NOTE: I originally started this as a reply to a query on the thread “A Different JW Viewpoint.” AlanF had asked me why I stay a JW in view of what I posted there. As I developed the reply, it started to become clear to me that it was such a deviation from my original post that it deserved a separate thread.
AlanF and Andi
Alan asks a very good question, and a very complicated one. I didn’t particularly want to digress onto a different topic on this thread, hence my failure to reply to Alan. But maybe I can discuss it briefly.
Lots of factors contribute to who each of us is. For example, most citizens of the USA are such because they are born such. However, as they grow to be adults, I suspect that most are proud of their citizenship because, overall, they see good in what the USA represents. Does that mean they support, or even condone, everything about that country, its leaders, or all of its fellow citizens? Do they support all aspects of American domestic and foreign policy? What do they think about America’s involvement in the Vietnam war? Do they support, or condone, Gary Condit’s recent behavior? Bill Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky, and subsequent behavior? The views or activities of NAMBLA?
I suspect most would answer “no.” But how many renounce their US citizenship?
Those who have “known” me for a while on the internet know some of my views about certain aspects of the beliefs and practices of JWs:
1. I am concerned about the propagation of certain aspects of our doctrine that I feel have become as much JW dogma as what we criticize as the dogma of other religious groups.
2. I believe we put forth propaganda in the sense that we spend a lot of time congratulating ourselves, organizationally speaking, to our own members. I’m an elder. I’ve seen enough to know that our organization is not always the “spiritual paradise” we continually tell ourselves that it is.
3. I am concerned about the pedophile issue, although I personally have not been exposed to some of the horror stories that seem to be popping up on the web.
4. It certainly seems to me that our blood policy gets more and more inconsistent as time passes.
5. The whole emphasis on “works.” I believe that faith should manifest itself in works. But Paul makes a classic argument against the type of works that we seem to expect, when he says at Romans 4:4: “Now to the man that works the pay is counted, not as an undeserved kindness, but as a debt.” A further question is: Why do we only count time for one kind of work, when there are others listed in the Bible? Why are JWs “graded” on only one thing?
But I have seen other facets of this organization as well. The stand that individual Witnesses were willing to take in the face of the Nazi assault. Those that served, and serve, prison terms in this and other countries because they will not go to war and kill another human. Those that have sacrificed their own wants, desires, comforts and preferences to become missionaries in foreign lands. I know many such individuals personally and I have nothing but admiration and respect for them. Whether or not one believes in the specific message they preach, I don’t think you can find much fault in their personal actions.
As I said, it’s complicated. This topic could be debated almost endlessly, and in many cases there are no easy, or clear, answers. But perhaps that may share a little of my perspective.
Finally, Alan, one of the characteristics of a true friend is that he or she “defends the absent.” In other words, if you are my friend, and somebody in my opinion unfairly maligns you in your absence, if I am a true friend I should speak up and defend you. On the thread referencing WOL, a blanket statement was made referring to Jehovah’s Witnesses as “perverts.” Is that OK? Should I have just let that pass?
Nicodemus