An old friend used to interpret the scriputue which says that women are not permitted to speak as "let the women shut-up"
(and old friend as in FORMER friend )
for the discussin i will set aside questions about whether paul was was infact a literary creation of the gnostic xtians.
"paul's" famous words at !
tim 2:12-15 and i cor 14:34,35 that insist women be silent in the congretgations have spawned hundreds of years of female repression.
An old friend used to interpret the scriputue which says that women are not permitted to speak as "let the women shut-up"
(and old friend as in FORMER friend )
i have noticed on past threads from posters from other countries than the usa that they would be hanging out in pubs and such while still jw's.
in the us i believe that going to bars would pretty much be a df/da offense.
in other countries is the policy different?
I've gone to bars however would not divulge this info to my ultra conservative j-dub 'friends' since i knew it would be frowned upon greatly. I've heard several talks but none recently which mention the dangers of bars, but moreso for the association and not the drinking. Point is as stated above, restaurants have bars, hotels as well. I went on a JW trip to DC and the hotel we stayed in had a bar. I went down and enjoyed a drink with an older brother and thought nothing of it and neither did he. When I go to the UK I find that j-dubs go to pubs and consume more alcohol in general than their US counterparts, which suits me just fine
what do you disagree with the disfellowshipping policy?
Forty and Corvette: That is the very issue I am facing. I live in a house of 5. Two are Jw and two are not. I am closest to the two who are not anyhow, and it just makes us even closer, BUT for the two that are, they have NOTHING TO SAY TO ME AT ALL. They walk around with their heads in the air (literally) and proclaim that its not their law its jehovahs law that tells them to do so. It hit rock bottom however when i was told that I must get out of my bed on January 2 (a day i had planned to take off from work) and leave the house for an hour or so while the meeting for field service goes on here (we currently 'borrow' use of another hall while ours is being built). funny thing, one elder said i could be there while another elder said i cannot. (My own house where I've lived for 26 years, i now need PERMISSION from an OUTSIDER to sleep in on my day off. ) evidently there is no jw protocol on the matter and instead of being reasonable and consulting THE BIBLE, they decide to make their own decision. I was told that if i just stay in my room and be quient it should be ok, but if i were to "cough and then someone downstairs hears it, that jah's spirit would be lost from the meeting for service" the point of all this: df'ing makes one not welcome in their own house, alienates and divides families and the mental torment from being labled is long lasting. Totally shunning someone is not in the spirit of AGAPE love.
in talking with a few long time jw's though, there is a feeling that the current policies should be revisited soon....yeah right!
just last night i was thinking about the numerous talks, assembly parts and wt articles that repeatedly denounced such "debasing music" such as "rap" and "heavy metal".
remember those?
seems like every week during the 80's that phrase made its way into a public talk or wt study.
Just last night i was thinking about the numerous talks, assembly parts and wt articles that repeatedly denounced such "debasing music" such as "rap" and "heavy metal". Remember those? Seems like every week during the 80's that phrase made its way into a public talk or wt study. Then one day, we heard no more about "debasing music". I think it was replaced by the ills of the internet and the evil "chat rooms" etc.
WELL as we should have it, heard in a talk today, in speaking of "matters of conscience", we should not try to force our views of music, among other things, on others. This of course i knew all along, HOWEVER, the young man giving the discourse took it a step further and proclaimed that "not all rap music is bad". I nearly fell out of my chair. I looked around to see the reactions of the others at this groundbreaking news coming "from the platform", and then i remembered how EVERYTHING must be taken with a grain of salt. I mean, i've heard people quote brothers who have given public talks, or they use phrases like "well unless i hear it from the platform, it ain't true". Hmmmmm does that REALLY mean that not all rap music is bad? Will I begin to hear rap tunes pumping out of the field service cars instead of kingdom melodies? who knows?
as much emphasis is placed on study and research has anyone noticed that you if you engage a dub in a conversation about the deeper things of the bible (not the wt), that you will end up doing most of the talking?
i made a personal decision to read more books, magazines etc, (of a secular, historical nature) becuase i do not wish to be that way.
unfortunately i found that within the dubs i had no one to talk to.
As much emphasis is placed on study and research has anyone noticed that you if you engage a dub in a conversation about the deeper things of the BIBLE (not the wt), that you will end up doing most of the talking? I made a personal decision to read more books, magazines etc, (of a secular, historical nature) becuase i do not wish to be that way. unfortunately i found that within the dubs i had no one to talk to. Most of the conversation during field service was either gossip related ('sister so and so's teenage daugher is pregnant...AGAIN') or related to some mindles television show or the sales at the local malls. I made it a personal point NOT to engage in gossip at anytime if i can help it, that is in all walks of life, and when i would change the subject, i would get blank looks. (what, a WOMAN that wants to talk politics instead of new shoes or bags? what is this world coming to) Has anyone else had this experience?
can someone fill me in as to what happened in 1980?
i was only 3 at the time, and that is right around the time my family got into the org.
also anything about the homosexuality at bethel too?
Thanks all for the responses! A lot of interesting stuff I read there!
can someone fill me in as to what happened in 1980?
i was only 3 at the time, and that is right around the time my family got into the org.
also anything about the homosexuality at bethel too?
can someone fill me in as to what happened in 1980? I was only 3 at the time, and that is right around the time my family got into the org. Also anything about the homosexuality at bethel too?
thanks!
towards the middle of my eighteen-month critical investigation of the jws and the bible i decided to pay a visit to my sister and brother-in-law at the patterson bethel complex in new york.
perhaps it was a last-ditch effort to salvage whatever faith i had in the organization, or maybe it was the realization that i would not be able to see my sister under semi-normal conditions again if i left; i don't know.
of course, the trip did not save my crumbling faith.
Wow, my visit to the Brooklyn bethel library was very similar as well. Its just the circumstances that landed me there which are different. Belive it or not i had to go all the way to bethel for my first judicial meeting before getting d'fd. the chairman of the committe was not able to make the 25 minute trip out to the local hall. So while the deliberations were made, i was made to sit in the library. and yes THAT IS WHAT I FOUND, books on science, all types of religion, point of view etc. There were also WT publications, but i gravitated to a book on world religions and started reading about the budhist religion. i joked to myself that if the decision made is to df then i have picked my new faith! I thought to myself however, how the rank and file are encouraged to only read WT publications and the NWT, just recently are other translations of the bible being referenced. They are even told the scripture in ecclesiates i think which says that the devotion to many books is wearisome to the flesh. well what about the many books in the bethel library? hmmmmm.... it has always been my opinion that that rank and file are not well read for the most part becuase of only reading wt publications. any scientific knowledge they get is from the awake magazine and they like to think they are experts for being able to spew out something they read from that. meanwhile they would NEVER pick up a book on their own about weather patterns, exotic plant or animal life, disease etc. they know only what WT tells them to know, and becuase of that, they are socially inept, and can't relate to the "outside world".
i am new...will try to keep this short and to the point.
up until then, there was a bookstudy held in my home.
i live with my jw aunt and cousin (more like "orthodox" jw if there was an official distinction) as well as my non-jw mother and brother with whom i am very close.
Well said by all!!! And I wholeheratedly agree. I am currently taking steps to reduce and eliminate some debt incurred in my early 20's. I am well on my way to that. I hope to have the debt elimiated by May and I am hoping to move very soon. Of course my Non-Jw mom plays lotto regularly so one can only hope...
I have thought about the non-support that I would get from the CO, however I still think he needs to know what is going on here, but of course he will back the brothers. I know and understand that fact!
The only true answer is for me to move, becuause yes, to be shunned in my own house is beyond ridiculous and my non-jw friends are amazed that I have not gone off the deep end by now. I understand that it is all a mind control thing, and that if you feel lonely enough without your JW "friends" then it will make you want to come back. That has the be the absolute worst reason to want to come back. To be honest, I want to serve God and not men. The JW's , my crazy aunt and cousin included are so serving an organization and they cannot see it. they will do anything the brothers tell them to do witout checking the bible first. It is so sad, and the majortity of JW are doing that as well.
If I do come back it will be to prove and expose the majorty as ones serving and org, and for that I may be put out again!!! To be honest I really think that the elders in my congregation, 5 out of 6 of whom have only known me for about 3 years or less, were quite taken aback that I have my own "views", that I am strongwilled, opinionated etc. I am quiet by nature but I REFUSED to back down in the judicial meetings. They probably saw me as a potential "problem" in the congregation and as one who would undermine their authority.
Thank you all for the advice! I will take it to heart!
i am new...will try to keep this short and to the point.
up until then, there was a bookstudy held in my home.
i live with my jw aunt and cousin (more like "orthodox" jw if there was an official distinction) as well as my non-jw mother and brother with whom i am very close.
I am new...will try to keep this short and to the point.
I was d'fd on 12/1/03. Up until then, there was a bookstudy held in my home. I live with my JW aunt and cousin (more like "orthodox" jw if there was an official distinction) as well as my NON-jw mother and brother with whom I am VERY close. Before the d'fing was announced, the elders met with the aunt and cousin to inform them that the bookstudy will not longer be permitted in our home since a d'fed person lives there. I am 26 years old by the way, not a minor child etc. HOWEVER, once my aunt displayed a shameful array of tears, they "gave in" and allowed her to have meetings for service here on wednesdays and fridays as well as a weekly letter writing campaign. However this is all based on the fact that I work during the day and that I will be not here, since evidently i am a "disease" to be avoided. This raises potiential sticky issues, like, suppose i wake up one day and i feel ill and decide not to go to work. what if the day is a wednesday or a friday? Or do i have to get permission before i schedule some time off from work? All of this does not seem right and i am ready to write a letter to the circuit overseer and let him know of the staunch SIMONY that is going on in the congregation here. thoughts please? should these meetings be held? also take into consideration that the house is 1/2 my moms and the other half my aunt. This complicates things further. No one from the elders approached my mom or even talked to her before allowing the bookstudy here. Since she is part home owner this should have been done. Instead they took my aunts word who is very overbearing as well. I am at the end of my rope. On top of that, my aunt and cousin will not say TWO WORDS to me unless it is to tell me to do something or order me around. My brother who is an aspiring actor and who needs as much family support as possible, had a play last night. My mom asked my aunt and cousin if they will attend. They sounded as if they would go, but then they asked if I would be there and when they found out that i would be, they told my mom that they cannot go. My mom who is not a jw does not understand any of this and they explained that "its not our law, its jehovah's law". well if they were so concerend about following "jehovah's law", then they would realize that having meetings OF ANY KIND at my house is WRONG. thoughts please!