Posts by pronomono

212

Why Do You No Longer Believe in God?

by Tenacious in

i know this question has popped up from time to time but i really would like to know how you guys, those that no longer believe, came to that conclusion?

was it the wts and all its crap?

was it something you read?

pronomono

For me it was a long, slow process to disbelief. I wanted to believe so badly because it was all I'd ever known. I couldn't accept the fact that my parents were wrong and that I had unintentionally been lied to. I took it that I was less intelligent and that as I grew and matured I would come to appreciate and understand the spiritual things everyone else I knew loved so much.

That never happened. I'm now 30. For the past 2.5 years I've been questioning everything, starting with our rich JW spiritual heritage and realized it wasn't as rich as I've been told. TTATT completely shattered my respect for the Watchtower organization, which led to an investigation of the Bible. That investigation led me to distrust the Bible as an authoritative source. This lead me to investigate the supernatural, which I found no basis for belief.

All my research led me to one conclusion: "The more we learn about science and the world around us, the more we explain religion away, and religion has to continue reinventing itself to stay relevant." Science has changed alchemy to chemistry and astrology to astronomy. I believe that early alchemists/witches/diviners/etc were people that had an early understanding of how to harness the power of some scientific phenomenon without understanding its true properties and cause, and therefore chalked it up to angels/demons. Phenomenon that was once used as a means for divination and mysticism have been explained away by science as having logical causes. When I think of religion and God, I see an early attempt of the human species to try and understand the world around them, and I think at the time it was a necessary stepping stone. Any hypothesis is worth exploring. However, once that hypothesis was shown to have no verifiable proof, it should have been discarded a long time ago. Instead, it lead to the real intellectuals and geniuses of our past being hindered and labeled heretics, hindering the scientific process, our technological growth, and our growth as a species. I truly believe that if religion hadn't got in the way, we'd be much better off today in all aspects of life.

As far as the Bible goes, I used to think (a looooong time ago) how could such a wonderful book be anything other than the word of God. Until I started reading the parts the Watchtower never highlighted on condoned rape, slavery, and other OT atrocities. And then I started reading the Book of Mormon and the Koran and realized it's easier to make this stuff up than you might think. They couldn't all be right, yet they had all done the same thing.

17

My mom

by cognac in

jw
friends

i was just talking to my mom a few weeks ago.

she said, out of all her kids, i was the only one she didn't have to worry about as far as spirituality.

i always took a stand for jehovah.. she told when all of her kids were little, she gave us the option of not eating birthday cakes in school.

pronomono

I'm glad you've reached a point where you can be honest with your mom without her shunning you. I've thought about these same conversations with my mom and I'm not sure how they will go. She's one of those people that needs the truth to be true. Between recently loosing her mom and raising my sister who is disabled with severe scoliosis and a very low quality of life, she needs something better to look forward to. I don't think I could tell her that she's wrong.

I hope you can keep repairing the relationship you have with your mom. It sounds like you are on the right path, and she is responding positively.

312

Mass disassociation pact...

by freemindfade in

any takers?

we can pick a date and pull the plug?

lol .

pronomono

This is a really bad idea. The best way to work against the machinations of the Watchtower is to always have agents of truth within.

The sad truth is no matter what tactic we use, the Watchtower will probably never change. Change will never come from within. Raymond Franz tried that. It didn't work. If you had 4 or 5 Raymond Franz's reach GB Pope level, then you'd have the possibility of change, but that's a crap shoot. Our main effort here should be raising public awareness so that the public sees the JW religion for what it truly is. If the organization changed a few destructive policies, I'd be fine with them believing what they want about God, 1914, this generation, etc. It's their right to believe what they want in this regard. However, it isn't their right to divide families because someone decides they no longer believe those very things. It isn't right to cut people off from their closest friends.

If these harmful policies receive enough negative publicity, maybe they will change, but probably not. The best we can hope for is that the general public will become aware of these policies before it is to late and they find themselves in the same position that many of us were/are in.

312

Mass disassociation pact...

by freemindfade in

any takers?

we can pick a date and pull the plug?

lol .

pronomono

If the campaign goes well this year, it should become an annual Human Rights campaign that continues on until the Watchtower reforms all policies that violate basic human rights. So we'll be doing this for a long time, close to forever, but hopefully it would continue to make some sort of impact. We just have to represent ourselves well, so as to not come across as mentally-diseased.

102

Finished Mystery (1917)... The book that Jesus approved...

by Alfred in

so a few months ago, a friend sent me an actual copy of finished mystery which was published in 1917 (not a pdf download... the actual book).

i must say, this was the most disturbing book i have ever had the displeasure of reading.

but i only read it because this was the main publication that was being distributed worldwide when jesus supposedly chose the watchtower in 1918 and i basically wanted to see for myself what jesus saw in the wt that would compel him to choose this religious corporation over all other religious denominations.. anyway, if anyone is interested in knowing the actual contents of this book, here are some bullet points i put together from some of the notes i took as i read the book:.

pronomono

You'd think they would have sunk this a long time ago. Nope, instead the portray it as an early victory true religion, except it's all false.

6

Presumptuous?

by Tornintwo in

jw
friends

i know this is old news, but just found this priceless quote on jwfacts from 2001 watchtower (yes 2001 not 1941!!!

) looks like geoffrey jackson never read this one:.

"is it presumptuous of jehovah's witnesses to point out that they alone have god's backing?

pronomono

Quite presumptuous indeed.

21

KM - another evidence for the leaked letter

by fastJehu in

the december kingdom ministry (km) is online.

.

no schedule for the first week in january 2016 - as in previous december kms.. so another evidence, that beginning with january 2016 the org will change the mid-week-meeting.. -----> download link: http://download.jw.org/files/media_publickm/72/km_e_201512.pdf.

pronomono

alanv5 hours agoInterestingly in the presentation section it gives options to offer 'this months offer of the Watchtower' or 'this months offer of the Awake'. I thought starting in January there would only be one of the magazines available and the other magazine being published and offered the next month.

That was the impression that I got too, but re-reading the letter it just says we will feature the Watchtower in January and the Awake in February. Seeing both have January presentations in the December KM leads me to believe that we'll get both in January, but feature them in different months. Pure speculation, but that would make more sense because they could do all their deliveries in the odd numbered months and not have any in the even numbered months. And if special orders were done during the odd numbered months too, they could consolidate shipments and have greatly reduced shipping costs. Or the discrepancy could be a transitional oversight. Either way, we'll find out more soon. Hopefully someone will be able to get us a copy of the video for this.

45

After leaving did the feeling go away?

by committeechairman in

the feeling that you're never good enough.

the feeling that you're wicked and evil.. .

because i'd give anything not to feel this way.

pronomono

A lot of those feelings went away, but some of them were replaced by equally negative feelings, like:

- I'm not good enough for my wife.

- I think my wife secretly resents our marriage because I'm not the man I used to be.

- Guilt for maintaining a false pretense of being a believer with my family and some friends.

- Agonizing over all the worst-case scenarios when I'm finally outed.

Don't get me wrong. I'm glad that I've been schooled in TTATT and checked myself out of the TMS and this religion (mentally), but I haven't reached my full solution yet. Sometimes trying to deal with a fade can wreak as much mental havoc as waking up to TTATT.

14

How Much Does It Cost To Produce One Watchtower Magazine?

by The Governor in

jw
friends

hello everyone i had a quick question to ask.

does anyone know how much it cost to produce a watchtower magazine?

also does anyone know how much each watchtower magazine is worth?

pronomono

What really puts a drain on the Watchtower resources are all the Bethelites who run the presses, research, and write that the Watchtower has to feed, house, provide limited medical care to, a small stipend for clothing/miscellaneous expenses, etc. I'm sure there's a lot more supporting expenses that add up. New machinery and technology help them to do more with less, but printing still puts a major drain on their resources no matter how low they can bring the cost down per page.

Cutting printing helps them in so many ways. With all the Bethel cut backs that have been reported on, there's a good number of people they can cut from printing because they're reducing they're public magazine load by half. They're pushing stronger for the R&F to download, so there's a few less things needing to be printed and a few more people to be cut. Less people printing means less people that will be needed to support that staff for cleaning, feeding, laundry, deliveries, etc. It's all one big chain reaction that lets them continue to cut, cut, cut to reduce costs and maximize gains from whatever money they are still getting.

Before long, Jehovah's Witnesses will resemble more of an e-religion that just so happens to have congregations of people meeting in your local area.

There's a lot more thought that has to go into determining the cost of printing a magazine that just the cost of printing a magazine. It seems cheap, but it's really not. Otherwise, the Watchtower wouldn't be downsizing so much.

43

New here!

by Mandy97 in

jw
friends

hi guys !

hm.. i'm new in this website !

my name is mandy and i just want to meet new people!

pronomono

Sabin: You've just never had good snails. lol. If you ever make it to New Orleans, Dickie Brennan's Steakhouse has some of the best escargot you can get. It's one of my top dishes to try before you die.