Smiles

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Posts by Smiles

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  9

  Michael's Story (JW commits suicide)

  by RolRod in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  this is the story of michael.

  a 4th generation jw.

  elder, husband, father with relational ties to marley cole.. pimo, stepped down as elder, and the body went after him tooth and nail.

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  Smiles

  All paths in and out of JW high control can become lethal.

  Seek healthy external support, preferably before exiting the cult.
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  27

  Will the ministry ever resume?

  by optimisticskeptic in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  going on 2+ years of no public ministry.

  can't imagine anyone is really enjoying letter writing still or that it's remotely effective.

  i'm a little shocked that we haven't resumed yet but i guess that's what happens when the org is run by a bunch of old people (ie high risk for covid) and a bunch of other sheltered germaphobes.

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  Smiles

  @ OS

  WT just announced resuming all forms of public ministry except door-to-door.

  See the news alert at jw org
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  32

  WT resumes public ministries*

  by Smiles in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  from jw org news alert:.

  breaking news | resuming public witnessing.

  on may 31, 2022, the governing body informed all branch committees that they may now resume all forms of public witnessing with the exception of the door-to-door ministry.

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  Smiles

  from jw org news alert:

  BREAKING NEWS | Resuming Public Witnessing

  On May 31, 2022, the Governing Body informed all Branch Committees that they may now resume all forms of public witnessing with the exception of the door-to-door ministry. Each Branch Committee will examine the local situation in its branch territory, taking into account any governmental restrictions, and will soon provide direction to the congregations.
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  5

  I'm Going To The Olympics!

  by Simon in

  1. social
  2. humour

  i can barely believe it.

  it's really a dream come true.. the culmination of years of training and hard work.. i'm going to the olympics and i'm going to win multiple gold medals.. i finally figured that if a man can identify as a woman and win a medal, then i can identify as a disabled woman, so i reckon i can absolutely clean up at the special olympics.. it's so liberating being woke..

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  Smiles

  LOL

  The new norm
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  3

  Dennis Christiansen release

  by riblah in

  1. social
  2. current

  does anyone know exactly how/why he was arrested?

  i know it was for practicing the religion, but did he and others totally ignore the law in russia and continue meeting openly and going door to door or were they trying to avoid detection?

  did the gb instruct people there to either stop or continue activities there after it was outlawed (i'm sure there's nothing in writing)?.

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  Smiles

  Yes, JWs receive instruction how to covertly violate prohibitions of their activities.

  Read this:

  2019 - Keep Worshipping Jehovah When Under Ban

  https://www.jw.org/finder?wtlocale=E&docid=2019486&srctype=wol&srcid=share&par=2
  
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  26

  When did JWs stop reciting the Lord’s Prayer together?

  by slimboyfat in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  does anyone know what year?

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  Smiles

  WT replaced the hallowed-be-thy-name prayer with a confidential directive to publicly pray for the WT study conductor by name.

  Someone here can probably provide a link to that rubbish.
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  20

  Caleb & Sophia - The Watchtower gets weirder

  by Listener in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  the latest video release 4/4/22 (lesson 44 'don't give up') in the comic series of caleb & sophia just got weirder.

  the plot is about caleb & sophia preaching door to door, caleb with his father and sophia with her mother.

  it shows each of them having doors slammed on them four times.

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  Smiles

  That animated video series (cartoon) "Become Jehovah's Friend" is losing its magic even among PIMI JWs. It is not received as seriously as at first. It has become something of mere entertainment value, even among JW children.

  Some PIMI old timers would prefer if those JW cartoons were excluded from meeting programs in congregations with no children of applicable age.
  
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  12

  The Sanitizing of David

  by Doug Mason in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  the bible depicts king david as a deeply flawed, unsavory character, the perpetrator of evil acts including: murder, insurrection, adultery, banditry, and extortion.

  the sanitizing of david’s character during the following centuries and millennia created an image that idolizes him as the paragon of virtue, closely associated with the promised messiah.

  my study identifies the davidic sanitizing process.. https://www.academia.edu/s/390a7ba170?source=link .

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  Smiles

  Notice how WT changed the wording of Ps 51:4 in their grey abomination...

  "Against you—you above all*—I have sinned"

  *Footnote: Literally, “only you.”
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  32

  Can you list the positive points of being a JW as against the negative points of being a JW in your experience ?

  by smiddy3 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was a twenty y/old when i converted to the jw religion and was a problem drinker and i was a chain smoker .when i was baptized at a circuit assembly a year later , my conversion and change in lifestyle was given as an example of the effectiveness of incidental witnessing to the audience.. so i can point to the 2 positives becoming a jw .. 1.i gave up smoking.

  2.i gave up drinking for a while ,but because i still had association with my wife`s and my family who were not jw`s ,i learnt to control my social drinking when i started again.. and i have been a responsible drinker ever since ,even though i left the religion 29 years ago.. the negative points of being a jw in my 32 years of being one ?

  are far too great to list here .. love to hear your thoughts..

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  Smiles

  However positive any personal benefits may be, JW ideology brings guilt by association.

  The average naïve pro-Nazi individual in 20th century Europe probably enjoyed certain personal perks & benefits, and may have even transformed into a more disciplined person as a result of the ideology; yet any such personal betterment is blemished by crimes of the broader organisation and its leadership.

  Realising how vulnerable we were to high-control group propaganda is a profound lesson, and it can empower us to protect ourselves & others against future exploitations.
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  33

  Response to "The Flood is Real, Because ..."

  by Simon in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  i remember one of the flowchart responses to people questioning the biblical flood was something along the lines that "every culture has a flood story".. of course, nearly everywhere has flooded at one time or another and we know there are minor floods and then there are the 1-in-1000 year kind of weather event, that tend to get a mention (anyone from the uk will still talk about the summer of '76, and that's probably nothing in comparison to a decent flood).. but the inference is that the flood must be real, because every culture has a flood story.. the best response is "now do dragons".. because apparently, nearly every culture also has a dragon legend.. does it mean dragons exist?

  some desperate jw may show their ignorance by suggesting that man lived at the same time as dinosaurs and they are what the stories were based on.

  fun fact: stegosaurus was a fossil when t-rex was alive for longer than it's been since t-rex has been a fossil to us - we're talking old, and no overlap (ignore the map in the cover of the old green bible).. do jws still even bother trying to defend the cray-cray aesop-fable kind of ot beliefs?.

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  Smiles

  No overlapping generations of the stegosaurus class & T-rex class...

  If Carl Sagan compared notes with David Splane.