I'm trying to figure out how anyone can be a celibate homosexual while also living together with someone of the same sex. Do they just not find each other attractive? Otherwise it sounds like a recipe for disaster.
Apognophos
JoinedPosts by Apognophos
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Sunday Washington Post: Gay Christians choosing celibacy emerge from the shadows.
by Balaamsass2 inlocal.
gay christians choosing celibacy emerge from the shadows.
despite encountering criticism, the lgbt community is finding greater acceptance, even in religious circles.
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Jw's attitudes toward the act of baptism
by _Morpheus ini attended (meaning was emotionally blackmailed) a jw baptisum ceremony today.
i was awestruck at the "event" status given this.
to be sure it wasnt the first time i witnessed it but for whatever reason it really stood out to me what a spectical they have turned this into.
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Apognophos
I'm more fascinated by how you spelled "baptism" correctly in the subject line but then it mutated to "baptisum" and then "baptsium"
Anyway, I don't really see anything I could call worship of baptism. I mean, you line up for the pool, everyone watches you get dunked, and then what? You go off, find a towel and change your clothes. People congratulate you if they bump into you later in the day, or at the next meeting at the Hall, and then everything is back to normal. Most of us actually felt it was pretty anti-climactic.
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Couple questions....like if JW's not the right way then what is?
by world innew member here so don't attack :d here is a couple questions i have been contemplating lately.. .
if jw isn't the right religion, then which one is?
or is it basically believe in god, the bible and you'll be fine?.
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Apognophos
Heh, welcome world. Newbies always get a ton of replies, so I'll keep mine short and focus on one thing you said. You mentioned the way that Witnesses cross racial boundaries. Yes, this is commendable, but it doesn't indicate that Witnesses have to be the right religion. How many churches do you know that are actually segregated in this day and age?
And, for that matter, did you know that Witnesses were segregated too when it was the common practice in the U.S. and other places? Imagine how "progressive" it would seem today if the Witnesses back then had simply held to the principles in the Bible. From the early days of Christianity, Jews associated with Gentiles; they were all "brothers in Christ". So why didn't Witnesses challenge segregation like they challenged so many laws that infringed on their practices?
Personally my experience has been that congregations today are well-integrated, and people of all colors feel close to each other, but what causes this? Is it the holy spirit? It's actually easy to explain using in-group psychology. You see, Witnesses are more ostracized (or perhaps we should say more self-ostracized) from the community than are, say, people of color. So when a Witness meets a Witness, it's a bit like feeling an immediate kinship when you meet a fellow member of some other minority that you're a part of -- a fellow vegetarian, or a fellow Linux user.
Humans can only divide their groups into so many sub-groups; the desire to belong to something larger can thus cause them to cast aside divisions that apply in the world at large in order to feel a sense of belonging and solidarity with some group of people. It's no different from any club, whether it's a chess club, an atheist convention, or an association of parents whose children suffer from a certain disease; they all bond over their common interest or difficulty and ignore other differences, in the name of feeling a sense of togetherness and mutual encouragement.
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Why JW marriage is a huge problem for the organization.
by kneehighmiah inthe difficulty of finding a marriage mate is well known for sisters.
but i would say it's hard for brothers also.
i was talking to a jw last night.
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Apognophos
Beauty IS in the eye of the beholder, and the reason why all the JWs that are single seem unattractive is that their JW essense is to you, (or whoever) just unattractive! Not about looks, but about whether a whole person 'attracts' another person. It is easy to see the "pretty" in a person who is unavailable. Most of us can observe the pretty face and move on, dismissing them. When a person meets a prospective mate, 'attractive'is about a lot more than looks.
JWs don't like JWs. They don't want to be married to one. They may not even like themselves. They probably think they are unworthy of anyone as good as they want in anycase. If the brothers you know are not seeeing any attractive single sisters, it is because they simply don't want to be married to a JW. Objectively, there are a lot of pretty single JW women. And men. And froggy ones, too. But what sane person wants to marry into that mess?
A pretty,yet pious JW is kind of like a frosted turd. And while we often make wrong decisions with marriage mates, most have SOME instincts for survival. Being a JW destroys the sense of self and destroys our trust and faith in others to have anything good in them, either. It is the guilty folks that suspect others of dishonesty the most. Same principle applies. NOt about actual guilt, but the sense that we are just unworthy and undeserving of anything good. You get told that enough, you believe it.
For the first time since I've joined this forum, I'm quoting the entirety of someone else's post. JWdaughter said something profound here that I don't want overlooked. I've known a ton of pretty, single, spiritual sisters in my time as a Witness -- some incredibly beautiful -- and I never desired to get to know any of them. I didn't know why. I just felt like it would be a really bad idea to get married for some reason. Since marriages are forever in JW Land (unless adultery occurs), it would mean a commitment that I couldn't take back, and something told me that this would be a huge mistake, no matter who I married. I told myself that the reason I resisted the idea of commitment was that, as an imperfect human, I couldn't be sure that I would make a good choice in finding a mate that I would then be stuck with for an infinite amount of time in the new system.
Looking back, things are finally becoming clear for me. I understand now that the one attribute all these girls had in common which made them undesirable was the very thing I thought I admired in them: their spirituality. If they hadn't been sincere about the religion then I would not have respected them, because I hate two-faced people. So yes, I respected these sisters for taking the religion seriously and for dressing modestly and giving good talks, etc.... but they all just seemed eminently unmarriageable. I didn't know why until now. I think one part of it was JWdaughter's suggestion that I just felt unworthy to be with anyone that I would actually want as a marriage mate. I also think it's because, if I married a Witness, I would have been committing to not just her, but the religion, and there was a little voice in my head warning me not to.
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This idea might not be new, but does a website like this exist?
by ILoveTTATT ini am deeply upset every time there's someone in the news who has died because of the stupid and immoral blood doctrine.. i would like to make a website documenting every single instance of a news report of someone dying from lack of a blood transfusion, and to keep track of it.
that would give some data on the real and current incidence of deaths due to the blood transfusion doctrine.. is there already a website like that?.
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Apognophos
I agree with flamegrilled. When we consider all the stories of Witnesses who survived with incredibly low blood counts, it reminds us that we don't have the ability to say how big of a factor blood is in the deaths that do occur.
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If you don't have an "electronic device" you aren't ready for service!
by LostGeneration infrom the feb 2015 km, page 2:.
have a publisher demonstrate how he.
prepares for the ministry by reviewing the tracts,.
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Apognophos
It's not hypocrisy -- there was simply no good use to which to put such a device until jw.org and the JW apps came along
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HELP ME COMPILE A LIST OF DISCARDED WORDS AND PHRASES from the WTS
by Terry inin fort worth, texas around 1959. gradually i became aware of the argot.
special, private language).
jw's had these phrases they used over and over again.. upon first hearing, these words and phrases stood out as odd, weird or awkward.. however.
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Apognophos
I would have thought that 'wearing many hats' wouldn't give anything away because lots of people say that. I did notice that Zimmerman used the word "suppression" a few times in that video. Did you intentionally post that video without comment to let us discover that, Terry? :-)
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DEMONS: the torment I suffered
by Terry inwhen i was in my teens i wanted a room of my own, but i lived with my grandparents whose house was very small.. my uncle had been living in a little one room bed-sitter way out in the backyard.
he married and moved away and i moved in.. it was quite isolated and the ceiling was six feet from the floor.
unfortunately, the top of my head was four inches higher than that!
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Apognophos
One I wish I could recall more about ( it was the 60's ) was a warlock who became a witness and was tormented by the demons until he proved he was not backing down.
I remember one like that, though I thought it was published around the '80s. A guy who used to summon demons who, after he started studying, had the demons clawing at his window trying to get at him. There's also a story in one publication about a woman who had snakes falling from the ceiling in her bedroom and filling up the entire room. I can't find either of those stories on the CD-ROM at the moment, though.
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Q-tips and Coffee Filters helped me learn TTATT
by RedPillPopper inwell they didn't fully teach me ttatt but helped me on the way.............. first thing i do in the morning after waking up is grinding some nice coffee beans and getting the brew started while i take a hot shower.
after the shower i like to clean out all the nasty wax out of my ears with a q-tip (or cotton swab for those not familiar with that term).. while cleaning out my ears i would think about how nice it is we have things like q-tips and coffee filters that make life more enjoyable but at the same time realize that somebody somewhere is in a factory making these.. i can't imagine a child saying "when i grow up i want to work in a factory making coffee filters".
the people who end up really doing that as adults did not set that to be a life goal.
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Apognophos
I think this line of thought is why some JWs conclude that we will be living in pastoral times in the new system. Say goodbye to those iGadgets, people! And phones and television and cars and so on.
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Origin of Black Skin - JW.org Noah Movie
by Bloody Hotdogs! ini've never seen this discussed here, so thought i'd bring it up:.
as far as i can figure, jehovah's witnesses no longer teach that black skin is the result of a curse from god.
instead, they seem to teach that canaan was already dark skinned when his father, ham, brought the curse of servitude upon their family.
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Apognophos
But surely it would have made more sense if Ham's descendants gradually acquired the color of their skin over many generations. It's the sudden jump from white father to --poof!-- black son that is so comical.