@Chemical Emotions:
What are the best things to first bring up to a JW parent about mistakes, lies, etc., from the GB?
I need advice.
Over the history of Jehovah's Witnesses many interpretations of the Bible have been advanced in our search to gain an understanding of truth, which interpretations later had to be abandoned when we discovered they we were in error about them, which means that we are quite candid about our mistakes when we discover we are wrong about a particular interpretation even though some Jehovah's Witnesses have been reluctant to make what adjustments are necessary after we have published these adjustments in the Watchtower or in Our Kingdom Ministry. No one likes to be wrong, especially about the Bible doctrines that they have been persuaded to believe because we all like to trust that the things we have been taught are true, only to be told years later that upon further consideration we have come to realize that we were mistaken in our viewpoint, that our interpretation of a scripture or of a scriptural passage was wrong and we all have to adjust our understanding so that it accords with the latest viewpoint.
Now I understand you to be 17 years old, which means you're too young to know how often we old-timers have had to make such adjustments in our understanding in our interpretations of certain Bible texts, but it has always been our endeavor since the days of Pastor Russell and Judge Rutherford, to get it right, and in 2012 this continues to be our endeavor since we are reminded when adjustments are made that our understanding of some things is yet imperfect. I would provide an example, but maybe that can wait.
Many of the people that might give you advice on JWN are adults and many of these adults are bitter for one reason or another, so the reasons for the decisions they made in their lives to sever their relationship with Jehovah's organization may not at all be your reason for wanting to do so. I don't have any way of knowing whether you are a troll having fun on the internet or are really a 17-year-old young woman, but as I, too, am an adult, @Chemical Emotions, however, assuming that you are what you claim to be, I would advise you to think carefully before you do anything that may adversely affect your life, for it is never wise to do anything that cannot later be undone.
@Fernando:
Since we are dealing with arcane cults, addiction and spiritual bondage HOW may be the most important or first question.
I do realize that many people -- including some here on JWN -- believe we enslave those that join God's organization and exercise control over our members and restrict other people's freedom to live their lives as they might wish to live them, so that non-members, especially our own family members and friends have concluded that Jehovah's Witnesses aren't really like other Christian groups in the world, aren't like the many other Christian denominations, because they hold beliefs that are in many ways oddly different than the beliefs held by many other Christian churches, many of them concluding that our belief in Jehovah God, our rejection of the trinity doctrine and our unwillingness to view the Lord Jesus Christ as God makes us members of a cult.
Yes, Jehovah's Witnesses have odd or strange beliefs when compared to those of Christendom, such as our trademark door-to-door evangelization style and our embrace of Bible teachings that has resulted in many of us taking a conscientious stand against things like blood transfusions, in vitro fertilization and war, that has caused many of us to keep oneself away from becoming spotted by worship of the state through participation in politics and in political ceremony, that has caused many of us to avoid creature worship and worship of self through elaborate birthday celebrations, things that have made some conclude that we are members of a cult. It is God's holy spirit that has transformed our thinking as to all such matters, and it is through the holy spirit that our Bible-based consciences have been trained so that we have the mind of Christ and can distinguish between right and wrong from God's viewpoint.
Our beliefs aren't watered down by human standards of morality as is the case in many of Christendom's churches, but it is through our own study of the Bible, individually, that we have carefully proven to ourselves that our beliefs are in line with God's good, acceptable and perfect will, so when we should read in the Bible, for example, God's command to "abstain ... from blood," we recognize that these words were written under the inspiration of God's holy spirit, when we should read in the Bible that we should "abstain from fornication," we recognize that the holy spirit is speaking to us, and as we read and study the Bible, we become more and more filled with holy spirit so that it isn't brainwashing that kicks in when we face the decision of whether we are going to "hook up" with someone to whom we are not married, it isn't because we have been brainwashed when we struggle with medical decisions as to whether to accept or reject blood transfusions, but it is because of our Bible-trained consciences and because of our desire not to do anything that we ourselves believe would displease God.
The conscientious adherence by Jehovah's Witnesses to God's command to "abstain from fornication" has served to protect us from the plague that has adversely affected not just single people and gay couples, but married couples as well, by those engaging in premarital or extramarital sexual relations, subjecting the innocent partner or spouse to diseases that are associated with oral sex like chronic Hepatitis B, cytomegalovirus, genital herpes, genital warts, Herpes simplex, HIV/AIDS, pubic lice or scabies, and to diseases associated with anal sex like amoebiasis, cryptosporidiosis, E. coli infections, giardiasis, gonorrhea, granuloma inguinale, Hepatitis A, Hepatitis C, human papilloma virus (HPV), Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpes virus (HHV-8), lymphogranuloma venereum, syphilis, trichomoniasis, salmonellosis, shigella and tuberculosis. Jehovah's Witnesses do not want to contract any of these diseases, not because we are a cult, but because we don't want to die or become sterile or face quality of life issues for the rest of our lives, and we don't want to displease God.
Some whose conscientious adherence to God's command to "abstain ... from blood" and has prevented many Jehovah's Witnesses and even non-Jehovah's Witnesses from accepting blood transfusions, who through their study of the Bible have come to learn is disapproved by God, have ended up dying, for very often Jehovah's Witnesses find themselves admitted to hospitals that lack the personnel with the medical expertise, or the surgeons that just aren't comfortable performing certain surgical procedures without transfusing blood to replace the volume of blood that their patients typically lose during surgery. This is often the reason that a Witness patient dies in a hospital -- incompetence -- for no doctor can guarantee, nor do they give a guarantee to anyone that a patient in their hospital will survive surgery if they approve the use of blood during surgery, because they know that they cannot guarantee that such blood transfusions during surgery will prevent the patent from dying.
Jehovah's Witnesses have learned that blood transfusions come with a significantly higher risk of complications, including post-operative infections, respiratory problems, kidney failure, and death, with things like colorectal cancer recurrence, organ failure, and a significantly long-term impact on the recipients' immune system with respect to things like anemia, allogenic blood transfusion and immunomodulation found in critically ill patients. A blood transfusion lowers the host's immune response and its ability to fight infections, so that it predisposes a sick patient for the inset of infections that their immune system could have fought off were it not for the transfused blood introduced into the patient's body.
The risks associated with the use of blood in connection with the transfusion of blood and blood products far outweigh the benefits that one hopes to obtain, for if the doctors cannot demonstrate the benefit of giving someone a blood transfusion, the only thing they are able to offer the patient is risk and so the real question to the patient is this: How much risk is acceptable? How much risk is a parent will to subject their child, who is not in the hospital because he or she needs a blood transfusion, but because of a car accident or a bad fall that led to trauma, or because of a inherent medical anomaly with which he or she was born or a food allergy or some disease he or she contracted?
If there is a way to treat a patient without blood, why would anyone be willing to accept a 25% risk, a 10% risk, a 5% risk, even a 1% risk knowing that once the patient's immune system has been compromised by blood not their own, the body will not be able to defend against the infections to which blood predisposes them. People want to believe blood transfusions are life-saving, but they are not life-saving. They are, in fact, dangerous due to the risks attendant to transfusing blood not their own into a patient's body.
Consequently, while trying to protect themselves or our children from unnecessary risks, many Witness patients or their children have ended up dying from the trauma or the disease for which they had sought medical treatment in the first place, and not because of their refusal of blood, often because of the delay caused in finding capable surgeons able to perform surgical procedures without extensive blood loss, which is the real cause of death, rather than the reason often given for a patients death, namely, that we tied the doctors' hands and refused to allow them to give the patient blood transfusions that could have saved their life.
Again, Jehovah's Witnesses have learned that no doctor is willing to give anyone a guarantee that a blood transfusion will save anyone's life, and we know that the parents of a child or the surviving family members of an adult that dies cannot sue any of the doctor and surgeons, nor a hospital, even if the parents or the patient agreed to the blood transfusions he or she received, for if the patient dies, it is from anemia, from organ failure, from infections caused by a compromised immune system, from liver failure or kidney failure, or from the trauma or anomaly for which they were admitted into the hospital and the parents or the patient that dies will have signed a release indemnifying the doctors and the hospital from responsibility for the risks attendant to giving the patient one or more blood transfusions. Jehovah's Witnesses go to the hospital, not because we are a cult, but because we don't want to die, but we don't want to accept a blood transfusion and compromise our immune system or our child's immune system, and we don't want to displease God either.
Now what's true about cult members is that they follow human leaders, such as the charismatic Reverend James Warren "Jim" Jones, who had claimed to be the messiah and led his congregation of 909 people, including 260 children, to leave the US and move to what turned out to be a concentration camp in Jonestown, Guyana, and led them to form a suicide pact with him, so that they, along with Jones died on November 18, 1978. These 909 people in Jones' cult were not slaves of God nor followers of Christ Jesus, but had become slaves of men, slaves of Jones' unscriptural ideas. Jones often subjected children to torture by electric shocks and by dropping them down into a well to submerge their entire bodies and heads under water as punishment, and we know Jesus would never have done such a thing. But Jones did do these things. Although Jones had a wife, he had taken many men and women as lovers.
Warren Steed Jeffs who was recognized as "the prophet" in a sect of the Latter-Day Saints called the "Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints" (FLDS) as convicted of raping both a 12-year-old and a 15-year-old girl, but he had engaged in sexual relations with as many as 70 wives, and had raped two boys, but, when convicted on September 25, 2007, he is said to have had only 20 active wives (some of whom were minors), and he had 60 children. Jeffs was the president of the FLDS Church, but very charismatic, so that he was able to enslave and exercise control over the homes of the men and women of his church, and severely restrict the freedom of those living in his compound. Jesus would never have done the things that Jeffs did to women and children, but Jeffs did all of these things, and those in his church were followers of a man, not of Jesus Christ.
You tell the OP here -- this 17-year-old young woman -- that Jehovah's Witnesses are an 'arcane cult,' and that we impose something you called "spiritual bondage" as well as"addiction" (which I didn't understand) on our members, but Jehovah's Witnesses aren't guilty of doing these things to anyone. I am one of Jehovah's Witnesses and never once have I done to anyone what things you are here accusing Jehovah's Witnesses of doing. There are people right here on JWN that can attest to the fact that while they were actively associating with Jehovah's Witnesses, they didn't do these things themselves nor did they learn about anyone else doing such things.
Some like to say that Jehovah's Witnesses are devoted to the seven members of the governing body of Jehovah's Witnesses, but we aren't devoted to any human being, or group of human personalities. We worship and are devote to Jehovah God, and we are followers of his son, Jesus Christ. Actually, many Jehovah's Witnesses have never met any of the governing body members, many have never even been to Brooklyn, New York, never received any correspondence from a single member of the governing body, never received even a telephone call from one of them or placed a telephone call of their own to one of the governing body members.
While these seven men do sign-off on the articles that appear in the Watchtower and give their approval over what other literature that is published and distributed by the Society that all Jehovah's Witnesses study and use in their ministry, Jehovah's Witnesses are grateful for the work they are doing in connection with the spreading of the good news, but we aren't devoted or obliged to the governing body to follow any of the guidelines and suggestions they provide to the congregations.
Jehovah's Witnesses aren't obligated to the governing body to follow any of the scriptural guidelines they might provide on various topics, including the controversial ones that have to do with blood transfusions and shunning or smoking cigarettes or voting in political elections, for adherence to such guidelines are voluntary and based solely on the conviction of each one of Jehovah's Witnesses that accepts and conscientiously agrees with these guidelines for the sake of peace in God's organization.
If anyone chooses to stop regularly attending meetings with us or should decide to leave God's organization altogether, one is free to do so, and even live an immoral lifestyle if that is their wish, but in their so doing, they may be expelled as members in good standing and may be shunned by many both inside and outside of the congregation for treating the precious blood of Christ with contempt, as ordinary, without which our sins cannot be forgiven. While there are reports of unscrupulous individuals, who were thought to be in good standing as Jehovah's Witnesses have engaged in some horrific conduct involving minors, these reports are the exception, and our hearts go out to those who have been raped or otherwise abused by such ungodly men since they were not of our sort, for we would have taken steps to protect these victims had we known that such persons were in our midst.
Some have wanted the Society to pay money damages for a disfellowshipping action that leads some in the congregation to shun them, but before one ever gets baptized and becomes one of Jehovah's Witnesses, one learns that we take our dedication to God seriously and learns what will happen to them should the decision be made to disfellowship them as a severe reproof against serious wrongdoing. We all learn that we might receive a private or a public reproof for wrongdoing as well, but some judicial committees will disfellowship when they could have decided to reprove the individual, but that is why there exists an appeal process.
But while a specific procedure for disfellowshipping may not be found in the Bible, nor a specific procedure for reinstatement, the holy spirit does say through the Bible that the "wicked" person should be removed for serious wrongdoing, and disfellowshipment is the process upon which Jehovah's Witnesses have decided to do so. It's like being put on a "time out," except that this "time out" could last for three months, six months, a year or longer, and it certainly cannot feel good to the disfellowshipped individual if he or she is being shunned during the length of this "time out."
So even though other Christian churches do not interpret the Bible in the same way that Jehovah's Witnesses interpret the Bible, this does not mean that their interpretation of the Bible is more right than our interpretation of the Bible. We view disfellowshipping the same as we do reproofs: As ways in which Jehovah wants us to administer discipline in the congregation, not to punish anyone, although there are reports of certain judicial committees that have abused their authority as used disfellowshipping to punish due to a vendetta had against the disfellowshipped person, which doesn't necessarily come to light until years after the disfellowshipped one has been reinstated.
Now some have become so enraged as to want the Society to pay money damages for the sins of these ungodly men, except the Society is far removed from the things that these men have done, as these ungodly men aren't employees of the Society and only had a spiritual connection to the Society through the local congregation that they were attending. In the churches of Christendom, when a statutory rape occurs, for example, if the rape was between one of the church leaders and a child, then the church leader that committed the rape must stand trial for the crime and any lawsuit filed against the church could lead to a damage award.
But in the case of Jehovah's Witnesses, if an ungodly man that we considered to be one of Jehovah's Witnesses should commit statutory rape, that man is usually disfellowshipped and is made to stand trial for his crime, but because this man is not employed by the Society, a lawsuit filed against the Society would have to be dismissed the same as if you were the owner of a laundromat, and a rapist enters your laundromat and raped one of your customers. The man would have to stand trial for his crime, but any lawsuit filed against you, the owner, would have to be dismissed since the rapist didn't work for you, but you would have had to pay had he been one of your employees. Most Jehovah's Witnesses in the world are not representatives of the Society, but are ordained ministers that are organized by the Society to facilitate the spread of the message of the good news, men and women that support themselves and their families, and volunteer much of their own time and money to accomplish their ministry.
A cult is an exclusive system of religious beliefs and practices, which by this definition would indict every Christian denomination that exists in the world. Some of these cults employ many rituals in their religious practices as well. Jehovah's Witnesses have such a ritual that we refer to as "the Memorial of Christ's Death" that we practice once a year, but some other Christian denominations, like the Roman Catholic Church carry out a similar ritual -- the Eucharist -- at least every Sunday.
While you are here using the word "cult" as a pejorative, the point I want to make here is that the word "cult" would aptly describe every Christian denomination on the planet since all Christian denominations are each of them exclusive systems that are distinctly different from other denominations, each having their own religious beliefs and practices, and some of them even employing rituals in religious practices.
I reject the pejorative use of the word, "cult," but I cannot tell you that you cannot call Jehovah's Witnesses a cult, but we are not a cult, since (1) we do not follow a human leader, (2) we don't isolate ourselves from society in compounds and the like, (3) we don't follow doctrines that aren't based on the Bible, and, lastly, (4) we also don't try to force doctrinal interpretations upon anyone after we discover them to be in error, but we will always abandon that which we have determined to be false to embrace the truth as we understand it.
Many posters on this site have given excellent advice based on Steven Hassan's book "Releasing the Bonds" and the chapter "Interacting with Dual Identities".
Ok, but what have you found to be so wrong with the Bible and the good advice it gives?
None of us like to be told what to believe. We prefer a "guided discovery" process where we are asked questions that are not too far out of our comfort zone, and then to be given the chance to investigate for ourselves and come to our own conclusion.
No one that has become one of Jehovah's Witnesses have been told what to believe and what not to believe. Through our ministry we make a concerted effort to teach people what things the Bible teaches and to explain the reasons we believe the things we do. No one is forced to become one of Jehovah's Witnesses, although this may not be technically true for some of the children of Jehovah's Witnesses. Many Witness parents, at the behest of their local elders, are permitting their young children that may have become familiar with some of the scriptures and are able to explain what things they were taught these scriptures mean to get baptized to early.
Perhaps "compelled" is a better word than "forced," but many of these children are just not old enough emotionally to know the full implications of the scriptures that they've learned, some having been baptized way before the "bloom of youth" had set in, when a child becomes aware of these new sexual impulses going on in their bodies where such lack of experience and knowledge on their part can be easily exploited by other children, and lead them into engaging in conduct that the scriptures they knew so well -- or thought they knew so well -- condemns.
These children have learn ed that Eve was deceived, but they had no real idea was it meant to be deceived, until they were deceived by someone at school and now they are on a prescription for syphilis or have herpes for life. Now this child knows firsthand how scripturally wrong it was for him or her to ignore God's command to "abstain from fornication," but he or she is being shunned by their closest friends and relatives, because he was too young to get baptized and because his or her own parents as well as the elders went along with the idea of their being able to boast at a circuit assembly three years ago about this baptized 12-year-old kid that now sits in their congregation three years later, disfellowshipped and feeling all alone for just being 15 years old and naive. But elders and the parents of these children are imperfect, and can get caught up in "contests" with other congregations in the circuit over the age of their baptismal candidates, which might make good press, but all involved end up coming to their senses and realizing the folly of such contests, and the effect they can have on scripturally-savvy children that were baptized too early.
But my point here is that Jehovah's Witnesses is not a cult. No one is told what to believe, but everyone one of us is taught that the Bible teaches and how we interpret the scriptures. The decision to become one of Jehovah's Witnesses is not forced upon anyone, save for the child that is baptized too early. There is a process where we ask questions and the Bible student asks questions, and that Bible student is able at all times to do their own research so as to prove to themselves whether he or she agrees that what things they were taught is consistent with what the Bible teaches or inconsistent, and to decide whether they will symbolize their dedication to Jehovah by getting baptized or not.
Depending on the person's situation one could for example ask: please can you help me understand if "legalism" is apostasy? (The only article that mentions "legalism" or the following of rules to prove or attain righteousness, calls it a denial of Christian faith).
I don't know what you mean. Perhaps you can clarify what you are saying here.
Another is: "should we as 'publishers of the good news' preach and embrace the 'good news' according to Paul"? (More than half the Bible's 152-odd references to the "good news" are by Paul - yet Watchtower religionists are ignorant of everything but a future physical interpretation of Matthew 24:14).
I don't know what you mean by this either since Paul had nothing at all to do with what Jesus stated in Matthew's gospel at Matthew 24:14. Perhaps you wouldn't mind clarifying what it is you are saying here as well. Paul does write at 1 Corinthians 9:16, "Woe is me if I did not declare the good news!" for the only way that anyone can "publicly declare that 'word in your own mouth,' that Jesus is Lord, " is by preaching "the 'word' of faith" to others in our ministry. (Romans 10:8-10)
@Broken Promises:
Find a subject you are familiar with eg NGO/UN fiasco, 144k doctrine, blood doctrine whatever.... and keep asking them pointed questions. Research the topic first here to get some good points, then ask your parents questions that they can't answer.
What good would doing this do? The OP here has asked for advice on "the best things to first bring up to a JW parent about mistakes, lies, etc., from the GB." Has the governing body lied about our the blood doctrine? No. About the anointed followers of Jesus numbering 144,000? No. And how did our being registered with the UN as an NGO become a "fiasco"?
For the record, Jehovah's Witnesses need to make certain compromises from time to time about which you might hear, but may not really understand as to the reasons these compromises are made, but our registering with the UN is what gives us the right to appeal to the UN should the human rights of our brothers and sisters be denied in any UN member state for our being conscientious objectors or any of us should be subjected to lengthy prison sentences or death in any of the member nations over which the UN holds sway.
I will add here that just as many religious organizations (Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, etc.) have registered as NGOs to protect such groups from human right violations that might occur in any UN member nation, so Jehovah's Witnesses as an organization has done so as a way to protect our right to appeal to the UN whenever the human rights of any of our brothers and sisters is denied in any UN member state over which the UN holds sway, which doesn't violate our Christian neutrality nor alter our neutral stance, since Jehovah's Witnesses do not assent or dissent on matters taking up by the UN on matters that are unrelated to our right to worship. The UN doesn't promote any religion, but being an NGO serves to protect the right of NGOs to worship without interference from any UN member nation.
I remember reading somewhere that you're not baptised, is that right? If so, the onus is on them to convince you that the JWs have the right religion.
No, it really isn't. Whether her parents believe Jehovah's Witnesses have the right religion has nothing to do with the OP. She must prove to herself "the good and acceptable and perfect will of God" and if she doesn't believe Jehovah's Witnesses to be the right religion, this would be the OP's decision to make, and not her parents' decision.
@mind blown:
Who are the real apostates?
When you say "apostates," I'm not clear on what religion you are asking the OP to determine Jehovah's Witnesses to be apostates from. If Jehovah's Witnesses are "apostates," as you say, then from what religious group did they become apostates?
@Vidqun:
In connection with the UN-NGO debacle. This argument, based on Matt. 24:15 and Mark 13:14, is for those that are trying to convince family and friends to get out of the Borg. The reasoning follows WT theology....
When you catch sight of = notice, even for a short period of time
The disgusting thing causing desolation = The UN
Standing
In a holy place = place of true worship
Where it ought not....
The UN stood in the "holy place" for nine years, from 1992-2002. Now is a good time to flee.
Flee from where to where? While the UN is "the disgusting thing that causes desolation" to which Jesus refers at Matthew 24:15 and at Mark 13:14, that presumes to stand in a "holy place" in place of God's Messianic Kingdom, it is not yet known the position that this counterfeit of God's kingdom that is "disgusting" in God's sight will take against God's people.
The National Council of the Churches of Christ in America did, back on December 18, 1918, claim that the UN's predecessor, the now-defunct League of Nations, to be "the political expression of the Kingdom of God on earth."At Mark 13:14, Jesus directed his followers to "begin fleeing to the mountains" when the great tribulation began, and so Jehovah's Witnesses have been helping others to flee to God's organization and away from all political alliances and false religion before the great tribulation begins!
@PaintedToeNail:
I ask my spouse questions, he has no answers and often agrees that I am right. Yet, he says he will always remain a JW. He is a 3rd gen born-in...there are none so blind as he who just won't see.
What persuades you to believe that your spouse is blind?
@Finally-Free:
I don't know much about your situation, but if I was young I'd be quiet and let them pay for my education first. Then I'd get a good job and an apartment. When I didn't depend on them for anything I'd start asking them questions, and stick to topics I felt might be an issue for them.
This does sound to me like a good plan.
@inbetween:
usually older ones remember the hype about 1975, and if they are honest, they will have to [admit], that it was not the brothers running ahead, but it was the whole Org pushing this date.
Well, you're mistaken. It was due to the enthusiasm of many of the brothers back in the late 60s and early 70s that 1975 began to be hyped as the year when Armageddon would occur, even though the Society had not intimated that the end of this system of things would occur in 1975, only that 1975 would mark 6,000 years of mankind's existence on earth. Many mused about how appropriate it would be, based on the comment made in the Life Everlasting—in Freedom of the Sons of God book, were the Millennial Rule of Christ Jesus to begin in 1975, and this is how 1975 was given more significance than should have otherwise been the case and the Society was responsible -- "regretted" is the word that was used later -- over its not tamping down the expectation that they knew had come to exist in many of the congregations over the probability, rather than the possibility, of that end would occur in that year. Some of the brothers had indeed run ahead by reading more into what the Life Everlasting book, on page 29, paragraph 42, had stated:
"So in not many years within our own generation we are reaching what Jehovah God could view as the seventh day of mankind's existence," and continuing on page 30, paragraph 43, the following: "How appropriate would it be for Jehovah God to make of this coming seventh period of a thousand years a sabbath period of rest and release, a great Jubilee sabbath for the proclaiming of liberty throughout the earth for all its inhabitants! This would be most timely for mankind.... It would not be by mere chance or accident but would be according to the loving purpose of Jehovah God for the reign of Jesus Christ, the "Lord of the sabbath," to run parallel with the seventh millennium of man's existence."
Some of the brothers that had run ahead were responsible for the way in which many responded to what seemed to them to be a sure prediction by piling up debt for things that they could not afford, burning up their credit cards believing that they would never have to pay off such debt, which resulted in many losing their homes and leaving, accusing God's organization for their being deceived into believing the end would occur in 1975, when in 1974, the Watchtower article, "Serve with Eternity in View" [w74 6/15 ¶18, p. 379], stated "these Christians are intensely interested to see if [1975] will coincide with the outbreak of the "great tribulation...." It could. But they are ... content to wait and see, realizing that no human on earth knows the date." (Emphasis added.)
I was there in the years that preceded the year 1975, and you're mistaken.
@Black Sheep:
In my experience they will try to get off the hook by denying everything, so have literature of their era at your fingertips and dog eared at the appropriate pages before you say anything.
Deny what exactly?
Never ask a question that you don't know the programmed [response] for and always know (and have) the WT document that they need to read that demonstrates their dishonesty.
So are you suggesting that Jehovah's Witnesses are unwilling to admit what things we might have believed in the past? This is not the case. Our literature is not invisible and what we may have believed going all the way back to Pastor Russell is available for anyone to read today. No one has any interest in being dishonest in concealing what things we used to believe.
They need to feel guilty for every lie and dishonest tactic they try to use to weasel their way out of the crap they have dumped themselves in.
What lie? What dishonest tactic?
They need to feel like they are in one of those TV sitcoms where every lie they tell to pretend they are sane just gets them closer and closer to outright insanity.
What do you mean?
@djeggnog
