Are There Things You Didn't Understand About JW's Until AFTER Baptism?

by minimus 39 Replies latest jw friends

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  blondie

  Yes, shotgun, it is amazing how they hid that about Rutherford. They lived separately for many years. Strangely, though when he was living in California where she lived, they still lived separately. I don't think his son Malcolm became a JW. Malcolm died in 1989 and I think has a son named Paul who is still living. I'm sure the Internet forced the WTS to reveal this information.

  Proclaimers Book (1993) p. 89

  Brother Rutherford was survived by his wife, Mary, and their son, Malcolm. Because Sister Rutherford had poor health and found the winters in New York (where the Watch Tower Society’s headquarters were located) difficult to endure, she and Malcolm had been residing in southern California, where the climate was better for her health. Sister Rutherford died December 17, 1962, at the age of 93. Notice of her death, appearing in the Monrovia, California, Daily News-Post, stated: "Until poor health confined her to her home, she took an active part in the ministerial work of Jehovah’s Witnesses."
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  suzi_creamcheez

  I wonder if Sister Rutherford's poor health was due to spiritual weakness? or maybe she was an emotional basket case because her husband was a philandering power-mad drunk? -suz
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  minimus

  I wonder why not much is said about Rutherford's family. You would think that even the "apostates" would have some concrete info on them.
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  blondie

  Well, minimus, it could be that Malcolm Rutherford and his son Paul had/have no reason to talk to the "apostates." Or that the "apostates" felt that they had suffered enough from their unavoidable familial association with JFR.

  Blondie
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  TR

  I was so frickin brain dead at the time of my baptism, that I just wanted to answer the questions to be able to join the club. How sick is that? Anyone can tell you what you want to hear. It took a few years, but stress and reality of being a 'hovah caught up to me, and I bailed.

  TR
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  minimus

  Blondie, I hope you got my little "apostate" joke. Being referred to as an "apostate" to me, is really a badge of honor......I think RR posted something regarding the family but as I recall, it was not substantiated.
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  blondie

  Hi, min. All I know is that Malcolm had no love for his father and was a young adult when his father got involved with the WTS. As to his son Paul, that information I got through Social Security as well as Malcolm's date of death. I have to admit that I would have like to have tried to talk to Malcolm. But I doubt that I would have shared it with anyone.

  Blondie
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  kgfreeperson

  I read somewhere that Rutherford started the "don't marry, don't have children" pressure because neither his wife nor his son was interested in his cult and it embarrassed him. I have no idea where I read that. I do believe it was Ray Franz who suggested that the ban against marriage was lifted when Knorr wanted to marry.
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  Panda

  Great thread MINI.

  What I didn't understand (even as an adult of 22 when I got baptized) was the trauma involved when friends were df'd. I at first went along with the blurb "[that] it's like belonging to a club and following the rules. When you stop following the rules you're out of the club."

  Yeah, but when you're not at the club you can still talk to ex-club members. The emotional stress of shunning is like the Stockholm syndrome. Where the tortured comes to follow (and love) the torturer. The WTS is responsible for terrible emotional pain. Not the pain which we encounter through soul searching but purposeful "under the thumb" pain.

  I actually thought that I was becoming a free thinking person by getting baptized. I had no idea that questioning beliefs (for me it was the 1914, 1975 stuff) would land me in hot water. I also didn't know that accusing the PO of wrongdoing was a no-no.
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  minimus

  Panda, I also used the "club" membership example. We did that because we were part of the club! We thought we were better than those that didn't want to follow our rules. But we live and learn.