the best game of the whole football year is almost always the champions league final.. it's on tv live right now and this year both finalists are from madrid.. real madrid v athletico madrid.. the talent on show for the next 90 minutes is stunning.. diego costa has been subbed already - hamstring.. if you can't get the game in your country you can follow the updates here....
Ronaldo played injured.
I was there. Pretty boring game until minute 90. THEN, suddenly it got very interesting. What a party on the streets for the Real fans. A fan of the Atletico who was with me kept repeating to me: "Just kill me now. I want to die." I really felt sorry for him.
As a side note: Sometimes we lash out here on the WTS...well, yesterday I had it first hand just what a bunch of as***les the UEFA people are. Unbelievable. A gold-painted turd is still a turd.
Eden
plans for a huge jehovahs witness commune on the outskirts of chelmsford are gathering pace.. the international bible students association, the charity which manages jehovahs witnesses printing and literature distribution, wants to create a new british headquarters.. the 82-acre site (about 15 football pitches) at temple farm site, off ship road, west hanningfield.. the plans include a printery - producing bible-based literature - admin and language translation of?ces, video and sound production studios, an auditorium, training centre and workshops all on site.. plus there will be one and two bedroom apartments - for up to 1,200 residents and visitors - along with onsite caterers, laundrettes and healthcare facilities.. the site would also have its own energy centre - making it self-sufficient - and a new access road would also be built from temple wood.. a resident from stock, 60, who didnt want to be named, said: its all a bit sci-fi if you ask me.
its a very unusual development, a commune really.
i wouldnt say i was against it as it is all a bit of a mess at that site at the moment.. the land, currently occupied by a car breakers yard, was removed from the green belt by chelmsford city council in 2008 and earmarked for employment use.. ibsa agreed to buy the land from its current owners in december, as long as they get planning permission for the project.
My gut feeling is that all of Europe's branch offices will end up being consolidated (closed) into this one giant compound in the UK.
Eden
.. the new wbt$ donation arrangement/ jw kingdom hall bank account theft... is a very hot topic right now... the wbt$ is literally going to clean out kingdom hall bank accounts,filled with donations from jws... that theft is going to happen world wide..the wbt$ is going to steal from 7 million plus jw`s... .. we have jw elders here on jwn,that know whats going on... they "serve" in kingdom halls,they are "supposed" to be looking after the welfare of the average jw... they know there is a 4 page letter,only one page will be read to the congregation..the rest will be kept secret... they know the wbt$ is about to steal jw donations..on a world wide scale!!!...
.. i would like to know what you active jw elders are going to do about this??!!...
are you going to let "your" congregation know about the other 3 secret pages?...
YOUR MONEYS ARE BELONG TO US! GIVE IT TO ME NOW!
(so glad I'm not an elder anymore)
no longer a ms ........................... can't give details atm, for it might be a dead-giveaway and it ain't quite over yet.
but, it really taught me one thing: if you're trying to fade or stay in, trust no one.
and i mean no one.. eden.
hey MissFit :)
My son had a curious experience at school the other day, at a philosophy forum. Some evangelical colleagues stated that faith can solve every problem; he asked them why people of great faith have problems that cannot be solved. Their reply was that if a problem cannot be solved by faith, then such person is lacking faith. My son then went to tell his classmates that he has never known anyone of greater faith than his grandmother (JW) and yet she is being slowly eaten away by cancer. They told him that obviously she hasn't got enough faith, otherwise she would be healed by now. My son came home furious and commented that there are other religions that can be more ignorant than the JW's, after all. I thought it was a fair remark lol
He doesn't go to meetings nor field service, but when there's some social meeting in the congregation he goes and manages to have a good time; I'm glad that no one is snubbing him.
As for me, I file a couple of FS hours a month and the motley crew leaves me to my devices.
The other week I had the n.2 bible reading and my ex co-elder had to give me the counsel from the School book. He was soo uncomfortable I had to laugh. I've usually been The top speaker of The congregation on The public talks :P I'm happy to report I made a "model reading" lol. How happyfying!
Eden
for those who still believe in god, if local congregations could break away from the watchtower would you consider becoming a witness again.
this would mean no more governing body, circuit overseers, watchtower magazines, and each congregation could have its own "new light".
most of us left because of the control (no college, disfellowsipping) but if the watchtower was out of the picture, all of this would disappear.
The major problem with the JW's is the flawed theology. Once you realize that, it's of little consequence the issue of how autonomous are the congregations. First, the theology must undergo a vast overhaul (and the question of just how reliable the Bible is must be faced with honesty, not with the self-blinding mantra: "the Bible is God's inerrant word"). If some day this issue would be dealt with properly ...but I'm afraid that is only wishful thinking.
Eden
i like to tell you what we've been doing these past few days here in portugal (ex-jw).
we create a brochure and printing, so we can send to the maximum of congregations in portugal.
some individuals were also covered in this campaign.. the title of the pamphlet is: "when will the kingdom arrive?".
I'm yet to see it in the flesh ....
Eden
the lawyers acting on behalf of the wtbts/g.b./'mother' during a paedophile case a couple of years ago, have stated on record that - .
a) "field ministry is not controlled or monitored by the elders, the congregation, or watchtower".
b) "an individual publisher's field ministry activity, including the time and manner it is carried out, is a personal matter between the publisher and his god.".
marked
ok so... how to condense all the flip-flops and doctrinal changes, and show graphically how the different doctrines changed, and when?.
ttatt in a can!!.
enjoy ;).
Good job! Marked.
Eden
when jehovah's witnesses began distributing door to door the new world translation beginning in the early 1950's a firestorm of protest broke out in mainstream churches.
the alarm cry was "they've changed the bible to fit their own crooked teachings!".
you can imagine the discord as church members tried to figure out how jehovah's witnesses could prove by reading from the nwt the king james version was full of omissions and errors and outright fraud concerning, for instance, the trinity doctrine or the name of god!!.
Terry, do you really think that the NWT deserves as much credit as starting a 'revolution', as mainstream christian churches felt threatened by the non-orthodox interpretations lend by the text of the Jehovah's Witnesses' NWT and started to sponsor more serious scholarship on the Bible? I find it a bit of a stretch, such conclusion.
To wit:
1862 - Young's Literal Translation
1885 - Revised Version (Based on King James Bible)
1890 - Darby Bible
1901 - American Standard Version
1926 - Moffatt Translation
1935 - An American Translation
1936 - Westminster Bible
1949 - Bible in English
It seems to me that, much more than the NWT, it was the discovery, study and publishing of the Dead Sea Scrolls that prompted the new scholarly approach to translations.
Eden
i've been reading a lot lately about the historical jesus, and the latest archaeological findings and what a comparative, horizontal, reading of the 4 canonic gospels actually do tell us about the historical jesus and his teachings.
pick your side, but let me ask you this, because that's the core question i have been asking myself lately:.
if the historical jesus wasn't the son of god, but simply a human prophet with no previous super-human existence, hence, merely the "son of man", with very appealing teachings, but no previous super-human existence, hence, not "son of god" as we commonly believe as jw's, would you still be a christian?
Good point, VdH ... if Jesus wasn't of super-human origin, then how could his death mean "salvation" / atonement for anyone?
Eden
