Sparkplug:
That's why I dig Quaker weddings. moment of silence, then the vows, and then the cake.
Would you look a gift horse in the mouth?
by LittleToe 26 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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LittleToe
I would suggest that the "Christian mindset" which is all about grace is something that most of us never acquired from the JWs. Further, as a working practise, it's absent from the majority of those who would nominally call themselves Christians.
IMHO it is almost singularly on this factor that you'll see the difference between an overbearing Christian and a humble one. Heck, Ghandi seens to have had a clue about this quality and he wasn't even a professing Christian!!!
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Sparkplug
I would suggest that the "Christian mindset" which is all about grace is something that most of us never acquired from the JWs. Further, as a working practise, it's absent from the majority of those who would nominally call themselves Christians.
Spoken better than I was getting at.
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SWALKER
Not all gift horses are what they appear to be:
Don't forget the Trojan Horse!
Swalker
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parakeet
LT:
***It has long been my humble opinion that for an exJW just to walk through the doors of a church is to break down an important barrier. .....After demonising other religions for years, due to our conditioning, it can be an incredibly scary/liberating/emotional event.***
A year or two after I left the JWs, I went to some church services out of curiosity -- a few Catholic masses and some visits to the local Lutheran and Methodist churches. I was never a gung-ho JW, so it wasn't a big deal for me; it wasn't a scary barrier or liberating event. I just wanted to see what they were like. The music was 100% better, and there was a genuine friendliness in the air -- no JW-style love bombing.
Nothing I heard there convinced me to continue attending, but it was definitely worth the trip if for no other reason than to confirm how ridiculous the JW/WTS' views about "Babylon the Great" are. -
LittleToe
Parakeet:Ooh, don't get me started on the singing!
So aside from the religious variety, are there other kinds of support that we might eschew, because of a JW background? -
Lady Lee
When I left the WTS 21 years ago I was still a believer. It took 10 years and an innocent question from a friend to get me searching for an answer to her question. And Pandora's box flew open and fell off the box.
My friend is a bron-again Christian. She, and hewr husband, knew my background. They never pushed and I don't think they ever started a discussion with me about religion. They waited for me to bring it up. My friend offered to go with me to a JW Sun meeting. We wound up at a CA.. That was a huge eye-opener for her to see the conformity.
Once I realized thw WTS did not have the truth about anything we had some interesting discussions. I went to their wedding in their church. It was scary and I sat in a pew off to the side, still expecting a lightening bolt to hit me
But later I went to an Alpha course in someone's home and realized just how wrong the WTS was.
The next step for me was to go to a Sunday service at their church. They offered to support me. I felt like there was a thinderbolt hanging over my head. They sat with me in the back and supported me all the way.
Now I had gone to several churches before my mother hooked up with the WTS. I had tried United, Baptist Pentcostal (scared the crap outta me). My firned was an Anglican, so I had some experience but the WT propaganda was strong. By going to a church I was able to let go of a lot of the fear.
My struggle was interesting. I was not pressured to join her church. Not by her or her husband. Not by the minister or others who had participated in the Alpha group.
But it was there. And it took me a while to realize that in great part it was the WTS' teachings to be "whole-souled". I couldn't go further and I couldn't go back and felt stalled. I didn't want to be whole-souled in religion again.
There was a person in the Alpha group that I liked and thought it could get interesting but I knew I could not devote myself to a church and knew I couldn't involve someone else in my confused spiritual journey.
Now I see religion as a very personal journey for me. Some times I need it more than others. I don't feel like church is the only place I can connect with that side of myself.
I think my biggest fear about religion is that religion is an "all or nothing" kind of thing. And I'm not willing or not ready to make that kind of comitment
But I ain't sceered of churches no more