Thanks for the responses so far.
Clam: I already saw the ‘glazed looks on faces’ at the Kingdom Hall, as people tried to stay awake during the Watchtower study! You are correct in pointing out that proposed panaceas can have their sinister side.
Fullofdoubtnow: Your comment about JW’s imagining themselves living in the nicest homes of those who they believe will soon die at God’s Armageddon is true. One of the main evils according to JW doctrine is materialism. However this hope of having all the things in the world to themselves once non-JW’s are destroyed at Armageddon is materialism taken to an extreme.
Dansk: Thanks for your comments about life and suffering. The Watchtower lures people with its promise that life will be easy and peachy-keen for its adherents, if only they work and suffer now. I often heard from the platform (at the Kingdom Hall) that life now is ‘not normal’, and everything will be back in balance after some future Armageddon. They preach suffering for the “Kingdom”, and they add to people’s suffering with all their demands to do more and their constant judgement and scrutiny of their membership.
Geevee: Your MIL’s comments are ones we probably would have made as JW’s. It reflects their view that ‘living’ begins only in the new system. I want to live life right now. This is the life we have; it’s the one we’re sure we get.
Bonnie_Clyde: I think the phrase used in JW weddings was ‘… as long as we live together on earth under God’s marital arrangement’. That phrase leaves open a lot of possibilities, including the termination of the marital arrangement, or even the possibility of living together on some other planet (if you think about it).
Van Gogh: Your comment ‘death is innate to nature’ reminds me of the words attributed to Solomon in the book of Ecclesiastes: “There is no difference between man and beast. As one dies, so does the other.” And, “after a man dies, all memory of him fades away” (or words to that effect). Life is temporary, and anything beyond that is unknown. Living strictly for what is unknown robs one of accomplishment during the present life. As far as Luke 23:43 (“today I say you will be with me in paradise”), all I can say is that again, no mention is made that the paradise is earthly. The WT inserts their idea that it MUST be earthly because that is their teaching, and the Jews didn’t have a concept of heaven. But Jesus was being quoted here, and his concept of paradise could have been very different than the idea held by the average Jew of his day.