I know it hurts to lose a very close friend and it is so sad how brainwashed they are. I agree with the others and maybe you can send him a card with a note about his wife to let him know how much you love them. Take it from there and if he doesn't want to communicate with you he will soon let you know. So sorry for your loss.
"Thanks for showing an interest" - why I'd rather be completely shunned.
by Julia Orwell 21 Replies latest jw friends
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Quendi
I agree with those who say to forgive him. As The Searcher says, many of us here once acted the same way toward people who weren't 'strong in the faith' whether they were officially out or faded. I am dealing with a Witness who was one of my closest friends for more than thirty years who won't respond to any of my overtures to resume our friendship. My partner has encouraged me to keep on trying, citing the cult mentality as the reason for my old friend's behavior. I will continue for a while longer but my patience is running out. Write this man back in a few weeks and see where that goes. If he is unresponsive, then move on. There's no reason to press your affection on somebody who does not want it.
Quendi
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DesirousOfChange
He is a mess now. Forgive him.
Yes, what a mess it is. He & his wife were never supposed to die. They were supposed to slip right into the Panda Petting Paradise, hand-in-hand, together for ever and ever.
Yet, he can't accept that they LIED TO HIM.
Doc
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quellycatface
So sorry to hear about your friend passing away.
Please don't let this poor chap upset you. He is not allowed to think for himself or choose his own friends, even. Pity him. Maybe send a card to let him know you are there for him. Keep the door open. He may need you one day.
Love, xx
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whathappened
Julia, just be glad you are free. It doesn't matter whether or not you are faded, DF'd or DA'd...you are FREE!!!
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Magnum
I agree with some of the comments indicating that maybe he's emotionally drained, etc., but I'm not so sure he should be so quickly forgiven. According to your post, he's an older man and has been a JW for some time. He's been around long enough to have the same issues with the org that we have. The situation has become such in JWdom that I don't see how any honest, reasonable, intelligent, discerning person could not have serious questions and doubts about the org and the religion. Some might say "well maybe he does have doubts and he just suppresses them because he's older and he has nowhere else to go and he's given his life to JWs." Well, to me, that doesn't excuse him. JWs regularly condemn people, including older ones, in churches for not recognizing the wrongs of their religions, their doctrinal fallacies, etc.
I blame my own family members. I think one knows something's wrong, but loves the indirect glory she gets from her husband's position in the org. Another probably somewhere in the back of his mind knows something's wrong, but he keeps his doubts suppressed because he's a goody-goody people-pleaser who's looked up to and doesn't want to lose his status. Another is extremely ignorant about the Bible, JW history, the goings-on in JWdom, etc. yet she stubbornly thinks JWs have the one and only truth even though she can't begin to defend the org, JW theology, etc.
With every passing day I become less wiling to forgive JWs, and anybody who becomes one now with all the info available about them and all the craziness deserves to be one.
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Julia Orwell
I forgive him and pity him but was just plain shocked yesterday...even though he made the first call to me. This shows he still has a spot, a tiny, tiny spot, in his heart for me. He's been a jw for 40 years and is totally under their thumb. He knows there are things wrong with the org but to him it's about Jehovah and he puts up with the org crap out of the sense of superiority serving "Jehovah" and knowing the "true" interpretation of the bible gives him. If fronted with evidence of the org's corruption or proof the bible is not true he'll just ride roughshod over it and drown out the dissenting voice.
I feel for him because at heart he is a decent guy and when I've seen his authentic self break through it is compassionate and caring. I've also seen the jw cult persona too, the callous, cold, superior personality, which is the part that shuns me. Funny, when his authentic compassionate self has come through to other jws over the years I was in, they didn't know how to handle it and were rude to him, which pushed his authentic self further under. A less desirable part of his authentic self, the inferiority complex he grew up with, played into the jw persona which gives him superiority over every non jw in the world. I think it was the kind, compassionate authentiiic self who called me yesterday, but the jw self that ended the conversation.
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stuckinarut2
Sadly it's occasions such as this that we sort out Real friends from Conditional friends.....
Most of us have gone through, or will go through times when even the seemingly closest person to us will betray or turn their backs on us if we are not seen as "appropriate witness associates"
It is sickening what cult mentality does to a person!
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Ocean1111
To check Bethel's objective it is best to understand "shunning" enriches Bethel as JWs direct resources to the bliionaries rather than their brothers and sisters. And as such, with the profit motive and expertise of Bethel to engineer perceptions, we have to be aware the Bethel racketeers are who dictate the JW modern personality. JWs are indirectly involved due to fear of man, not fear of God, men who have asumed the "divine authority" veneer very effectively, JWs modern Korah sold to them as "Moses" at Bethel.
When Bethel reaps what it has sown, of course JWs will be utterly tested in faith if their faith is placed on the Bethel Titanic and it's Captain GB, which is the case. So JWs will need help when those days come, because their faith is placed on entities that can be deposed, and those idols will be deposed because it is a Biblical principle of what happens to hypocrites, that is the main leaders of the JW "faith", a faith now in men and orgnization that just so happens to pay extremely well.
Thus it may be something to not direct hurt from what the JW puppets do or say, they are being influenced by an apostasy and it's obligatory lawlessness and frigid reality that makes other religions seem almost holy. Bethel is the pinnacle of the modern apostate manifestation, so JWs are much to be pitied because no one usually willingly follows lawless frauds, they must be decieved gradually, as is the case of the GB tenure since 1976, to do so.
Eventually JWs have to wake up to the true shock of their life, being pillaged by their own "priests". We may be disgusted by JW hypocrisy, but we have to understand Bethel is the lead system, the home of the true apostate,the molder of the modern JW. So we should not allow them to direct full blame to others, from Bethel to whom the main blame does fall. Bethel is expert at diverting attention away from their own apostasy, to attention to everywhere the apostasy cannot actually be. JWs are also victims and financial supporters of this con.
Days are coming that poor JWs will NEED help, they are also victims of the self-glorified error at Bethel. (Rev3:17-18)
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Julia Orwell
The memorial is tomorrow. I'm not going. My mum said it would do my head in if I did, and conveniently I have to work anyway.