I wasn't in the popular crowd. I would volunteer as an attendant at the assembly every year, and the overseer would never remember my name. I would always be the one at the entrance of the assembly hall handing out programmes, but very few outside my own congregation would ever stop to speak to me, despite me being there year after year.
Posts by 88JM
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55Were you popular in your congregation or district?
by Emery innot to start some form of popularity contests here but i was wondering how popular some people were?
how far did your network go in this organization?
this question also pertains to those who are actively fading..
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Jehovah's Witnesses Conference Center, photographs from Jan. 25 open house
by moomanchu inmore real estate & money !click here http://thetandd.com/news/jehovah-s-witnesses-conference-center/collection_cb5ac476-6825-11e2-9002-001a4bcf887a.html#0 for a slideshow of the assembly hall.emily youngblood says there are a lot of opportunities in the world for a 21-year-old opportunities for success and fame.but serving god and others is youngbloods joy.
so the lexington resident was honored to take part in the construction of the new orangeburg assembly hall of jehovahs witnesses.just seeing something all of us are so passionate about and that we enjoyed doing, to me that is a great opportunity to show that we are doing this as volunteers and as part of our worship of god, youngblood said.youngblood was among the approximately 5,000 volunteers who worked on the assembly hall over the past year and a half.the 3,000-seat assembly hall sits on 58 acres near the intersection of s.c. highway 33 and interstate 26. an open house was held friday.the center will serve primarily as a location to educate the jehovahs witnesses on biblical principles for daily life.
more than 300 congregations will use the assembly hall for their semi-annual assemblies.youngblood said she heard about the orangeburg project about six years ago and knew she wanted to volunteer at that time.i worked on anything that i could, she said.
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88JM
You can tell those books had to be written by someone on LSD
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I blew up tonight!!!
by msconcerned inwatching "our whole association of brothers" for the meeting tonight, and we came to the part where the japanese brother lost his two kids and wife.
he went on to relate that holy spirit helped him to cope with the loss.
i came unglued!
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88JM
I was made to watch this video last night too with my dad. I had forgotten how much it screemed "IT'S A CULT! IT'S A CULT!"
It clearly wasn't made for "outsiders" surely, because anyone who saw it would think, "what the hell? who are these weirdos?"
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Does anyone have copies of the full Publisher Report's 2000 to 2005?
by jwfacts ina university has requested the publisher reports for the years 2000 to 2005 for a social science academic study.
i only have the grand totals.
is anyone able to provide scans of the reports from the yearbook?
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88JM
Here you go Paul - hope these are all ok. They were quick scans, and I've tried to straighten and adjust contrast as best as possible, but nothing much else. I didn't dare put them through OCR as they don't scan particularly well with the paper being so thin. They're probably just about ok for on-screen viewing, but I'm not sure how well they would print. You can read the figures at least:
2000:
http://depositfiles.com/files/1tqpwg1pq[Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/rHguJAj2001:
http://depositfiles.com/files/cl9llsfv7 [Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/rHguJAj2002:
http://depositfiles.com/files/a7meawzve [Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/rHguJAj2003:
http://depositfiles.com/files/fzgy98wcx[Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/wTPEmAQ2004:
http://depositfiles.com/files/jg2tpzk6k[Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/wTPEmAQ2005:
http://depositfiles.com/files/e3u7jbdss[Mirror] http://www.fileflyer.com/view/wTPEmAQ -
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Tonight on Channel 4 prog about Child Abuse !!!
by Phizzy inthe programme is at 10.30 gmt and is a channel 4 dispatches special about child abuse in a religious community.
i think this is concerned with a case within the jewish religious community here.. i think we all in the u.k, and anyone else who can access it, should watch it , and then perhaps many of us can e-mail the programmes makers and highlight the jw problem.
the jewish religious community is probably only about twice the size of the u.k jw's, about 266, 000 identified as jewish in a religious sense in the 2001 census.
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88JM
I watched it too.
To me, I noticed the word that all the rabbis and their supporters were using a lot was "hope".
Like: "we hope these abusers will be brought to justice", and "we hope that it all turns out okay", all the while doing very little about it.
But they think that is all fine, and that hope is enough - they seem to think they are perfectly capable of handling the problem themselves - "hope" will sort it all out. These people are dangerous. Hope does not sort it out. If they do nothing about these abusers, they will keep on abusing as the program showed. Hope does not get an abuser arrested - only the proper authorities can do that.
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Were/Are you and Elder, MS, CO, Bethelite, etc.? (Please check in here)
by El_Guapo ini'm sure alot of you have noticed, the influx of new jwn members with "postitions within the cong" this is amazing, i myself am still an m.s.
working to get removed.
lol my wife (who has been really supportive throughout my fade) asked my why i am doing i decided to fade?.
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88JM
I've been an MS for about 4 years now I think. Trying to fade in a small congregation.
I like the idea of "I'm doing it under compulsion" as an excuse for stepping down - hadn't thought of that one, so thanks guys.
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You-are-too-dumb: Proper handling of nested magazines (BOE Letter)
by pixel into all bodies of elders.
re: proper handling of nested magazines.
dear brothers:.
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88JM
Yes, we had it too here in the UK: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/244630/1/Letter-about-placing-TWICE-as-many-magazines
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Does anyone have copies of the full Publisher Report's 2000 to 2005?
by jwfacts ina university has requested the publisher reports for the years 2000 to 2005 for a social science academic study.
i only have the grand totals.
is anyone able to provide scans of the reports from the yearbook?
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88JM
I could probably scan them for you. Are you looking for all countries or just a specific one - U.S., Britain etc.?
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Was jehovah/yahweh/god the first to commit an abortion?!
by OneDayillBeFree injust caught this in today's watchtower!
while the wtb&ts is going on about all of david's sins and how god was being a "god of love" and showing forgiveness to his servants, (keyword: his= only jehovah's witnesses) i decided to go ahead and start reading the whole story about what really happened.
so then i stumbled upon 2 samuel 12:15&18 .
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88JM
Today's Watchtower was yet another whitewash. Not only did they go to great lengths to to defend wicked King David again (they never really discussed all the other bad stuff he did that was arguably worse) but they also made Jay Hoover out as someone who could forgive anything as long as you said you were sorry - be it adultery, murder, infanticide or whatever. These King David articles are sickening - we had one just 3 weeks ago.
If God is so merciful on the big stuff, what about the poor guy in Numbers 15 who was killed for picking up sticks on the Sabbath? Did he get the chance to repent? Where was the loving mercy then?
I sure don't want to serve a God who is fine with letting murder and mass slaughter slide past, but will quickly dispatch anyone who gets his firewood on the wrong day.
When it comes to Elders in a Judicial Committee, you just know they will be turning to Numbers 15, and King David won't even be mentioned.
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My Story Part 2 - by 88JM
by 88JM inpart 1 here: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/243954/1/my-story-part-1-by-88jm.
part 2. so my parents married in 1980 and my older brother was born 2 years later in 1982. by this time, my grandparents had moved into the house next door to my parents.
my dad was still working for yorkshire water and was in a very well paid position by the time i was born in 1988. between these years, my mum had also had a miscarriage, though this is rarely mentioned in our house these days, but i'm sure it must still affect her.. there aren't many notable events that i can recall from before i was 4 years old, though i was later to learn that my dad was having an affair at this time.
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88JM
Part 1 here: http://www.jehovahs-witness.net/jw/friends/243954/1/My-Story-Part-1-by-88JM
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Part 2
So my parents married in 1980 and my older brother was born 2 years later in 1982. By this time, my grandparents had moved into the house next door to my parents. My dad was still working for Yorkshire Water and was in a very well paid position by the time I was born in 1988. Between these years, my mum had also had a miscarriage, though this is rarely mentioned in our house these days, but I'm sure it must still affect her.
There aren't many notable events that I can recall from before I was 4 years old, though I was later to learn that my dad was having an affair at this time. My mum apparently “forgave” him, though not in any real sense of the word, and essentially still holds it against him to this day, though they never did separate.
I guess we were a little spoilt as kids – dad would always buy us toys, including a (rather impressive) train set which I always loved. Perhaps this was to make up for the many hours where he was absent due to a demanding career, often working overnight, I don't really know. Having grandparents living next door, you could always run to them when you got in trouble with mum or dad, and get spoilt all over again. My grandmother would often take us into town on the train to do her shopping, and I have fond memories of helping her out around the house and also learning to bake.
Our house was in a small cul-de-sac of semi-detached 1940s properties, and we were probably one of the last suburban generations that would (be allowed to) freely play outside for hours on end, even with the (non-JW) neighbour kids, as long as we stayed in sight.
The Kingdom Hall was within walking distance from home, about 5 minutes away, though we would often go by car as we were one of those families that was always running late and leaving things to the last minute. My granddad was an elder in the congregation, and liked by many I'm told.
I'm not sure my dad ever became a ministerial servant before this time – if he was, then I think he must have been “removed” after his affair. I never did get the full story on that, and only found out about it many years later when my mum was upset and blurted it out in a tirade against my dad. I feigned that I knew already, but in reality I was never sure of real reason they argued so much, though I always guessed there was something more.
Around this time, I do have fond memories of the congregation book study. The first I can remember was at the apartment of an elderly widowed sister (I loved riding the lift up) and where a tin of Quality Street sweets would be passed around after every group, as well as tea and coffee for the grown ups, and cold drinks for the kids. This was for a few years until this sister passed away from a long illness, and hers is one of the first funerals I still remember. The next group was at the house of a divorced JW sister, which while it was always neat and tidy, it was the sort of place with lots of decoration and “knick-knacks” that the sister would bring back from her travels, and the smell of burning joss sticks which I still associate with the book study if ever I encounter them today.
The congregation where we grew up felt comparitively “young” compared to what is seen now – there were many young parents, prams being pushed around the lobby and quite a few kids running around, though I was always at the younger end of the spectrum, and probably the youngest child in the hall for many years. The congregation had grown to such an extent that it had split in two when I was quite young, so my parents would often speak of their friends in “the other congregation” who I never really knew, but they always seem to forget that and talk about them like I did anyway.
At 7 years old, I “joined” the Theocratic Ministry School - in reality my Dad had pushed me into it and signed me up. I did half of my first bible reading, then he took over and did the other half. This was in the days when you had to write your own introduction and conclusion to the reading, and it was 5 minutes long, instead of 4.
At school, there were always about 3 other JW kids going through at the same time as me and quite a few before us (like my older brother) who had come and gone, so the teachers were well accustomed to us sitting out of religious education classes, and also from church services on Thursdays, this being a Church of England infants school.
I never really enjoyed or excelled at sports particularly, but did better in the classroom, and always was a bit of a teacher's pet usually, but I suppose also being brought up as a JW, it gave me a feeling of superiority over other “worldly” kids. I wouldn't say that I got bullied, and I tended to keep to myself and out of trouble.
There was always rivalry between my brother and myself. Likewise, being the youngest in the congregation, I was usually the one to get the jibes whenever younger ones got together for socialising. As I grew older, by the age of about 10 it became even more difficult – my older brother would go to play football with a squad of brothers on a Sunday evening, while I would be left at home and quite upset that I wasn't allowed to go. I guess I can understand now that I wasn't really old enough – my brother often came back muddy and bruised. Still, it also didn't matter that I didn't even really care for football – I still felt left out, and remember being very upset around this time, and isolated socially, which I guess many young JWs feel to one extent or another. Our family never really did very well at hospitality, and were rarely the ones to hold parties - only very occasionally and only by my grandmother.
Not only socially, but this was also a difficult time as my granddad had passed away quite suddenly, and while I wasn't quite as close to him as my grandmother, he was the first close family member to pass away, and it certainly affected my grandmother who was never really the same. Only a few years later, she herself had a long battle with breast cancer, finally succumbing to it in 2007.
For as long as I can remember, we always took our family holidays up north in Scotland. There were a few different places to begin with, including caravanning near the borders, but many years we visited the rural north of Scotland.
My dad was later offered early retirement, and a healthy pay-off with a pension. My mum had particularly loved visiting Scotland, so it was decided that the whole family would move to the north of Scotland with my dad's pay-off, and that is what we did in 1998. I have lived here since that time.
...to be continued in Part 3.