Last Memorial Experiences

NoviceLocs14

I'll share mine first...

I had never missed a memorial for at least a quarter of a century of my life. I was kind of raised to believe that missing the memorial was a sin in itself.

By 2013 memorial season, I was missing most of my meetings (even though I was still technically part of my foreign language congregation), and I had just come off the pioneer list. I still made plans to attend the Memorial (God forbid if I missed that lol).

I knew that typically our memorials were around 9 pm, since we usually got last priority (being a foreign language hall and all). The problem was I hadn't been to a meeting in several weeks, so I couldn't confirm the time.

So I get to my kingdumb hall at 9, and to my horror, I see people from my congregation walking out the doors into the parking lot. It turns out, the memorial was actually at 7:30, despite 3 straight years of being later than that. I don't know how the heck I got out of that parking lot without anyone catching me.

I ended up driving all over Atlanta, where I lived at the time, praying to Jehovah all the way to help me find a Memorial to go to. The guilt I had for possibly missing the memorial was overwhelming (what a shame). I ended up driving to 3 different kingdumb halls across Atlanta before I found a memorial that was still in session (by now, it's almost 10 o'clock at night). I made it just in time to pass the emblems.

I remember actually making it to one of my meetings to field circus after that and my FS overseer giving me the side eye and cold shoulder, almost like "How DARE you miss the memorial!"

Anyway, I'd love to hear your stories...

just fine

The last time I went to a memorial (almost 20 years ago) I wore a pantsuit. You should have seen the looks I got :-)

never a jw

" I was kind of raised to believe that missing the memorial was a sin in itself"

Interestingly enough I share that part of the story. I am 52, but when I was about ten or eleven I began to question that the loving God of the bible was going to throw me in hell for not attending the Catholic mass (one of five capital sins, I think). That was the beginning of my conversion to atheism which was well settled by the time I was 15. The second phase came about six years ago when I researched the JW religion, the bible and pretty much everything about Christianity. Now you can call me a[nti]theist, even the antichrist. I would take that as a compliment.

Ding

It's always amazed me how much emphasis the WT places on the Memorial, given that at the vast majority of Kingdom Halls no one ever partakes of anything and the talks are the same every year -- just repackaged.

It reminds me of people who attend their church just once or twice a year -- at Christmas and Easter.

It's like some sort of superstition... bad things will happen if you don't show up...

OnTheWayOut

In 2006, I had pretty much faded from my local congregation. My wife and I went on a Spring vacation to Las Vegas during the Memorial. After the session, she started making plans to hang out, do field circus, and attend a regular meeting with some other JW's. That pissed me off as I didn't intend to spend my Vegas vacation doing JW stuff. So I told my wife I was done- done attending ANY meetings.

I did not go back at all, but one year later we were on another vacation, this time staying with a JW friend in her family's home on a tropical island. This JW friend was close and relatively unconcerned about my inactive status. But she said her family didn't realize I was totally inactive. We were scheduled to leave the island the day after the Memorial.

I had not rented a car and the friend drove her father's car. Her parents were deeply concerned that I was not even attending the Memorial. They said they shouldn't go so far as to kick me out of their home, but didn't want to aid me to get to the airport the next day (despite the fact that my JW wife would need that ride). The home was a good 20 minutes drive past where cabs would even take you on the island. Well, I was about to grab my suitcase and start walking to get a hotel for my last night, but my wife defended my right not to attend. That was all I needed- my wife's support. So I said I would just go to the Memorial and the friend said she could smooth it over with her parents.

I was wearing my best Hawaiian shirt, khakis, and clean hiking shoes. My wife tried to get me to wear a different shirt and a tie. I said no way. Funny, I wasn't the only "tourist" dressed that way. The talk was from a Spanish "branch brother" from Puerto Rico. Maybe his Spanish Memorial talk for the other congregation was spectacular, but his English talk totally sucked. Nobody, absolutely nobody, would say "Great talk" to him or to each other.

I got my ride. Since then, I went to one funeral talk at a Kingdom Hall just last year for my father-in-law.

EverApostate

I was kind of raised to believe that missing the memorial was a sin in itself

To all those who still feel the same, just ponder over what the memorial is all about. Don't fall for the JW pressure that this is a very important and holy event. It is a cannibalistic practice of eating the flesh and drinking the blood of another human, to attain salvation, king-hood, or whatever non-sense. Even though the emblems are symbolic, it is still a cannibalistic ritual.(Symbolic cannibalism though )

This disgusting ritual for sure, was a practice among most of the ancient tribes to appease their gods and was borrowed by the Biblical Writers.

As for my experience, I missed the very first memorial after having awakened myself. Lot of dubs were terribly shocked though. I didn't give a damn, coz by that time I was thoroughly convinced that this was all fake. (Having read "Crisis of Conscience" cover to cover)

pale.emperor

The last one I went to was 2 years ago when I was still an active JW but in the process of awakening. Didn't go to 2017's because I was already wide awake and out.

I am going to next years though so I can eat and drink it. My arrival will make the elders think coming back, that I'm playing their game. But when they see me partaking it'll likely piss them off. I hope so. Might even break a peice off for my daughter to eat.

Nathan Natas

NoviceLocs14 confessed, "I was kind of raised to believe that missing the memorial was a sin in itself."

This is interesting.

Did you then, or do you now, partake of the emblems as an indication that you are anointed?

I'm going to take a statistical leap and guess that your answer to that question is "No."

Which means that like hundreds of thousands of JWs around the world, you REJECT the bread and wine when it is offered.

So... do you now, or did you then, believe that it would be a SIN for you to REJECT the emblems in the privacy of your own home?

Personally, I am QUITE HAPPY to reject the emblems from the comfort of my comfy recliner in front of my glorious wide-screen TV.

Saename

The most recent memorial was actually the first memorial I missed since I had become an atheist (or a non-JW.) It was nothing spectacular, really. I got an invitation in the mailbox; my mother and my brother attended but asked me why I wouldn't. I said I no longer believe in god, and we had an argument about the existence of God and evolution. None of the Jehovah's Witnesses cared enough to visit me and encourage me to go. I wouldn't attend anyway as by that time, I had become too interested in philosophy (epistemology and logic) and science. I found out too many things to believe in a god without evidence, especially the god of Jehovah's Witnesses or any other denomination of Christianity.

What I still wonder about is how Christians who believe in evolution can reconcile the original sin with science. The only answer I find satisfactory is that there never has been a perfect human (or any perfect, living thing for that matter.) God must have created humankind (by directing the process of evolution—but even that is problematic as natural selection doesn't need god at all) sinful in the sense that we have been aging and dying ever since our moment of creation. But then... when was our moment of creation? It would have to be the moment when god gave us the soul, but... every offspring that has ever been born was almost identical to its parents. A chimpanzee never gave birth to a human. A human always gave birth to a human. Evolution is very gradual that way. So... at one point in time, multiple couples of soulless human parents gave birth to human children who now had a soul (new generation)? But what was the difference between the children with souls and their parents with no souls? Moreover, are we to understand that the soulless parents will never go to heaven just because they didn't have soul? Does that mean the children, some of whom no doubt had affection for their parents, will never see their parents in heaven as opposed to the children of these children?

sir82

So... at one point in time, multiple couples of soulless human parents gave birth to human children who now had a soul (new generation)?

I think that is pretty much the Catholic spin on the Genesis creation account - it is the allegorical story of when God first "implanted", for lack of a better term, a soul into humans.

If you have any questions, take it up with your local priest. That's all I know (and even "know" is a stretch - it is my vague recollection), and I'm not interested enough to research it.

Last Memorial Experiences

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