by ithinkisee 40 Replies latest jw friends
A bethel speaker at an assembly said, "Apostates and other opposers of truth will attempt to use LOGIC to persuade you that this isn't the Truth."
That is great! Apostates use LOGIC to reason but don't listen them! Listen to us, we use round about means to persuade you ! Don't question it 'cause it's God's word.
He sounds like he might have had doubts himself.
For me it wasn't the JW doctrines, it was the bible itself. Once I realised it was a book of myth and legend I was on the way out.
Nice breakdown. Here goes mine in abbreviated form:
Raised in the "truth"
Virtually no doubts during childhood
Never really liked going out in field service but did it because I had to. Pioneered so that I could justify staying at home with Mommy and daddy (kind of like every single person that pioneers today does)
Went to Bethel at 19, appointed MS at 20. Like I thinkisee I also noticed that it was all politics there..its who you know. My bethel work overseer used to take weekend trips and fly back on Monday and show up at 1 or 2PM and have us cover for him so that a vacation day wouldnt be deducted. Once he auxiliary pioneered so he would go out in service every morning and show up for work at 1... his overseer was non the wiser because we covered for him. He was an elder... so I guess in retrospect this gave me some doubts but like a good little JW I chalked it up to imperfection. Besides he was a great guy.
Left Bethel and got married. Generation change happened and still this didnt give me major doubts. In fact I fondly remember justifying this to some of our friends when they questioned this and also the "you can go to college now" thing. What an idiot I was!
Appointed an "elder" at 25.. 25, yeah right an elder. Looking back I have to admit that I really doubted holy spirits role in that one. Now I know it was because I was a company man and the elders liked me bottom line.
Began to be used full swing in the org. Service Committee fairly quickly, judicial committee's, called by CO's to sit in on elders complaints a couple of times (aka Special Committees that many dont realize even take place), public talks out to the entire circuit, etc, etc blah blah blah. You get the idea, idiot "Company Man" also had a kid during all of this despite the CO and DO's efforts to get us back in full time service.
Then the bomb dropped... 2002... pedophile scandal. It hit me like a ton of bricks. After the dateline aired I was in a daze for weeks... then went online and let google do the directing. I let down my previous inhibitions and read almost every anti-JW site out there. If they had policies in place that allowed innocent children to be harmed then that was it for me. They couldnt be god's org on earth.
So now here I am trying to figure out how to peacefully escape this corrupt book publishing company while leaving my family intact. How do I do it with my entire family deep in it...elders, CO's, pioneers, missionaries...
I think I was a skeptic from childhood on. I was interested in nature and mechanics. I loved history and I've been a perpetual student. I had a nasty habit of challenging myself. My thinking and my constant questioning were discouraged by my parents and the Witness people. I've always been very poor at blindly accepting anything. I made a poor Witness. I was bound to leave. The lies before 1975 discouraged me. The lies after 1975 pissed me off. The shunning that started in 1992 sealed the deal.
Bob was a kick. He looked like a Biker version of Santa Claus, he was very smart, and nice, and had obviously studied up on cults at some point. He chose one point, very deliberately, and stuck to it. It was such a little thing, but I'm convinced that indoctrinated people generally don't break their indoctrination over a big thing. It happens, but it's rare, and it's usually a few little things that stick in the mind and let you work things out sort of under the radar.
Thanks Odrade! Very good bit of info for us to note.
Sad,but alot of useful info here. hopefully this will help alot of people threw their doubts and open some eyes as well.
thanks.
XBEHERE:
Me and you have lived parallel lives. My WHOLE family is in deep (POs, Elders, Pioneers, etc.) and I've been unplugged from the Matrix........
Black Man:
Were you ever at Bethel? If so, what years? Feel free to PM me if you don't want it public knowledge.
Thanks,
-ithinkisee
Odrade:
You are so right about everything you said but especially about all those books. I could never understand the need for all those damn books! Does everybody remember the scripture that says: "to the making of many books there is no end and too much devotion to them is wearisome to the flesh". But I guess this scripture does not apply to THEIR books LOL! And never mind that the damn thing will be obsolete at some future date because of some blooper or changed teaching. It got to the point that when something was released at an assembly I didn't even bother to go out of my way to get it unless I was actually handed one as I was leaving.
What an insult to our intelligence to actually think we should get worked up like pavlov's dogs over yet another waste of paper!
ithink:
I pm'd you...........
