Hi all,
This observation came to mind in a related thread on cultural changes in the JW community over the years, as the organization evovles from a feisty, intensely radical, militant band of `theocratic warriors'' to a more maintream religion.
As the passage of time has eroded almost all of the plausibilty in the chronological component of their message (remember how big a part of our preaching was ``doing the 1914 drill'' -- you know: 2,520 minus 607, plus no zero year = 1914; ask yourselves how few modern and younger JWs can do this by rote nowadays), teh focus has shifte to ``ain't we the greatest?''
Almost every WT issue runs articles featurng sanitized, idealized, versions of aspects of their modern history. JWs in the concentration camps, the Atlanta penitenitary for Rutherford and his gang, praise from public officials for JW comportment at assemblies, quick-build Kingdom Halls, disaster relief for their own kind, lifestyle makeovers, the experiences of oldtimers who unapologetically squandered a lifetime living in nomadic, vagabond poverty out of a suitcase or shuttered away in Bethel or a missionary home, etc., ad ininitum, ad nauseum.
We used to complain that the JWs were guility of shoving Jesus in the background, reducing him to a mere ``area code'' we dial up on the line to get through to Jehovah God. It now seems that God has joined Jesus on the WT's sidelines while as Brooklyn extols the wonders of the Faithful and Discreet slave and its throng of mindless drones.
More than ever, JWs are preaching themselves, and it's a tedious message. We all know that an individual's incessant, self-imprtant bragging can be insufferable. How much more when its practiced done by an organization of 6 million as a substitute for the pure Gospel? Therein lies but one reason for the organization's stagnation; the inexorable ticking of the clock is another.
JW's Gospet of Incessant Self Praise
by Room 215 5 Replies latest jw friends
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Room 215
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Gopher
Room 215,
This is a real good point you bring up. Idolatrous reverence for the organization has replaced anything resembling pure Christianity. It's "my religion, right or wrong", blindly defending it in the face of incalculable harm and innumerable scandals (up to and including harboring of child molestors and going to bed with the UN organization.) It must truly disgust the God that they claim to worship.
I've been told "you turned your back on Jehovah". To them, Jehovah means the sum total of the earthly organization + Jehovah + the heavenly angels, I guess. Strange definition, but it's how they choose to accuse.
GopherWhy shouldn't truth be stranger than fiction? Fiction, after all, has to make sense.
Mark Twain (1835-1910) -
D wiltshire
Room 215,
Very well written, nice and clear.
You have a very pointed sense of clear reasoning IMHO.
I like it!If someone lived a trillion X longer than you, and had a billion X more reasoning ability would he come to the same conclusions as you?
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patio34
Thanks Rm 215 for that review of the WT. I haven't looked at one for some time (for fear of falling down the rabbit hole again!).
They've done the 'critical times" and 'last days' to death. You can only keep people on the edge so long. So now they're in a new mode. Or maybe they got some new writers.
You're right, self-praise becomes insufferable. And boring. But, JWs (myself included in the past), will put up with it, looking for meaning in every word.
Pat
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Mommie Dark
This was one of the things that started me escaping the cult. That smug arrogant thumbs-in-suspenders self-satisfied attitude, "Aren't we Jehovah's chosen humble people?" made me ill. How can you CLAIM to be the 'humblest meekest people on earth' at the top of your leather preacher lungs and be taken seriously?
It embarrassed me. It's an unconscious thing among most JWs but so very very ugly! How can anyone believe that an attitude like that is pleasing to their God? If he fosters that mindset, then HE is as venal and shallow and unspiritual as they!
Meanwhile there is that petty jealousy and competition to be 'strong spiritually' which is of course measured by CORPORATE WORKS first and Christian charity very very last.
I decided I'd rather die with all the sane worldlings than remain in that topsyturvy madhouse of alleged salvation!
Of course now I am free of all that superstitious claptrap, free as the little sparrows outside my window to choose for myself what path I follow. Life is good even when circumstances SUCK! And nobody monitoring my 'spirituality' and measuring me by some impossible standard of guilt and shame. OH YEAH!
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Room 215
Hi again Mommie, et al,
What I find the most galling is that when they sing the praises of the Faithful and Discreet Slave Class (the irony is that ``faithful'' and ``discreet' are the last adjectives in the world that should be applied to them), THEY'RE TALKING ABOUT THEMSELVES!
Kinda makes one wanna puke....