Should some people actually be Witnesses? (page 2)

designs

AA instructs people to develop their own 'higher power' which is an admission that the mind fantasizes an authority and then submits to it. How many persons here on JWN are religious, have a concept of a higher power and submit to their fantasy. A JW can easily have a good happy life if that imagined higher power is pleasing.

Honesty

My ex deserves to be a Jehovah's Witness.

Her attitude towards others fits right in with pioneers, elders and other mature ones.

happy@last

It sounds like you do not have any experience with any other groups, in particular ones that are able to help with drug or alcohol abuse. I would not recommend anyone join JWs to help with a structured life, it only creates a different set of problems for them contend with.

I have a feidn who was a JW for 2 years, he came off drugs to become one but was only able to live the JW for a short time as it was too much to take. He realises it was a useful tool at the time but thankfully got out in order to live his life. He could have got the same results going to any structured group.

done4good

Let me ask this question another way...Do some people actually need to shoot heroin?

Religion is much like a drug. Authoritarian religions are hard drugs. JW is heroin. An heroin addict will need something to help them rehabilitate, (such as methodone), which is still addictive and harmful, just not as deadly. The idea is an addict needs to be weened off the most harmful substance.

Leaving JW is no different for some. Many have no point of reference for how to exist without it. Like the heroin addict who tries to quit cold turkey, (a potentially fatal situation), a JW of this type will not be able to function normally in the outside world. They need something to help them find direction. That does not mean they should keep taking the worst possible poison however. Most other religions are not nearly as harmful, (however untrue they are), and might at least serve the purpose of helping one gain equilibrium.

I am atheist, but I know leaving is a process, not unlike detoxification.

d4g

cultBgone

done4good - amen.

Xanthippe

I'm not convinced that the religion is bad for everybody. It seems to work well enough for many JWs. - Apog

I do wonder if some people will ever be able to leave the JWs. My brother seemed to really enjoy bethel and having bells ringing to tell him when to get up etc. It would drive me crazy living like that and I hate being told what to believe now but I agree some people are followers, advertisers know this.

At the last two family funerals one of my sisters said something about the colours of the flowers each time. Nothing else! I thought is that all you can say after all these years? She learnt Russian at school! Have their brains been atrophied with disuse?

I don't know if everyone could cope with leaving. 'Humankind cannot bear very much reality' - T S Eliot

And do you have any suggestions of equal effectiveness for someone with this kind of need?

Do I have any suggestions? This site is great for people who are thinking of leaving but I just think if the likes of my siblings ever find their way here we should be careful not to jump all over their probably continuing theism as they try to find their way through the craziness of human beliefs. Giving up the structure of a belief system and one as strict as JWs takes time.

jgnat

What about the children of these lost souls? If the children are of fairly normal development, they should be allowed to break free and explore when they come of age. Without fear of losing their entire family.

I read the title, and my thoughts went to the people who patently do not fit in. Maybe they have a strong personality or a brash nature that never figures out that there is an unwritten code of behavior. Or perhaps they are single parents or are married to "unbelieving mates". They sit in the fringes, ignored by anyone who "matters" at the Kingdom Hall.

WTWizard

Astrologically, there may be some that are damned to become jokehovian witlesses. Let someone be unable to attract the opposite sex, and then along comes Saturn in Sagittarius. While Saturn is in Sagittarius, the jokehovians find this soul. They promise to fix the opposite sex problem, blaming Satan for it. In doing so, they finish driving Satan right out of the victim's life--as if Satan wasn't already out of that life enough. The victim gets baptized, and then there is a legally binding contract. This fact doesn't come into play--so long as the Gehenna threats and disfellowshipping threats work, they will stick with that.

However, there is no assurance that it will work. Let them not fix what they promised to fix, let them make it worse, and this person somehow sneaks out. Now, come another Saturn Sagittarius transit, and someone could dig out that they could use the baptism as a grounds to force the victim back. This time, the victim is required to do more than they were doing before. Throw in a square of Jupiter in Virgo, and you have a miserable situation. Needless to say, that victim's attempts to legitimately develop their soul(s) only helps joke-hova to trap such victim(s) all the worse, and bring in all the more victims as Saturn is in Sagittarius with the assistance of Jupiter square Saturn in Virgo. It doesn't help that Neptune is near square Saturn, in 9 Pisces--helping the dollar become toilet paper and these victims all the more bound to the cancer.

As to anyone benefiting, there is nothing to gain from that religion. People have been known to quit smoking and drugs through Rockefeller programs (the worst possible, as with any Rockefeller program, where the results are just barely better than doing nothing). People have quit smoking and drugs on their own. People have started exercising without being prodded. And, for every person that was a lazy slob before becoming a jokehovian witless and is now in reasonably good shape, there are many more that were in good shape and are now fatter and poorer than they were before.

Balaamsass2

Had this discussion with a still in JW last week.

I might of agreed with the OP in years past, however after watching family and congregation members with serious addictions over many years(Drugs, violence, sex, Alcohol), in almost every case these folks were steered away from medical help by the Borg. Within a few years they simply learned to live a double life within the BORG and the addiction continued.

designs

I knew a lot of older JWs who would be better staying, its the only world they have.

Should some people actually be Witnesses?

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