Yep...technically still one. I have a card in the box at the hall, even though it hasn't shown any hours of service for over two years now (or is it three?).
Personally, I consider myself a recovering JW. This is my group therapy session.
undercover
JoinedPosts by undercover
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110
How Many Here Are "Technically" Still JWs???... Who's Not??
by minimus inwhat i mean is according to the society, there are a number of persons that are "technically" "inactive" yet are viewed as jws still.
i'm sure that i'm viewed as a witness still because i am not df'd or disassociated.....what about you??
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"We do't believe in war."
by hubert ini've heard this time and again from my j.w.
sister-in-law and daughter.
yet, when i found this hymn book, "sing praises to jehovah", i was shocked to find war songs in it, such as ... "gaining victory over the world", page 3.. "god's warriors are advancing", page 39.. "proclaiming jehovah's day of vengeance", page 189.. "see jehovah's army"!
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undercover
I was raised as a JW and the one thing that kept me in longer than any other teaching was the "learn war no more" part. JWs take no part in worldly politics or wars. All other(or more correctly, most other) religions are running around killing each other. That one thing kept me going as a JW. But then as other things crept up that were wrong, I questioned everything. Including war. Pacifism is great if everyone adheres to it. But unfortunately, being a pacifist is a good way to being conquered, enslaved or killed because there is always an agressor out there.
When I started reading some of the Bible on my own without the WTS influence one thing jumped out about the Israelites being led by their God. After their exodus from Egypt, after roaming around for forty years without a home, did God lead them to empty lands to settle down in? No, he had them invade and take over the lands of people already establised there. This wasn't self defense. This was an act of agression by an invading army. They killed women and children indiscrimanently. And people complain about George W. Bush invading Iraq.
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Guess who is being spoken about.
by Maverick inthis information is taken from my daughters college philosophy text book, "the story of philosophy" by bryan magee; .
(this group) tended to regard their beliefs not just as personal opinions but as scientific knowledge, and therefore as "known" with absolute certainty.
this gave them enormous confidence and made them famously intolerant of all alternative views and opinions; and whenever they got into power they forbade the publication or teaching of any ideas that were incompatible with theirs.
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undercover
Guess who that group was......Marxism
Would that be Groucho or Harpo? heh heh
Seriously, that is an interesting quote. On one hand the WTS runs itself much like how that quote described, but then on the other hand they are much more like the Marx brothers, stumbling, bumbling idiots with a couple of smart alecks who think they know everything.
No, that's not being fair. Groucho deserves better than that.
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I'm in Red China!
by Leolaia inwell, i've been in beijing for a good while already, and tomorrow i leave for xian.
it was quite an adventure getting here.
we flew out of tokyo/narita bound for beijing on ana airlines, and after 20 minutes in the air, i finally caught a glimpse of mt.
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undercover
I went to an English-language bookstore to see what books they were selling....I saw Mao Zedong's poems, Thomas More's Utopia, Plato's The Republic, a history of torture and execution, and a retrospective on Ronald Reagan.
I guess things are opening up even more. I felt that they were trying to be more "western" in many ways but I also saw resistance to change.
Great pics. The little girl with the cell phone reminded me of my trip. The little ones just loved us "round eyes". They wanted to practice their English on us. They would just walk up and start talking. And they were so cute. (A side editorial: When you go to a country like China and realize that enough people speak English or partial English so that you can get around okay, maybe us Americans can take a lesson and at least try to learn a little of other languages so that we can be more accomodating to foreign visitors.)
Thanks for sharing the pics and experiences.
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The theocratic week of a "spiritual" JW (brown nosing Arse kisser)
by DaCheech in6:00pm: eat .
6:00pm: eat .
6:00pm: eat .
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undercover
There?s no such thing in the organization as a one- or two-week grace period for the rank-and-file to just catch their breath, or just catch up (there should be!).
It's worse than that. Remember every spring we would be reminded that when we went on our summer vacations that we should still find time to share in the field service and that we should locate the local KH so we could not miss any of Jehovah's spiritual provision?
One elder asked where I had been after I got back from vacation one year. I told him, beach/florida/whatever and he said why bother going on vacation. We should be using our time off of work to share in the ministry more. If we wanted to travel, travel to where the need was great and serve there during vacaton. I just looked at him like he was from Mars or something. A statement that stupid didn't deserve a reply.
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I'm in Red China!
by Leolaia inwell, i've been in beijing for a good while already, and tomorrow i leave for xian.
it was quite an adventure getting here.
we flew out of tokyo/narita bound for beijing on ana airlines, and after 20 minutes in the air, i finally caught a glimpse of mt.
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undercover
I was in Beijing a few years ago. I remember before going that we were warned to be very careful about what reading material we took. Nothing that could be misconstrued by the Chinese Gov. Nothing religious included. No problem, I wasn't planning on taking any Watchtowers or Awakes. While we were there we visited a 400 year old temple. Buddhist I think, can't remember. Anyway it was full of jade idols and what not, very "pagan". While in line to go inside, I saw a western woman sitting on a bench reading. Something struck me funny about her for some reason. I watched her for a bit and it finally hit me. She was reading a Watchtower magazine. And underlining it. Two things struck me about this; One - this is a communist country and we were warned about what reading material to bring. Sneaking in a Watchtower seemed risky to me. Two - apparently this devout JW was there with some non-JW family or on a business trip and while the rest visited the temple, she refused to enter a place of false worship and to keep the demons at bay would read God's supplemental word, The Watchtower. The bastard part of me wanted to alert the Red police to her presence, but that was just a fleeting thought. I did make sure that I was nowhere near her at any time, just in case she got busted. I didn't want to be part of any international religious perscecution controversy.
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Looking for some advice...
by NKyGuy ini have been inactive for the past 5 years or so.
i just could not bring myself to sit through meeting after meeting of the same thing any longer.. however, my wife and children are still regular and as such are preparing to go to the district convention next month.. for the past 4 years i have been able to avoid going to it with commitments to work, etc.
unfortunately this year it is not the case and my wife has made it very clear that she expects me to go with her.. how do i express to her that i don't want to spend 3 days of my life in uncomfortable clothing, sitting in a hot arena, listening to information that makes me want to stab pencils into my ears?
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undercover
I have heard of husbands traveling with their wife and kids but not attending conventions, then going to visit family in the convention city if they had any. Also heard of husband staying in the motel room watching TV while wife and kids went to convention.
I've known people who've done that. As husband and father but not a JW, they still felt that they needed to travel with their family to the convention city. They didn't attend the sessions but found other things to do, but at night took their family to dinner and even arranged to stay a couple of days extrs to visit some of the sites the area had to offer.
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Looking for some advice...
by NKyGuy ini have been inactive for the past 5 years or so.
i just could not bring myself to sit through meeting after meeting of the same thing any longer.. however, my wife and children are still regular and as such are preparing to go to the district convention next month.. for the past 4 years i have been able to avoid going to it with commitments to work, etc.
unfortunately this year it is not the case and my wife has made it very clear that she expects me to go with her.. how do i express to her that i don't want to spend 3 days of my life in uncomfortable clothing, sitting in a hot arena, listening to information that makes me want to stab pencils into my ears?
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undercover
Does your wife understand why you don't want to go? Do you understand why you don't want to go?
It may not be easy, but you're gonna have to tell her the things that have caused you to question the religion. Is it faulty doctrine/prophesy? Is the JW lifestyle too restrictive? Is it just plain boring and dumb? You need to be able to thoughtfully, tactfully and slowly explain the whys and hows to her. She'll probably still get defensive about the "truth" and claim that you're just not "thankful for what Jehovah has provided...blah...blah...blah", but you have to be able to intelligently defend your position and what you know is true. To just keep quiet and hope she doesn't "make" you go is not fair to anyone.
It's hard, I know. I've been there, I'm still there. I get the guilt trips, the speeches, etc. She just hasn't opened her mind up enough to see what's going on, but I hope one day that the right trigger will open the flood gates and she'll see what I was trying to tell her all along.
On the flip side, what's so bad about an occasional meeting or convention? Granted, I could never step foot in a JW meeting of any kind and be perfectly happy for the rest of my life, but at the same time, I refuse to run scared. If the occasion comes up where my presence is required for whatever reason to go to a KH(remembering that I have lots of family still in) I'll go. I'll go with my head held high and be friendly and nice to all that are that way to me. I'll use it as a social occasion to visit old friends and then zone out during the religious part of it. Conventions are a waste of time but if it keeps peace in the family, it's sometime better to go. But it's great to wander around during the sessions, glaring at the little MSs with their "please be seated" signs. Checking out the hotties is a good way to spend the song and prayer time. Everybody else is busy, so it's easy to let your eyes wander around and not get caught by the missus. Hell, If your brave enough, take a book to read. I recommend "The DaVinci Code".
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The Purpose of Beth Sarim
by VM44 inbeth sarim, the house in san diego rutherford had built and lived in.. from the proclaimers book, page 76,a few years after brother rutherford?s death, the board of directors of the watch tower society decided to sell beth-sarim.
"the watchtower" of december 15, 1947, explained: "it had fully served its purpose and was now only serving as a monument quite expensive to keep; our faith in the return of the men of old time whom the king christ jesus will make princes in all the earth (not merely in california) is based, not upon that house beth-sarim, but upon god?s word of promise.
but, did the watchtower of december 15,1947 state what was the purpose beth-sarim had fully served?.
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undercover
This might be a bit off topic but since it involves Da Judge I'll ask anyway.
Is there anywhere online that has the entire transcript of the speech that he gave where he claimed, "Millions Now Living Will Never Die?" I seem to remember that he made some other hair-brained claims that have since been overshadowed by the "million dub march" to death instead of paradise earth.
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Some questions?
by def insince iam a new member of this board, ive got some questions maybe someone can point me to the answer.. 1. is it stated anywhere in the bible that you cant marry/date a non-jw?.
2. does the bible state that you have to go door to door and be at "x" number of meetings?.
3. why do most jws not know there history?
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undercover
They told me the first witness was Able...
I've heard that too. But...this simple statement raises questions.
Jehovah's Witnesses consider themselves "THE" Christian congregation. If Jesus started Christianity, how can people who lived before Christ be part of the Christian congregation? If Jehovah's Witnesses have existed since Abel, why was it necessary to implement Christianity?
...the first witness was Able not Charles Taze Russell
Actually C.T. Russell wasn't the first modern "Jehovah's Witness" either. That would probably be J.F. Rutherford. Do a little research on the history of the WTS and JWs and you'll see that Rutherford pretty much did a hostile takeover over what Russell had built and converted it to his own brand of idealogies.