am i wrong in that thought?.

oz.

Jofi_Wofo

In my part of the US, hardly anyone even knows it happened, and those that do usually haven't seen the actual videos and have only heard stories from the grapevine.

Those stories, of course, were that JWs won the day with the help of holy spirit. Just like every other time. Nothing to see here, folks. Just move along and don't find out for yourself.

How it's even possible to get millions of people to not type 3 words (such as "JW Royal commission" ) into the smartphones they carry 24/7 is downright baffling to me. But it works. Every time.

48

If you speak against the Governing Body you will be punished.

by punkofnice in

this was a comment from the meeting(tm) on sunday.. the person that told me about it, is very confused about the validity of the corporation.

somewhere between a pimo and a pimi-lite.

the thing that angered me was that this person has cancer.

Jofi_Wofo

OMG- I just read some of the other posts that I didn't get to before writing mine. Apparently, I'm faaaar from the only one who's made such observations regarding the result of criticism of God/Jesus/Bible vs criticism of WT/GB.

Also, off topic, I'm writing these posts in secret while sitting 1-foot away from my believing wife. I feel like a little kid sneaking sips of my parents booze right now.

48

If you speak against the Governing Body you will be punished.

by punkofnice in

this was a comment from the meeting(tm) on sunday.. the person that told me about it, is very confused about the validity of the corporation.

somewhere between a pimo and a pimi-lite.

the thing that angered me was that this person has cancer.

Jofi_Wofo

I'm in the middle of carefully planning my exit, and in doing so I realized something rather poignant that hit me deep in the pit of my stomach. If I critique the Bible, I will be considered spiritually sick. If I critique the Watchtower, I will be considered an enemy.

A far cry from the Biblical teaching that faith in Jesus is required to salvation (John 3:16; John 20:31; 1 John 5:13).

On a related note, during this past week's WT study (See paragraph 8- https://www.jw.org/en/library/magazines/watchtower-study-november-2019/large-shield-of-faith/ ) our conductor went so far as to accuse apostates of splicing together audio recordings to attribute false quotes to the Governing Body.

The message here is clear: do not listen to ANYONE or ANYTHING that presents the Governing Body in a bad light, no matter what. No evidence is to be considered. No arguments to be heard. Believe only what the Governing Body tell you to believe, until they tell you to believe something else.

7

Interesting WT Deluge Contradiction I just noticed.

by Jofi_Wofo in

i was reviewing some of the evidence the wt proposes for their claim of the bible's scientific accuracy, when i came across this interesting assertion.. the mountains rise and fall, and today’s mountains were once under the ocean.

(psalm 104:6, 8) in contrast, several myths say that the mountains were created in their current form by the gods.. https://www.jw.org/en/bible-teachings/questions/science-and-the-bible/.

interesting.

Jofi_Wofo

I was reviewing some of the evidence the WT proposes for their claim of the Bible's scientific accuracy, when I came across this interesting assertion.

The mountains rise and fall, and today’s mountains were once under the ocean. (Psalm 104:6, 8) In contrast, several myths say that the mountains were created in their current form by the gods.
https://www.jw.org/en/bible-teachings/questions/science-and-the-bible/

Interesting. Veeeeeery interesting. I'm not sure anyone involved with writing that article realized it, but this little piece of information debunks one of the WTs evidentiary claims in support of a global flood.

In the days of Noah, the Bible says, a great flood covered earth’s highest mountains and destroyed all human life that was outside the huge ark that Noah built. (Genesis 7:1-24) Many have scoffed at this account. Yet seashells are found on high mountains.
https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1101985027

...some see in this, as well as in such other things as marine fossils found on high mountains, convincing evidence of a sudden, catastrophic global flood.
https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1200000758

Men of science in times past held that the flood of Noah’s day was merely local in scope, but...“even on the tops of high mountains, whole trees sunk deep under ground, as also teeth and bones of animals, fishes entire, seashells, ears of corn, etc., petrified”; which could never have come there but by a world-wide deluge.—Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge.

https://wol.jw.org/en/wol/d/r1/lp-e/1953840

The WT acknowledges in one part of its proposed evidences for biblical scientific accuracy an extremely important and relevant fact in debunking another of its proposed evidences for biblical scientific accuracy. The existence of marine fossils as well as other out-of-habitat fossils on the tops of mountains can be reasonably attributed to the fact that the earth's mountains used to be under water. Marine fossils weren't deposited upon mountains. Mountains were formed from lands that contained marine fossils.

22

What scripture or scriptures did the cult use to imply animals vegetarian?

by Crazyguy2 in

when i was a kid they implied that all animals and humans were vegetarian before the flood but i don’t know the scriptures they used, anyone know?

.

Jofi_Wofo

Interesting that this topic would be near the top, on my first day here. (It must be from Jehovah!!!) (JK!) Even when I was at my peak of compliance, I knew that this couldn't possibly be true. I'm not the only JW in my circle who noticed it, but unless everyone was hiding better than I was, no one seemed to think it was as serious of a problem as I did. Everyone just reasoned that either 1) Jehovah would help to resolve all difficulties in understanding, or 2) science is missing the necessary information to accurately convey Biblical truths.

What is most interesting is the peculiar pattern that comes up when WT teachings don't conform to established facts. No one I've ever discussed this with ever spoke of how the WT would be proven wrong, rather, they spoke of how the Bible would be vindicated. As if WT interpretation of the Bible, and what the Bible itself actually says, are somehow one-and-the-same. Until, of course, the GB changes their mind on what the Bible says.

In any case, despite very little emphasis on discussing the topic in JW publications and meetings, the plight of animals in God's purpose is one of the most persistently troubling when it comes to juggling the doublethink (triplethink?) required to believe in Bible AND the WT AND scientific discovery. From the questions of pre-Edenic/antidiluvian diet, original sin, God's supposed allowance but non-cause of suffering, the value of life, the symbolic question of blood, the mercy of God on the innocent, the temperament of animals in the new world, the fate of the animals both on and off the arc, and the abundant evidence of evolution, there is a surprising amount of starting and ending points to this topic.

What's more, you can typically, as an unbelieving but faking-it JW, tactfully bring these subjects up, with otherJ Ws without them having a knee-jerk GET BEHIND ME SATAN reaction (with the exception of evolution, of course). It amounts to a simple curiosity and some handwaving, but who knows, maybe it opens up the quiet floodgates of the ever-freed mind.

Jofi_Wofo

Posts by Jofi_Wofo