underground
This is your first post. Are you new to the forum, or an existing one using another layer of anonymity?
no-zombie
i’d like to start out by saying this is my opinion.. i believe that the organisation is about to make blood transfusions in any form a conscience matter.. they will still ban the eating of blood.. they will gaslight everyone by talking about how it is so much safer now.
and will say something along the lines of how our stance protected us from the aids crisis etc.. and i believe this change is going to happen before the annual meeting 2024.. i think the annual meeting will announce they are scrapping the midweek meeting and instead we get to watch a streamed talk at home through a revamped website similar to the way netflix works.. obviously take my opinion with a hefty pinch of salt..
underground
This is your first post. Are you new to the forum, or an existing one using another layer of anonymity?
no-zombie
as your family considers its disaster preparedness plan, please ensure that the secretary has up-to-date contact information for you and your emergency contact.
also, we have re- peatedly seen good results when brothers and sisters are prepared with go bags and are ready to obey direction when they face various kinds of disasters.
please be sure you have a go bag, and review its contents at least once a year.
While have a 'go-bag' is good idea (something that few witnesses really understand how to make an effective one, or know the skill-sets required to survive a local natural disaster), I have always been rather cynical about the Governing Body's push to have them. This is because I believe that this whole 'disaster, go-bag and relief committee' thing is to increase the Brotherhood's fear of the future, while making them mentally more dependent in the Organization.
However, as anyone who have had studied EMT healthcare or even deeply read into the events after cyclone Katrina, the Haiti earthquake or the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, in a real emergency you will on your own for three to four WEEKS before there is any outside assistance start to trickle in. Proving a silly two day backpack with a couple of cans of beans, is not going to get you very far.
Like many things the Governing Body says and 'arranges' ... its not going to you any good, when half of your family are pissing blood like sprinklers, while you're are waiting for the Bookstudy conductor's f****'n phone call.
(sorry for the language)
i need help regarding a video where geoffrey jackson likened the governing body to a watch dog given false alarms to its owner just like they do regarding numerous false alarms about the world coming to an end.
here is why i need that video.
to make comparison with the words of geoffrey jackson (the false dog illustration) fully, the words of gerrit losch (who was reading out list of those who had given false predictions and alarms in times past before jehovah’s witnesses took over) .
As Beth Sarim says, both are dumb.
Even so, what I have noticed from various Governing Body members, is that when they criticize the weakness of Christendom, they become highly emotive and lay on the curses of being a false prophet. However they make light of their own failures, by trying to use humorously excuses and comic relief.
No ... the Governing Body have always ran with two sets of standards of integrity, one for the world ... and one for themselves.
y'all i am an unmedicated bipolar.
i had a mania streak and slept with my bf who is of the world.
i am pregnant from this.
Choose the first Elder you talk to about this, very carefully.
Choose the softest one you know.
He will most likely be on your committee. Don't go to any hardliner, even if you have known him for years. As rule-book people, will always be rule-book people.
as there has been some discussion calling bs on this topic, .
i will paste the text from my 10 year plan post and i will critically evaluate how i feel things will turn out.
i will add bold italics my thoughts.. the governing body has a 10-year marketing plan to remodel the organization to become closer to a mainstream christian religion.
joey jojo
The Organization isn't what it used to be, no ... it got more stupid. You see, from my view the overlapping generations of our Governing Body has dug such a great pit for itself, that only an earthquake could fill it.
When have you last heard of a happy Catholic decide to become a Witness because they though our teachings better reflected what's in the bible? What about a person who was a Pentecostal or Anglican? No, the only people who join, are the lonely and depressed ... impressed by the love-bombing that is actually available in many churches.
For me, its clear ... no earthquake, no growth, no religion.
as there has been some discussion calling bs on this topic, .
i will paste the text from my 10 year plan post and i will critically evaluate how i feel things will turn out.
i will add bold italics my thoughts.. the governing body has a 10-year marketing plan to remodel the organization to become closer to a mainstream christian religion.
redsetter2
Wherever the 10 year plan comes from (whether internally from its own committees or through a private external advisor), I ultimately don't care. However what I believe is far more important, is the question whether or not the changes we are seeing, part of a COHERENT DECISION to attract new blood into the Organization.
If it is all part of some kind of house cleaning or a form of legal risk mitigation, then it will all come to nothing when the Faith dies of old age. That's a just predictable fact.
On the other hand, if the Governing Body has CHOSEN 'the short term pain for the long term good' to make the Society more visually attractive to world ... then I say to you, the changes we have heard about are not nearly radical enough.
But is the Governing Body really smart enough, to do things they don't want to do? Because no one is coming into the Truth because he can keep is beard or his girlfriend can wear slacks to the meeting.
while having my first strong black coffee of the day, i was thinking about what may be to come next as the org.
rapidly goes mainstream, and this is what i came up with :.
1) they will introduce for sunday, the after meeting fellowship, a time for just chatting but with the added bonus of coffee and snacks.
Because there are so many thing that need to go within the Organization and the fact that its literally steered by a small unaccountable committee, it is really hard to foresee the next series of changes. And so at the moment, it could nearly be anything. But, as time goes on, a pattern of thinking will develop and things are bound to become more predictable.
However right now, I'm finding that the private conversations after the meeting much more interesting, with many of our good folk, making up their own wish lists of changes.
i think the gb needs to expand publishers' volunteer activities beyond door knocking.. gb has shifted away from door-knocking to more varied forms of witnessing and no longer counting time for publishers.
my prediction is that the gb will start encouraging jws to participate in broader community volunteer efforts: clean-up drives, food banks, senior citizen support, and other non-proselytizing activities.
this move could help them gain goodwill with government agencies and the public.. expanding volunteer activities could significantly shift how jws are perceived by the wider community.
Doinmypart
While having a outward focused social ministry (like soup kitchens and other real charitable works) would clearly revalue Jehovah's Witnesses in the eyes of the wider community. Its unlikely in the near term (say within the next 10 years) to have the number of young people needed to do this work in a meaningful way. Because as we are well aware, we are an old peoples' religion.
Thus the ability to implement this suggestion is just not possible and it will take a whole new generation of Witnesses (ones regrown or acquired in some other way) for it to be attempted.
Its not to say that it isn't a good idea, but like some many of the Organization's other issues, due to the single bloody mindedness of the Governing Body's sole focus on the door-to-door work, it sort of idea is now far too late. Even to current push to rebrand Watchtower construction projects as an exciting career option to our youth (as banged on quite regularly by our video updates) doesn't seem to be working, judging by the continual effort the GB spends on these advertisements.
But deep down, the core problem is that now after years of deliberate molding, Jehovah's Witnesses are selfish dependent children, not thinking Christians who look for ways to express their personal appreciation for God's kindnesses. And quite frankly, cultivating the real veneration Christ's qualities and the desire to obtain a mature conscience, is a much harder problem for the Governing Body, than dealing with a failed prophecy. No, not until they abandon King David as a roll model and start preaching the New Testament, will they see any change.
no matter what opinions you may have, the memorial is very important to us.
many are opposed to the way the organization performs the memorial because of restrictive rules as to who should partake.
as jesus said in scripture, "keep doing this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.
There has been the thought offered, that the Governing Body will some how revise the Memorial but I don't think that its necessary, nor actually advisable for the following reasons.
While we are reminded every year, that one day (after the rapture) the need for the Memorial will end, until that time it does hold a special place in the hearts and minds of the Brotherhood, that could be said to be one of the few Biblical things we do. But on a practical point, the fact that the option (and partaking of the bread and wine) for the heavenly hope, does help the many newer ones from Christendom accept the Faith easier. And its well understood and tolerated by local Elders (and by extension the Society) that many do actually partake do to an 'spiritual enthusiasm' that can dissipate over time.
Also, every religion (even the well established mainstream Christian religions) have a bit of magic or mysticism in their practical worship. And if you have ever been to an Orthodox Mass then you will understand the importance of the trappings around it are, let alone the Transubstantiation of Christ blood and flesh, in the minds of its followers.
Thus it could be said that religious particularities can be well tolerated and valued. And so I feel that the Memorial can be ours, considering that its not really an onerous occasion to attend.
Plus its one one few occasions, were Jesus cracks a decent mention.
let's be honest, there's a stigma to the name jehovah's witness.
if they are going more mainstream.
i imagine the first recommendation was a name change.
You're right of course TonusOH. I guessing that you must be half-full glass, kind of guy.