Gretchen, I'm sorry... I didn't mean to duplicate your thread. I looked several pages back and didn't see anything. The search functionality here is broken. I would have bumped your thread, had I found it!
Anyways, yeah, I think it's going to be a big deal. Seriously! What kind of effect would knowing the Society's net worth have on many Witnesses, who think that they are this cash-strapped organization that pays out as much as it gets in to support the building and missionary work? If they knew they Society was worth X billion dollars, would they be more or less likely to contribute?
under_believer
JoinedPosts by under_believer
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30
You want some big Watchtower news? I think this is big news.
by under_believer injust like the wts, the mormons (okay, the "church of jesus christ of latter-day saints," hey look, a religion with even less talent at picking a name than the jw's) hide their net worth.
nobody knows how much money they have, though estimates go as high as 30 billion usd.. .
well, this guy in portland is suing them for (what else) pastoral pedophilia, and part of the discussion of damages, the plaintiff argues, is the revelation of how much money the church has.
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under_believer
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30
You want some big Watchtower news? I think this is big news.
by under_believer injust like the wts, the mormons (okay, the "church of jesus christ of latter-day saints," hey look, a religion with even less talent at picking a name than the jw's) hide their net worth.
nobody knows how much money they have, though estimates go as high as 30 billion usd.. .
well, this guy in portland is suing them for (what else) pastoral pedophilia, and part of the discussion of damages, the plaintiff argues, is the revelation of how much money the church has.
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under_believer
Just like the WTS, the Mormons (okay, the "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints," hey look, a religion with even less talent at picking a name than the JW's) hide their net worth. Nobody knows how much money they have, though estimates go as high as 30 billion USD.
Well, this guy in Portland is suing them for (what else) pastoral pedophilia, and part of the discussion of damages, the plaintiff argues, is the revelation of how much money the church has. In the words of the attorney for the plaintiff, "A jury needs to know the entire financial context to know whether a punitive award is too much or sufficient or not enough."
Obviously the church disagrees and has been fighting to keep this information secret, but last Thursday, the 12th of July, 2007, the Oregon Supreme Court agreed with the plaintiff and ordered the church to reveal their financial data including their net worth.
Here's a link: http://www.oregonlive.com/oregonian/stories/index.ssf?/base/news/1184210740215720.xml&coll=7 (mini-reg required to read article.)
Why did I say this was big Watchtower news? Well, put the pieces together. I am not a lawyer, but I believe that this case will establish a little thing that lawyers like to call "legal precedent." Remember, the trial hasn't even started yet--these are pretrial maneuvers. The court has agreed that for the trial to even start, the jury must have the church's financial details in order to evaluate the damages the plaintiff is asking for.
In other words, next time someone sues the WT for damages for child abuse (and you know it is only a matter of time,) they will be able to ask the Society for their net worth, on the basis of this established legal precedent.
How would you like to know how much the Society is worth? I know I would. If it is indeed an astronomical sum as many here speculate, do you think the revelation of that fact would affect anyone's faith? I think it might. -
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Kirk Cameron should have stuck to mediocre sitcoms
by under_believer inhe's currently tamed up with this guy called ray comfort and together they run a "ministry" where they make banal observations and say that it proves god exists.
check this one out:.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=xkhurrkoht8.. .
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under_believer
He's currently tamed up with this guy called Ray Comfort and together they run a "ministry" where they make banal observations and say that it proves God exists. Check this one out:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=XkHuRRKoHT8.
See what I mean? -
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Former or Current Elders, MS, Pioneers.......Did you enjoy these positions?
by R.F. indid you ever enjoy serving in this way or did you view it more as, "it's the thing that's encouraged, so that's what i'll do"?.
im currently a ms and pioneer(will shed this one immediately) and before i ever were appointed these, i always wanted to.
i thought it was a pretty cool thing for someone my age to be instructing the congo, and to have so many look up to you.
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under_believer
I was an MS and a pioneer at about your age. I had a love/hate relationship with pioneering--I loved the good feeling that came from doing what was "right" and the fellowship with my brothers and sisters, we had a congregation with 25 pioneers in it. I hated the actual ACTIVITY of pioneering, which was obviously, to my objective young mind, a huge waste of time and energy with tenuous at best Biblical justification.
I really liked being an MS though. I was always an excellent reader and speaker and I had great organizational skills and I enjoyed the attention I got. I was young! Now I realize how facile and vain it was, but at the time it was great. -
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are Jehovah's Witnesses a cult? You decide...
by under_believer inthere are no new thoughts in this post, but i felt like this topic was timely, what with it being convention time again, and with the anti-education rhetoric they've been spouting lately.. .
there are many definitions and lists of criteria for the concept of "cult.
" this is only one of them, so your mileage may vary.
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under_believer
There are no new thoughts in this post, but I felt like this topic was timely, what with it being convention time again, and with the anti-education rhetoric they've been spouting lately.
There are many definitions and lists of criteria for the concept of "cult." This is only one of them, so your mileage may vary. This one is from the U.K.'s Cult Information Centre (http://www.cultinformation.org.uk), an educational charity that's been in existence for 20 years, focusing on cult education and research.
According to the CIC, every cult can be defined as a group having all of the following five characteristics:
1. It uses psychological coercion to recruit, indoctrinate and retain its members.
2. It forms an elitist totalitarian society.
3. Its founder/leader is self-appointed, dogmatic, messianic, not accountable and has charisma.
4. It believes 'the end justifies the means' in order to solicit funds and recruit people.
5. Its wealth does not benefit its members or society.
I'd like to stress that, again, this is only _one source's_ definition of "cult." There are others. Now, do the Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Watchtower Society, meet these criteria?
#1 might be the easiest one to see. The JW recruitment style often uses bait-and-switch, love bombing, and fear to get people to sign up, to indoctrinate them, and to retain them. How is it not psychological coercion to tell people they'll die if they quit the religion? How is it not psychological coercion to cut off all contact with family members and friends if someone steps out of line? How is it not psychological coercion to insist, overtly, that people not think for themselves?
#2 is pretty clear too, at least to me. Spend 5 minutes listening to a group of Witnesses talk about "worldly" (i.e., non-Witness) people and you will have no trouble putting them in the "elitist" category. Almost any Public Talk will do as well; non-Witnesses are painted as greedy, craven, immoral, evil people, with only Witnesses able to understand the Bible and act on the morality contained within. And as far as totalitarianism goes... Witness wives are not supposed to think for themselves, but instead to follow, without question or complaint, the direction of their husbands, EVEN IF THEY KNOW FOR A FACT THEY ARE WRONG. Families are to do the same with elders, elders with Circuit Overseers, Circuit Overseers with District Overseers, District Overseers with the various "departments" at the Brooklyn, NY headquarters, and the "departments" with the Governing Body. This is a strictly enforced hierarchy and stepping out of it will bring down sanctions on the disobedient one, up to and including being kicked out of the faith (see: #1). Mothers are encouraged to observe and report to the elders the wrongdoing of their children, as are husbands with wives, children with parents, friends with friends. Each member is expected to fill out a form stating exactly, down to the hour spent and the booklet "placed," what activity in their personal ministry in God's service they perform each month, and these are all sent to the Society who keeps them in a massive database detailing each member's activity. Orwell could not have designed a more totalitarian environment.
#3 is also a no-brainer. The Governing Body is the head of the Witness organization, which they refer to as "Jehovah's [this being the 17th-century English mistranslation of the tetragrammaton that they have decided God wishes to be referred to as by people of any language worldwide] Organization." The Governing Body takes its authority from what it says are the fulfillment of various prophecies from the Bible, fulfillments that they say they qualify for. Who has interpreted these various Bible passages? You guessed it, the Governing Body. They are therefore self-appointed--the Body itself appoints new members, and individual Witnesses have no say in the matter whatsoever. They most certainly are also dogmatic--as already discussed, it's their way or the highway. Frequently, "understandings" or interpretations of scripture are introduced without any context or proof, and of late they have grown bold with pronouncements and rules that they don't even attempt to back up with anything but their own authority, such as the recent ban on casual clothes after one leaves their summer convention. They are accountable to no one but Jesus and Jehovah, they say, and they are the ones who decide what Jesus and Jehovah want their followers to do.
#4 is the only point on which it is possible to vacillate. Certainly the Society is very mercenary when it comes to obtaining funds, encouraging elderly people to write their heirs out of their wills and make the Society the sole beneficiary of their estates. Certainly the pyramid-scheme-like fundraising of the three yearly conventions, where one can always be guaranteed to hear that the funds are thousands and thousands of dollars short, implicitly passing a virtual collection plate if not a physical one, lends credence to the "anything goes" notion of collecting money. On the other hand, they're not beating people up in the hallway and stealing their milk money. Recruitment is easier to prove, though... there is a Witness concept called "spiritual warfare." This is a policy wherein any member including the leadership is allowed to lie if it is a subject which a government authority "has no business to know." This seems like a "end justifies the means" policy to me if there ever was one.
#5? Fahgeddaboudit. The Society brings in billions of dollars in cash and estate donations, real estate appreciation and sales, and stock growth every year. This money goes into the Society, and only a (comparatively) little bit comes out in the form of a Kingdom Hall Building Fund for third world countries, printing of literature, building of facilities, and support of certain classes of full-time employees of the Society. They don't pay taxes. Where is this money going? What is it being used for? Nobody knows, but it certainly isn't benefiting society at large. It's not benefiting members either, unless you count efforts to recruit more new members into a totalitarian society as benefiting them.
So, what do you think? Are they a cult by this or any other definition? I've gone back and forth on this question since I've been posting here but at this point I'm solidly in the "yes" column. -
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Voluntarily Confessing & Then Getting Reproved or Disfellowshipped
by minimus indo you realize how many contrite witnesses went to the elders to make things right with god and wound up getting disfellowshipped or privately or publicly reproved?
a lot.. did you or anyone that you knew ever get "disciplined" unfairly?
many times, no one would ever know about anything unless it was voluntarily brought up.
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under_believer
This isn't criticism, because I am at a totally different place right now than you were when this happened to you.
I will never, ever allow my daughter to be treated in that way without some serious consequences. She is one of the treasures of my life. Some middle-aged elder sicko treats her like that, even ASKS any kind of question of that nature, the first thing that will happen is, if she's underage, I will call the police. I don't think you can talk to a minor that way or ask those kinds of questions, even if the minor agrees to answering them.
I'm not above punching someone's teeth in, either. -
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Voluntarily Confessing & Then Getting Reproved or Disfellowshipped
by minimus indo you realize how many contrite witnesses went to the elders to make things right with god and wound up getting disfellowshipped or privately or publicly reproved?
a lot.. did you or anyone that you knew ever get "disciplined" unfairly?
many times, no one would ever know about anything unless it was voluntarily brought up.
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under_believer
> had casual sex with men for initiation, and were lesbians
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"But what do i tell the friends?"
by zack inso three weeks ago my wife and i had an emotional discussion wherein i finally told her that this religion was not the truth.
there was much emotion, a chill has ensued in our relationship.
(i haven't been to a meeting in 4 months now, and have not reported time in two months) i am sure many of you know the drill.. towards the end of our conversation, she asks: but what do i tell the friends when they ask about you?.
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under_believer
I am in a very similar position to many of you guys. As an aside, why is it so often the husband who leaves, with the wife still in the organization? Or is this selection bias, maybe only the guys post about it?
Anyways, we've been married 11 years, we have 3 kids, and I have been inactive (the technical Witness definition of inactive) for a little over a year now, though it was token service for the preceding five years. The only reason I still attend is to help my wife with the kids, who she will take there with or without me. I don't comment, I've quit the TMS. I figure that this is kind of a reverse of the Witness strategy of "winning them over without a word." As long as I don't turn into what she perceives as a despicable person, abandoning her with three young children, it might help her to listen when I tell her about the cult.
We have the occasional discussion about it. She's a difficult one, though... she loves "Jehovah" and wants to give something back, she likes a spiritual element in her life, she likes the socialization, she feels a sense of community service when she "preaches," and her whole family is in. She feels like she's doing right by our kids. She really does think it's the best religion, and that association with a religion is necessary.
The weird thing is that she disagrees with many of the Watchtower teachings, she just doesn't CARE whether they're wrong or not. She's very pragmatic and practical about it--whereas I might get all worked up about the principle of a thing, she will just shrug and say that it doesn't matter. Among the things she dislikes or disagrees with: All the shit they make up about Isaiah, Daniel, and Revelation, the constant appeals to loyalty and avoiding independent thinking, some specifics about how the ministry is conducted, how much power individual elders have to ruin people's lives, how they discourage education, the ban on voting, the superior attitude they have about "worldly people," the huge obsession with sex that much of the Watchtower content has, and calling it "The Truth."
So I'm in a position where if I bring something to her attention that I have a huge problem with, she's likely to AGREE with me, and yet not care. How do you work with someone like that?
Anyways just wanted to say that I totally understand where you're coming from on this. -
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Voluntarily Confessing & Then Getting Reproved or Disfellowshipped
by minimus indo you realize how many contrite witnesses went to the elders to make things right with god and wound up getting disfellowshipped or privately or publicly reproved?
a lot.. did you or anyone that you knew ever get "disciplined" unfairly?
many times, no one would ever know about anything unless it was voluntarily brought up.
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under_believer
I apologize Open Mind, the first post contained a misstatement about whether there were two committees. I had a committee, she didn't. My mistake, I see how I caused confusion. :)
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How many happy JW marriages do you know of?
by Bonnie_Clyde injust reading frequent flyer miles on the subject of feeling guilty for having a happy marriage with a non-jw.. in our congregation which i haven't attended for about a year, i can only think of two or three who seem to be happy.
of course, i don't know what happens behind closed doors, but i know of several who admit they are unhappy.
i wrote out a long list of couples who have divorced over the last 20 years--including three elders (one is on his second divorce).
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under_believer
I don't know very many happily married Witness couples.
On the other hand, I also don't know of very many happily married non-Witness couples either. It's my opinion that the incidence of unhappy Witness marriages is not any higher than the statistical average for the population as a whole.
Even if I'm right there's still a great point to observe, which is that Witnesses teach that their headship principle and being immersed in spirituality causes happy marriages. The huge number of Witness divorces that any Witness anywhere is aware of directly contradicts this fact.