You are probably wondering what these two subjects have in common. Well, I have been pondering something for quite some time. I have been trying to figure out how explain the recent and HUGE doctrinal shifts of the WTBTS since the 2012 annual meeting, and the accompanying modernizing of the JW official website. For a thinking person there are many, many questions raised. What it all boils down to is " WHY?"
Why JW.ORG? Why the RNWT? Why the GB/FDS teaching? Why the new online " reasoning tract " [ not book LOL!!]?? Why does JW.ORG's archives only go back to 2000? Why the new "domestic" title without a raise for the R&F? Why have a JW version of Steve Jobs? Why all the apps?? Why make a new "memorial" outline? WHY, WHY WHY?!?!
I know that we could talk about each of these subjects at length. One common answer will be, "control and money." So for instance, " Why make a new memorial outline amidst all these other changes?" Control, power, and with that comes money. More partakers, means more are reading the Bible without WT goggles, and that spells trouble. So what's a corporation to do? That's where JJ Abrams comes into play.
A concept came to mind when I first heard of the nu-light and the 2012 AGM. Of course by then, many of us already knew that there was no slave "class" from 33 C.E onward, even though our motivations were worlds apart from the GB, but I digress. Anyway, I was hoping to find an exact quote from JJ Abrams to convey my thoughts. I was looking for another analogy about the recent changes in JW dogma, one that might help some to grasp what has been done. I finally found it by chance. Here it is.
ABRAMS: “Here’s the thing… I think the key to that was, first of all, it was one of those things that not everyone even cares about or understands the timeline of it all. The notion that when this one character, Nero, arrives in his ship, that basically the timeline is altered at that moment, so everything forward is essentially an alternative timeline. That is not to say that everything that happened in The Original Series doesn’t exist. I think, as a fan of movies and shows, if someone told me the beloved thing for me was gone, I would be upset. But we didn’t do that. We’re not saying that what happened in that original series wasn’t good, true, valid, righteous and real. Let people embrace that. We’re not rejecting that. That, to me, would have been the big mistake. We’re simply saying that, “At this moment, the very first scene in the first movie, everything that people knew of Star Trek splits off into now another timeline.”
Do you see it? Do you see what the Corporation/Organization has done? The first thing that came to my mind when I learned about all the nu-light and adjustments, website, DVD's, credit card machines, commercials, JW.ORG logo, ect, was , "My GOD.. they have really done it. They have created an alternate timeline. Nothing that happened in the past even matters."
It was then that I realized the futility of trying to save all the JWs. It makes me sad, and it hurts. I worry every single day about everyone that I know. Not a day goes by that I don't contemplate TTATT. From the moment I wake, until the moment I sleep, even my dreams are infused with TTATT. I imagine that when I die, I will still be worrying about everyone I know. Still, what can I do? You can't make someone see truth.
How can I convince a Star Trek fan that Chris Pine is not Captain Kirk? I say, "William Shatner is Kirk!" They say, "He is the Kirk from the old series, this is a new timeline. Can't you just enjoy the new movie? Look the awesome special effects! Besides, we aren't disrespecting the old, we are just embracing the new timeline." Imagine the endless debates that take place online and at Star Trek conventions. In the end they must agree to disagree. The difference being that Fan clubs don't ruin families by DF'ing people for preferring the old Scotty over the new one.
How can I convince a JW that the GB is not the FDS? How do you get them to acknowledge the "original series", or History of the Organization?
How do you reason against an alternate timeline in a fantasy adventure series, because in the end that's what JWism is, a fantasy.
DD
