Posts by Disillusioned JW

17

Letter from Mother: "...go right ahead on death's road and take your kids with you."

by silentbuddha in

so my jw father is sick.

my mother uses the opportunity to try and preach to my 16 year old daughter.

i simply told my mother to: "please refrain from trying to lure *my daughter* in with jehovah's witness questioning.

Disillusioned JW

silentbuddha, in reading what your mom wrote to your daughter, I don't think she was trying to preach to her. I think your mother believed that your daughter believes in Jehovah (and maybe even believed that you believe in Jehovah, even if you have told her multiple times that you no longer believe in Jehovah), and that part of the reason why she believes such is due to her hoping that you and your daughter will become saved and enter the paradise New Order.

In my own situation it was (and still is) difficult for my mom to accept that I am now an atheist. For years there were times when she taught I must still have some belief in Jehovah or that seeing certain things happening in the world must have caused me to believe in Jehovah again. She tells me she still hopes I will change my thinking and return to the organization and to worship of Jehovah, before it is too late (from her perspective). She really, really believes the great tribulation is extremely near. Most of the times when I tell her "I am an atheist" (in order to make a point with her that I will never become a believing JW again nor attend the Kingdom Hall again) I see great emotional pain in her face and I hear it in her voice. She doesn't want to be confronted with the idea that I am a convinced atheist - even though it was 10 years ago (and thus long ago) when I became an outright atheist. She loves her son (me) and remembers when I was a ministerial servant for years and that I even gave some Sunday sermon public talks, and was a regular pioneer. She also tells me I am a good son. My mother remembers those things about my past like your mother remembers your daughter's past love for Jehovah and your daughter's former worship of him.

Your mother wants your father to become healthy and she believes in the power of prayer to Jehovah God. She also apparently believed that if your daughter prayed to Jehovah for grandpa (your father) that it might help grandpa. As a result, she wrote the letter to you daughter - mostly for the benefit of your father (not to preach to your daughter and not to lure your daughter to becoming a JW). That is what I think she was thinking, but I might be wrong. Notice in her reply to you she says she thought your daughter still believed in Jehovah and possibly prayed to him. At the time your mother also said she was still hoping you would return to Jehovah. I think she meant all of that.

17

Letter from Mother: "...go right ahead on death's road and take your kids with you."

by silentbuddha in

so my jw father is sick.

my mother uses the opportunity to try and preach to my 16 year old daughter.

i simply told my mother to: "please refrain from trying to lure *my daughter* in with jehovah's witness questioning.

Disillusioned JW

redvip2000, you made good points but I think there is one problem with your line of reasoning. The WT/JWs say that when the governments of the world unitedly turn against Babylon the Great, that is the start of the Great Tribulation. The WT/JW's also say that when the Great Tribulation starts, because it is actually Jehovah executing adverse judgement ( through the governments) on false religion, it would be very likely too late to gain a favorable relationship with Jehovah God. Do you agree that such is what the WT teaches?

Furthermore in the case of the USA, the Constitution wouldn't actually have to changed, since the USA could sign and ratify a UN Treaty which bans religion. That is because the USA Constitution says all USA Treaties become part of the highest law of the USA - in practical effect an extension of the Constitution and perhaps even of higher authority than any parts of the Constitution which are in conflict with the Treaty. Another way would be if the USA government were to trample the Constitution by use of military force. However, I don't think any of these things could happen in the USA within the next 20 years.

51

PIMO elder

by Reservations in

jw
friends

i’m reservations, pimo elder.

i’m in no position to leave the organisation, maybe some people will see that as weak or whatever, but we have to all go down our own path in life.. i would like to be able to wake people up in my congregation, how do you think best to do this?

any ideas?.

Disillusioned JW

Reservations, here is my more complete reply.

There are many good ideas and recommendations expressed in a number of the posts in this topic thread. In this post I make some comments about the following quotes from this thread.

- "people wake up when they are ready to, often for personal reasons rather than anything doctrinal or organizational"

- " I think the best you can do , is to observe , and maybe if you know some jw who was questioning about jw / WT problem to show where to find more information"

- "They are happy believing what they do, otherwise they would have left a long time ago. You only have one life to live---why waste it on trying to help people who are not asking for your help. Let them live their own life and you live your own life. If they want to wake up they will."

- "As far as getting other Jobos to wake up, it's a vain wish. I have to be realistic not
idealistic here."

- "I now conclude that it is harder to convince a believing JW of the falsehood of their way than it is to convince a worldly person to accept JW beliefs. ow I respect their right to believe it if they want , they can see all that I can see."

- "... encourage people to do research, drop the names of a few non Witness sources, you can usually get away with it if it's historical stuff, try Edersheim."

- "... trying to wake up those in the congregation is a futile thing to do. ...So please don`t waste your life trying to wake people up , they wont do so until they themselves are ready to be woken up."

Some very active JWs (though they might be a very small percentage) though not appearing to be unhappy with the religion, are actually very unhappy with some aspects of religion. People (at least some them) in that category are active because the WT (and along with the Bible) convinced them it is their duty to Jehovah God to be active in the JW religion, even if they strongly dislike being active. But, they are active anyway because they believe it is the right thing to do, no matter how boring or unpleasant it is. I know that because I was one of them and I never expressed my unhappiness about such within the congregation, except for very few times with my mother (a JW). I kept my unhappiness about WT drudgery to myself. I was a regular pioneer for virtually three full years, and that was because of a sense of duty/obligation to Jehovah God, but it was a drudgery for me. I stopped pioneering because I couldn't take the drudgery any more and because I had obtained a Bachelor of Science college degree in Business Administration and I wanted to more fully pursue a career (instead of only working part-time).

I wish someone (whether inside the religion or outside of it) had offered to present reliable information and ideas that would have helped me to see problems with the JW religion (including with the Bible itself). I wish such had been presented to me during my teens or 20s. By the time I was was 31 years old I started having serious doubts (and started getting onto the internet and using a web browser soon after web browsers began being distributed) and had dropped down to about 1 hour to 3 hours of field service per month while still a ministerial servant). At about age 35-37 years old I basically stopped attending Kingdom Hall meetings, but I wish I had become inactive (or nearly inactive) in my early 20s, or especially in my teens. Though in my younger years I didn't have many doubts (though I had some), I was still open minded enough that I would have listened to good evidence (such as statements in old WT literature that show the weird false teachings the WT taught back then) and good arguments (even if initially only I only listened with the intent to disprove them).

However, I was afraid to read certain things (primarily books promoting atheism) for fear I might become an atheist and thus loose my prospect of salvation (if Jehovah God really does exist). I didn't want to become deceived into believing there is no god, if there really is a god. For periods of time I had an interest in reading science books about evolution (and I did read some science magazine articles about them), but in my teens I was afraid to read them due to fearing I might would be deceived.

Though I loved the idea of living forever in a peaceful paradise Earth, I very strongly disliked going out in field service, spending so many hours attending JW meetings, and being expected to study so such for the meetings. When considering giving comments/answers to questions in WT publications, I didn't like being expected to only make statements repeating the ideas in those publications. I wanted the freedom to think critically about what the WT literature says and to express ideas I might have that disagree with what the literature says is the correct answer. As a result, answering questions in the JW meetings was too routine and thus boring and a drag.

It would have been helpful if someone had personally encouraged me to read sources of quotes, with me being told that doing so would help me to get a clearer and deeper understanding of what the sources were saying. Furthermore, it would have been helpful if I had been told that doing such could potentially deepen my confidence in the Bible by seeing more fully what the historical and scientific sources said. You might be able to get away with saying such to select JWs, since the phrasing is stated in a reassuring way. At the same time, if people did check sources, in response to such encouragement, they would likely discover ideas that would cause them to see some problems with the WT's teaching.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

In chapter one of Victor Stenger's book called GOD: The Failed Hypothesis: How Science Shows that God Does Not Exist, the very first argument he uses is under the heading of "Lack of Evidence". In that section he says the following.

"... as we saw in the preface, the overwhelming majority of prominent American scientists has concluded that God does not exist. If God exists, where is he? Philosopher Theodore Drange has termed this the lack-of-evidence-argument, .... Stenger later says that "... the very existence existence of nonbelievers in the world who have not resisted such belief [in God] is evidence against his existence. The problem of divine hiddenness is one that has taxed the abilities of theologians over the years--almost as much as the problem of evil ...."

Chapter 9 of the book is called "Possible and Impossible Gods" and one section of it has the heading of "The Hiddeness Problem". In that section Stenger refers to the hiddenness problem in the form of the argument stated in handouts by Schellenberg. At the end of the section Stenger says the following.

"The hiddenness problem relates most directly to the scientific arguments I have presented. If the theist attempts to refute my conclusions by claiming that God intentionally hides himself from us, then that God cannot be the personal, perfect loving God of liberal Christianity. However, there is another brand of Christian God." The very next statement in the chapter is the heading called "The Hideous Hidden God of Evangelical Christianity". In that section he paraphrases the statement of an evangelical (named Jeff Cook) as saying "...God does not wish to spend eternity with all human souls, but only the chosen few who, by blind faith in absence of all evidence, accept a Jewish carpenter who may or may not have lived two thousand years ago as their personal savior." The last paragraph of that section (and also of the chapter) says the following.

"The existence of the Catholic, evangelical, extreme Muslim, extreme Judaic God who hides himself from all but a selected elite cannot be totally ruled out. All I can say is that we have not one iota of evidence that he exists and, if he does exist, I personally want nothing to do with him. This is a possible god, but a hideous one."

To me, Stenger's GOD: The Failed Hypothesis: How Science Shows that God Does Not Exist book makes a vastly stronger case against believing in God than Dawkins' The God Delusion book.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

PaddyTheBaddy (and others), I use the philosophical arguments in disproof of the existence of a god in forums in which there are those who believe in the existence of a god partly due to philosophical arguments.There are many Christians who are convinced that God does answer prayers (not just their own prayers, but anyone's prayers). Telling them the argument of divine hiddenness might help some of them to realize that a personal god does not exist.

My motivations are likely similar to those of Thomas Paine in regards to why he wrote the Age of Reason (except he believed in a deistic god and hoped for an afterlife, though he did not belief everyone receives an afterlife) and why Victor J. Stenger wrote his books which promote atheism. I also appreciate that Richard Dawkins wrote his The God Delusion book. Interestingly Dawkins' book has become extremely popular in Arabic speaking countries, so much so that Dawkins decided to give away free downloads of his book in Arabic, Urdu, Farsi and Indonesian.

See https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/mar/20/richard-dawkins-to-give-away-copies-of-the-god-delusion-in-islamic-countries . It says the following.

'Richard Dawkins is responding to what he called the “stirring towards atheism” in some Islamic countries with a programme to make free downloads of his books available in Arabic, Urdu, Farsi and Indonesian.

The scientist and atheist said he was “greatly encouraged” to learn that the unofficial Arabic pdf of the book had been downloaded 13m times. Dawkins writes in The God Delusion about his wish that the “open-minded people” who read it will “break free of the vice of religion altogether”. It has sold 3.3m copies worldwide since it was published in 2006 – far fewer than the number of Arabic copies that Dawkins believes to have been downloaded illegally.'

In addition to the above quote please see https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2019/03/13/translators-aim-bring-richard-dawkinss-books-atheism-evolution-muslim-audience/ . It says the following.

'... a group of translators wants to get Dawkins’s books in front of a new group of religious readers: Muslim readers, in Muslim-majority countries where atheism is rare.

“If you get enough people to talk about these ideas, if you convince people it’s okay to think about religion, to criticize religion — if you get a critical mass of people, you can probably change something, change the situation in these countries. … It’s a bit ambitious, but maybe not impossible,” said Jana Lenzova, director of the translation project. “I don’t mind what other people are, but I think they should have access to all the information so they can make up their own minds.”

... The translation project was Dawkins’s idea, inspired, he said, by two conversations he had — with a man who had translated “The God Delusion” into Arabic and claimed his illicit work was downloaded even more times than the number of copies the English bestseller sold and with a woman in Saudi Arabia who left her faith, her family and her country after reading the book.'

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

redvip2000, I say we should not care about a god that either doesn't exist, or doesn't ever intervene in human lives (and who doesn't provide an afterlife or intervene in an afterlife). But I do care if other people believe a personal god (or other spirit) exists, for such beliefs hinder the progress of human society.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

punkofnice, I agree with your statement of "... people have wasted too much time with this religion and god nonsense". I also think it is a pity and I strongly wish human society to would abandon it. Consider the following extreme example of religious-like thinking and superstitious thinking.

Yesterday a person whom I have personally known for at least four years tried to convince me that the Earth is a plane in the sense of being flat. He said it is not a sphere and not existing out in space. I asked him if he thinks it is a least a round in the sense of being a circle (since it casts a circular shadow on the moon) and I asked him if he thinks it is at least a planet. In reply he stressed the distinction of the word "plane" not ending in the letter "t' (as in the word "planet"). Furthermore, he asked me if anyone has ever proven the Earth is a sphere by means of directly physically measuring the alleged curvature of the Earth. He offered me a small handout, which he wrote, promoting the flat Earth idea (and I suspect it had a link to website about the topic). In prior conversations he told me he has a health problem caused by his genetics which he says requires him (in order to have optimal health) to have a diet that is nearly 100% meat.

In a prior conversation he told me he used to be a Mormon (and was briefly an atheist after ceasing to be a Mormon; I first met him when he was an atheist) and that he believes in immortal life and that some kind of God exists (but not the biblical God). Soon after he ceased being an atheist he tried to convince me (using scientific knowledge about brainwaves and energy) that the consciousness (soul) of humans continues to exist after the human body dies; he also tried to convince me to stop being an atheist. Though he now believes in evolution (at least to some extent) he is convinced that extraterrestrial beings created Humans by genetically modifying life (apes or australopithecines?) which had had already existed on Earth, and I think I recall him saying the aliens made humans to serve as slaves to the aliens (to mine for something which they needed and I think he said it was for gold). He said that the ancient humans thought the extraterrestrial aliens were gods, and I think he has spoken of those aliens as the creators. Furthermore, he says the story in the Sci-Fi movie called "Prometheus" is very close to the fact of how humans came into existence.

He has also told me the following: some people on Earth are reptilians - including Hillary Clinton; humans are not contributing in a major way to climate change (and global warming) and that no drastic dangerous climate change is taking place and that rising levels of CO2 in Earth's atmosphere are not going to be a danger; he believes that a number of UFO sightings are of actual extraterrestrial spacecraft; he says the aliens believe in pantheism, but he doesn't seem to believe in pantheism.

He voted for Trump in 2016 and back in 2016 he tried to convince me to vote for Trump.

He also voted for Trump in 2020, but he is socially liberal and uses marijuana. One time at his home he showed me a vaporizer he used and I think one time he offered some marijuana to me (if so I declined the offer). I think he is fiscally conservative and a libertarian Republican. One time he showed me a portion of a pistol and invited me to touch it (I refused to do so).

Despite not being convinced of climate change (in the sense of it being a dangerous trend), he likes electric cars and when I saw him yesterday he was showing me his Chevrolet Volt all-electric battery powered car which he bought used. I think he said he bought it when it had about 100,000 miles on it. He said it has a 200,000 mile warranty on the battery pack, but that the manufacturers of electric cars don't know how long the battery packs will last, and that it might last 300,000 miles. He mentioned that buying a used electric car that is a certain number of years old is more cost effective in the long run than buying a gasoline powered car. When it comes to electric cars I also like them (compared to fossil fuel combustion engine cars) but I have yet to own one.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

Correction: Where I said 'Parapsychologists have not conclusively demonstrated ..." I probably should have said "Investigators of alleged spirit mediums and of alleged spirits have not conclusively demonstrated ..." Parapsychologists seek evidence of ESP instead and they use the scientific method in their experiments.

Corrections: In my last paragraph of my prior post I meant to say the following.

Regarding what pistolpete said about those believe who God exists and those who believe God doesn't exist, I see much truth in that. For example, in my conversations of those who have a strong conviction that God and/or other spirits exist, they sincerely (as far as I can tell) claim to have personally heard or seen God or an other spirit or to have at least had their prayer requests answered/granted, whereas I disbelieve I ever experienced such. Likewise those who strongly believe in the supernatural (such as ghosts and demons interacting on Earth with people) or the paranormal, or an afterlife or an out of body experience, sincerely (as far as I can tell) claim to have personally experienced such, whereas I disbelieve I ever experienced such.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

I think that Schellenberg's idea of the meaning the word "God" with a capital "G" is one which has the core characteristics of what Christian theologians consider the Christian God to have. Philosophers in their writings about whether or not God exists seem to be fixated on that kind God, and give very little consideration to the idea of a God who is not all-knowing or or not all-powerful or one who is evil. They also seem to give no consideration to the idea that polytheistic types of gods might exist.

Regarding the point of "It is more related to evidence for your dissatisfaction in how he may or may not communicate with you personally" my title of the topic thread claimed "no God/god ever communicates with humans" and my post claimed "no God/god ever communicates with us". By "us" I meant all humans, not just some humans. I was thus not merely claiming that God never never communicated with me, but rather was broadly saying that God never communicated with any human.

I know that the Bible and other religious scriptures and other books say God (of some kind) has communicated with some people. I also know that many people claim that God (of some kind) has communicated to them personally, but I see no proof of such, no convincing evidence of such. Parapsychologists have not conclusively demonstrated any person as having received communication from any alleged spirit being. People who have claimed to gone to heaven (while being clinically dead or near death) have not provided any scientifically testable information which proves to be kind which only a supernatural being could provide to them. By that I mean such as unambiguous detailed precise descriptions of extraordinary future events, or of extraordinary scientific knowledge (which was not discovered prior to the prediction but which was later confirmed by science to be true), or of unambiguous detailed descriptions of things buried thousands of years ago in a specific location which had not been discovered prior to the prediction but which scientists could later discover.

Regarding what pistolpete said about those believe God exists and those who believe God doesn't exist, I see much truth in that. For example, in my conversations of those who have a strong conviction that God and or other spirits exist, they sincerely (as far as I can tell) claim to have personally heard or seen God or an other spirit or to have at least had their prayer requests answered/granted, whereas I disbelieve I ever experienced such. Likewise those who strongly believe in supernatural (such as ghosts and demons interacting on Earth with people) or the paranormal, or an afterlife or out of body experience, sincerely (as far as I can tell) claim to have personally such, whereas I disbelieve I ever experienced such.

31

Is the FACT that no God/god ever communicates with humans evidence that no God/god exists?

by Disillusioned JW in

is the fact that no god/god ever communicates with us evidence that no god/god exists?

i think it is very strong evidence that no personal god/god exits, especially a benevolent god who wants humans to know him him/her/it, to obey him/her/it, and/or to love him/her/it.

since no god/god communicates to us (including those who sincerely want communication with the/a god/god), wouldn't it be sensible for those who pray to what they believe is the/a god/god to cease all efforts to communicate to a god/god?

Disillusioned JW

What do you by "existence is left-minded thinking"? Do you mean the concept of existence (not existence itself) is left-minded thinking? Do you think left-minded thinking is a false kind of thinking?

Why do you say "There is no God. There has to be some logical/scientific explanation for all things," is in itself a proof that such belief is based on faith.' ? I didn't say (and I don't believe) that in order for all kinds of things to exist there must must be some logical/scientific explanation for their existence known to us. But in the case of a loving personal god who wants people to know him and to worship him, if such a God exists then the evidence for such a God must exist, and if the evidence does not exist then the God doesn't exist. The scientist, professor, and philosopher named Victor J. Stenger (a deceased atheist of the New Atheism movement) correctly said that absence of evidence is evidence of absence when the evidence should be there but isn't. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God:_The_Failed_Hypothesis says ' David Ludden of Skeptic magazine wrote that "Stenger lays out the evidence from cosmology, astrophysics, nuclear physics, particle physics, statistical mechanics and quantum mechanics showing that the universe appears exactly as it should if there is no creator." '