wedding anniversarys

Adrianoblue

hi everyone,

you`ve probably had this topic before, but there always was this one thing which kept bugging me: here in germany it is pretty common for married jw couples to celebrate their wedding anniversary each year. do jws in the us or elsewhere do the same?

well, the reason i`m asking, is the fact that i never really understood what the hell is the difference between such an event and a birthday party?

i asked an elder once about this when i was a jw. the answer he gave me i found absolutely weird: he said basicly that a birthday celebration is focused solely on one person instead of two (a marriage anniversary)! so, in other words - it`s ok to idolize (well, that`s the main reason and doctrine of the wt) a couple rather than a single person.

so what`s so wrong about birthday partys? just because it has a pagan history? wedding rings used to have a pagan background, so what? well, i know the wt points out to the 2 bible verses, which indicates that those two birthdays had a bad outcome. but have any of you guys expirienced someone having their heads chopped off at a birthday? well, i certaintly haven`t. and if anyone decides to overdo the drink, well it`s their head and health, it has nothing to do with the person who invited the guest.

take care, adrianoblue

no more kool aid

I totally agree with you. I think that because it's the only thing that is celebrated, it gets a little blown out of proportion. Besides the children and single people really get left out. At my old book study they would always have little anniversary parties but I always felt bad for the single sisters. One sister said something about it once and one of the old married sisters said "what's the matter we let you eat cake too". Isn't that sensitive!

crapola

I have also wondered many times what the difference is in celebrating wedding anniversaries as opposed to birthdays. The days my children were born were the happiest days of my life and I don't see why it is considered wrong to celebrate that joy.

suchafool

I too had wondered that same thing. I asked also, and a sister told me that Jesus was at a wedding and so therefore it would be okay to celebrate an anniversary. Yeah doesn't make much sense, because a birthday is still just an anniversary of ones birth. Whats the difference.

Snoozy

http://www.jwfiles.com

Snoozy..

crazycate

Marriage is God's arrangement, but so is birth. Remembering the vows we made when we got married and focusing on continuing to make the marriage work; remembering the importance of living the life you were given in a way that God would approve; what's the difference? It's all in how you spin it.

Let's face it, we celebrate anniversaries because we are happy to be married and because it is fun. We would celebrate birthdays because we are happy to be alive and because it is fun. How many people really spend their wedding anniversaries in soul searching and meditating on their determination to keep their marriage vows?

Cate

dismayed

Don't you know? people always get executed at birthday celebrations....

jws

I think both should be celebrated, but I can still do the JW reasoning.

Marriage is something God originated. It requires work and committment to keep it going. Although some might argue that JWs are stuck in marriage because of their beliefs, making it another year is generally seen a an accomplishment arrived at by two people working together.

On the other hand, living another year is not seen the same way. As opposed to what, killing yourself? For people that aren't depressed, it's a lot easier to end a marriage than to kill yourself. Having a survival instinct, living another year doesn't necessarily show you've done something good (as opposed to keeping a marriage going). All you did was survive another year and may have been a real jerk during that year (in which case, nobody's going to help you celebrate anyway).

I'd bet they'd accept the gold watch and a party at work for their 25th anniversary at their job. Again that shows some sort of accomplishment.

By that same measure though, why don't they celebrate the anniversary of their baptisms (if they're still active JWs)? That would theoretically show an accomplishment. But like marriage, you don't know how good that accomplishment is. Behind the scenes, a married couple could be divorced in mind. Behind the scenes an active JW could be an apostate in mind.

And the more I think of that, I think they should start doing that. It would be a surrogate for the missing birthday parties everybody else has. It could be an incentive for people to get baptized though. I think it would piss off the WTBS though and they would discourage it. I think they just don't like people celebrating. Especially when gifts are involved because it might take away some revenue. And, because of party planning, some may skip field service.

Anne

This is one of the things that bugged me most growing up. My parents became JW's when I was just beginning grade school and can remember celebrating birthdays and holidays then suddenly they were outlawed due to their new faith. BUT they still were able to celebrate THEIR wedding anniversary. It was OK to celebrate the "birth" of their marriage, but not the birth of their children. Even when I was a believer it just screamed of hippocracy. I told my mom we were celebrating the anniversary of my children's births. I think the correlation went over her head.

Adrianoblue

thank you all for your comments.

during my time as a jw, i also had a few conversations regarding this subject. it appears to be a similar thing just with a different label.

wedding anniversarys

Share this