Each situation is different iamwhoiam. I had a shepherding meeting for the readjustment of freedom mindedness, and I am not DF yet. And nobody has come to try to save me BOOHOO. It has been a year I think. I am being left alone so far. It's not only JWs that are unfriendly ya know. I think the whole world is cooling off. Hay! Did Jesus say that would happen, or is it my imagination? Yes, me in my image, but that's a different thread.
You are all wicked Apostates!!!
by iamwhoiam 33 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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NewChapter
The whole world is cooling off? Really? And there is a marked difference between now and all of human history? Read about the dark ages---learn how the peasantry were abused, enslaved, generationally in debt, and see what the average person has now. Do the revolutions in the Middle East prove that the world is cooling off? Learn about the revolutions here, in S. America and other places and see where that led. It wasn't a cooling off, it was an energizing and a shift of power. It was civil rights, self determination and representation.
The whole world is not cooling off, and NT prophecies are not coming true. Study history. There are shifts in power and attitude, but this does not constitute cooling off. It's your imagination.
Look at how things have improved for women in the area of the world that Jesus lived and preached. Is this a cooling off? Things have gotten BETTER not worse. And now the cycle continues as more areas in the Middle East stand up and take their rights. In Jesus' world, slavery was condoned and tolerate. Is there slavery today? Yes, but there is great pushback. In Jesus' day women were subjected to the authority of the men in their lives. Does that go on today? Yes---but many women have attained much greater freedom and self fullfillment than in Jesus' day. Again, it is your imagination.
Do we still have disease? YES. but the diseases of Jesus' day that would wipe you out are treatable now. We even have effective treatments for AIDS. It is a BETTER world than the world that Jesus lived in---which completely debunks his prophecies. The problems will continue, and if you look at those problems as a "sign" you will see the negative and conclude it's all falling apart. If you look at the whole picture you will see a great deal of progress, regression, but then more progress ahead.
Wobble---great point on how this will start out small and become part of their cultures and beliefs. You gave me flashbacks. That's exactly how the CO would do things. "Don't you remember the 356th sentence in the study WT 5 years ago friends????? It's here, in the footnote. What did you think that meant? Those who have become INACTIVE are listed as apostates. Let me read it again (for you slackers that missed or forgot)."
NC
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N.drew
I'm not talking about politics. I hate politics. I'm talking about inter-relationships between people.
I understand you and you understand me. That is what is cooling off.
Love is patient and kind, that is what is cooling off. People are kind, of course, but in my opinion,
which is anti-political, people are doing it because it is their business to do so, not for fellow feeling.
The ties that bind a person to another person is what I mean "the love of the many is cooled off".
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MrFreeze
Speaking of new light I recall at the Pioneer school several years ago the CO had us all scratch a portion of the reasoning book out about the generation teaching. I should still have that reasoning book. That was well before the WT came out about it. I'll look at it when I get home from work.
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Mad Sweeney
I see people interconnecting in new and far-reaching ways. Yeah, people nowadays might not know their next-door neighbors but they are WAY MORE likely to have made a friend on the opposite side of the planet than people back in the close-knit community days when churches ruled the world. So local cohesion has given way to independence while global interconnectedness has never been stronger.
I'll take that tradeoff and refuse to label it as a lack of love.
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N.drew
Thank you, but I can see that "the love" exists between persons who are the same. They think the same way. They believe the same things. They are the same.
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NewChapter
I'm not talking about politics.
Call anti-slavery movements, civil rights, women's rights, medical advancements, equal opportunity politics if you like, I call it love.
What pushes people to work for social justice? Love
What pushes people to legislate against domestic abuse? Love
What pushes people to find cures for suffering? Love
I don't care what vehicle it arrives on---politics, internet, science, business, charity---it is an expression of love. The willingness to reach outside your experience, outside your affections, to look and to see and to be concerned--that is love. It's not flowers, it is action. And the more we get to know each other globally, the more action we are taking. Why do I care if Syria has free elections, if African women are subjected to brutal circumcision, if children are starving in Somalia? WHY? I don't know them, won't meet them and they don't affect me. I won't send them flowers. But it is love of humanity that makes me care. Jesus was wrong.
NC
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N.drew
I think it isn't love but is survival mentality. It's Dawinian. Love is different.
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BluesBrother
A lot of the outcry has been due to the use of the N W T verse in 1 Tim 6.4 where it uses the phrase "mentally diseased" , as if we are suffering delusions , paranoia , sociopathy etc..
Other translations see fit to render it as :
King James - " doting about questions and strifes of words,"
New King James " obsessed with disputes and arguments over words"
New Living Translation " unhealthy desire to quibble over the meaning of words. "
Revised Standard Version " he has a morbid craving for controversy and for disputes "
The NWT sounds particularly insulting and dismissive of those who choose to differ - and the WT goes beyond what is written by applying it to those who differ,not with Christianity, but the WTS...
Come to think of it, if we suffered a disease of the mind then a Christian would treat us with loving care and consideration, would he not?
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Rabbit
Empathy.
Simple Human Empathy...pretty well covers most any good, progressive human endeavor. Love can be 'in there', but, empathy, over all is better.