My experience at the District Convention today - Appreciate your comments

by BonaFide 56 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  sammielee24

  and that the GB/Watchtower is, "God's Channel on earth", then every single assembly, every new release, every district convention/circuit and special

  I agree - that's the key and despite people grumbling and mumbling about the DC, you don't hear them saying they want to leave do you? Because they won't. I happen to agree with Bonafide...because even outside the DC, our meetings with those inside, prove that despite agreeing to changes year after year after year...big changes..they truly don't care. It is here. It is now and it's actually getting worse.

  When a person no longer cares about the past, they will accept the present without question. The witnesses we talked with are always interchanging the GB/faithful and discreet slave for example, even if you point out the origins of each. Doesn't matter. We've watched family members grow harder with each passing squeeze for control.

  I believe more than ever having watched them in action over the past few months, that this is a very dangerous cult and getting worse. They get no slack from me. I asked them how they could lie - how could they knock on doors, sit in someones house and try to recruit them, when they don't believe all of what they are spouting themselves. That makes them liars. Their lies can change the direction of an innocent persons life in an instant and possibly destroy it - they really don't care. Like a thief in the night they will steal your integrity and your soul to make you theirs. These are not good people. sammieswife.
• 

  drew sagan

  Does this really surprise anybody? This is what conventions are designed to do.

  Much of what we take into consideration when discussing the future of the org is not the people who are now associated, but those who may potentially convert in the future as well as the children, especially those under 30 (you know, the kind that were demonized in the drama!)

  That Watchtower rhetoric stirs people up emotionally should be no surprise at all. All those people despretly want to believe it is the truth. What else was going to happen?

  The Watchtower is in a state of stagnation. Their theology is rapidly becoming outdated, and their overall message no longer has the excitement it once did. They will need to adapt and change if they want to be viable in the future. So far they have only focused on window trimming (change around some meetings, differant magazines, new books). This is far from the kind of change they really need.
• 

  awildflower

  I'm just excited to be able to tell my JW friend that I already know all the new releases, the drama, and half the parts on the District this year! And I'm just the girl, what do they know! It's going to be funny to see his reaction! But I'm going to tell him that I'm sure he'll enjoy it completely because it is the highlight of their year! I work in the cleaning buisness and at times my boss and I will catch ourselves getting excited over a new cleaning product or device and think how pathetic, that we need to get a life! This is the same thing! Excited over a new song book? Wow........
• 

  hamsterbait

  SammiesW -

  God! Your post just now literally made my blood run cold.

  You are so right. They are stealing peoples very lives out from under their noses.

  It happened to us.

  In fact after we had been called on a few times, one Sunday the door went, and i trotted off to answer it.

  My first GUT instinct ( usually correct) was that the two elduhs in dark suits were confidence tricksters, and i slammed the door in their faces. Boy did i get in trouble, but ----

  HB
• 

  BonaFide

  I was touched also by the drama. Until I started to think about what they actually said.

  Afterwards I was talking to a sister in the truth for 40 years. She said the drama was so great because it was realistic. I said I agree some of the words were modern expressions. But how many young people have a father in the truth? How many have a pioneer fund waiting for them? How many wouldn't be disfellowshipped for what he did?

  She just got upset, I ruined it for her. She said she always likes to look for the positive things. I said I am not being negative, facts are neither positive nor negative. But she still looked upset.

  BF
• 

  lrkr

  Don't forget- the district assembly is a brainwashing session that has been carefully orchestrated and practiced for maximum effect. With all of the thought that goes into these programs its actually surprising how many people are tuned out and cynical.

  As for seeing a chink in the armor- don't look for it after 3 days of active brainwashing. Look for it after a significant period of dissonance- a personal, logical decision that is not allowed, etc.
• 

  thebigdebate

  I am so glad that I was not there.

  thebigdebate
• 

  Scarred for life

  Great post, Vinny.
• 

  cattails

  Sammieswife you are so right.

  There isn't a meeting that goes by

  that doesn't get at least a couple to

  several credits the "Faithful and

  Discreet Slave" for everything, for

  the litterature at the right time, for

  the help JWs get in disasters, to the

  separating work, to the bringing of

  millions to a "right heart condition"

  with God, etc. etc. But can a JW give

  a simple answer as to who is the

  "Faithful and Discreet Slave" what

  makes the Slave faithful and discreet

  and who was this Slave prior to the

  1970s. You'll get a bunch of blank

  stares like you're asking a stupid

  question that has no answer... Well,

  I can't think of a good answer myself

  so I just stare back.

  ---
• 

  dogon

  there is only one thing to do. Get out and live a good an happy life away from the cult. You can not change their minds just as you could not change the minds of many of the Jones Town Kool aid drinkers. You first have to save yourself and you can not do it by being involved in that cult. I have learned how to effectively argue against religion and Jehovah's Witnesses, and you can have the most clear argument that no jury could refuse and they will not take it to heart. Do not waste your time. Find others that are like minded and be happy. The assemblies are designed as a propaganda tool. Joseph Goebbels was no fool, do you think the Nuremberg rallies were for any other purpose other than to keep thinking aligned with the state? They use the same type fallacy of appeal to the masses. It is designed to create and reinforce emotional responses in the masses and to keep them from questioning what is obviously the bigger questions like why have they been wrong on every prediction they have every given. As Lincoln said;

  [Abraham Lincoln, from "What Great Men Think Of Religion" by Ira Cardiff]

  "I am approached with the most opposite opinions and advice, and by religious men who are certain they represent the Divine will. ... I hope it will not be irreverent in me to say, that if it be probable that God would reveal his will to others, on a point so connected with my duty, it might be supposed he would reveal it directly to me."