He was also in large part responsible for the mentality and outlook of the WTS today. He was paranoid, vindictive, ignorant, judgmental, self-obsessed, vengeful, petty, power-hungry, controlling, belligerent, unforgiving, uncharitable and deceitful. In no particular order.
MrMonroe
JoinedPosts by MrMonroe
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15
Rutherford and the new DVD
by truthlover incan anyone tell me why rutherford is not shown giving a talk or speaking in public?
i noticed that russell was on film in the first dvd -out of darkness but rutherford was shown in a picture only - never speaking or doing a public presentation, same goes for the second one -they have an actor portraying him... was there a reason?
was his persona that bad?
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109
Tonight I disassociated myself - after 24 years - had 2 hour meeting with Elder
by Intel ini am now sitting at home.
my wife left with my little child.
my fault (i dislike the word "fault", but don't have a better one right now).. it feels strange, relieved and free, at the same time it was all very strange.
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MrMonroe
Why should others pay for your freedom?
What the hell does that even mean??
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Extraordinary events and amazing coincidences: why do JWs always attribute them to God?
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MrMonroe
@Losthobbit, No, Witnesses say bad things happen because of time and unforseen occurence. Dying is bad. Conversely, when good things happen, it's because of God and the angels ... or the universe responded to their generosity in the amount of time they spent in field service..
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Pangs of Conscience - June 2011 KM
by dozy inthere is an article in the latest kingdom ministry about counting time spent in the ministry.
one comment surprised me - it says that counting time wrongly can lead to "pangs of conscience".
a bit of an ott expression , i can't help thinking.. the only pangs the local pioneers are concerned about here are hunger pangs as they head to dunkin donuts for a 40 minute "break".
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MrMonroe
For most of our final year in the org, my wife, who feared an elder's visit if we failed to report, would fill out the form and ask me what I'd done for the month. I'd tell her, "Zero." She'd round it up to the nearest two hours.
I wonder if the annual report of hours spent witnessing (1,604,764,248 for 2010 if you want to be precise) was presented as a pie graph, how much of the pie would be actual time spent talking to people.
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40
Convention without a 'Badge'
by IMHO ini attended a convention recently but didn't wear a badge i was treated with the utmost suspicion.
particularly when i arrived during the sessions one day.
the attendant didn't want me wandering off to find a seat on my own.
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MrMonroe
Puzzling. I don't recall wearing badges for the last few years I attended DCs in Melbourne. Never noticed any strange looks.
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27
JW's are so hot on their views being respected but they do not respect anyone elses!
by highdose injw's face a tide of "no"s and "not interested"s everytime they go banging on the doors, surely it would have occurred to them by now that the vast majority of the public don't want to know and don't want them at their doors.
but do they acknowledge or listen to this?
regardless of wether they have priviously been told not to call or not still they come.. they claim that its because jesus has comanded them to do so.
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MrMonroe
I went to a Catholic funeral of the sister of a guy in my congregation. A bunch of Witnesses went as a show of support for this guy. We all stood at the back because we didn't want to appear obvious when the Catholics were doing all their routines of standing, sitting and kneeling. What appalled me was an elder and his smarmy wife alongside me who spent the whole time sniggering and rolling their eyes at the Catholic rites.
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Extraordinary events and amazing coincidences: why do JWs always attribute them to God?
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MrMonroe
I’ve just been reading an excellent book called Wolfram: The Boy Who Went to War. It relates an incident during the latter stages of World War II in which Moroccan soldiers barged their way into the home of a home in Germany and began scouring the house for anything incriminating. Read this section and see if it rings any bells:
Marie Charlotte reluctantly led them downstairs and watched in dismay as they rifled through her various store boxes and alcoves. Her dismay turned to alarm when she saw the thoroughness of their search: they were turning everything inside out and upside down. She knew that the family friend, Kurt Weber, had hidden his German uniform down there. If the Moroccans discovered this and realised that he was a deserter, they would shoot him on the spot.
Her anxiety grew as the Moroccans approached the alcove where the uniform was hidden. They were emptying everything as they searched for items to loot and were certain to find it within the next few minutes.
Suddenly (until her dying day she was never able to explain how) she began talking to them in French – an almost fluent stream of words and phrases that she had not used since her childhood in Alsace. The men were so taken aback, and charmed to speak with someone who knew their own language, that they promptly abandoned their search and traipsed back upstairs.
If this had happened to a JW, and been written up in a Watchtower article or Yearbook as an “experience”, it would without doubt have been attributed to an act of God. But this woman wasn’t a religious person. She simply couldn’t explain it – just as people can’t explain how they summon almost superhuman power in a time of disaster to escape or rescue others. In life, strange things happen, and they happen to everyone.
Life is also full of coincidences. A couple of weeks ago as part of my work I knocked on the door of a woman I’d met (also by chance) exactly a year before in a different city. She had moved house since I’d last spoken to her. It was an amazing coincidence and we’ve all had them. But when they occur to Witnesses (“I was just praying to God, asking him to show me the true religion, when there was a knock at my door”) it’s always an act of God, the direction of angels.
JWs scorn superstition. But boiled down, the relentless repetition of claims about angelic direction and movement of the Holy Spirit, the constant hunt for a spiritual explanation and confirmation that they really are God's special people, makes JWs no less superstitious than anyone else in the community.
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My First DC 'Mentally Out'
by breakfast of champions inas the title indicates, the 2011 summer convention was my first one 'mentally out', and wow!
how can anyone stand this stuff?
demons, demons everywhere: yes, evidently after jesus kicked satan and his big hornets nest full of demons down to earth in 1914, they're all mean and nasty and just around every corner!
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MrMonroe
More than three years after my last meeting, I dreamed last night I went to an assembly. I was so bored I walked out.
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Religious guilt puts brakes on sex lives
by Thetis inarticle in our local paper stating that atheists have far better sex lives than religious people, who are plagued with guilt during intercourse and for weeks afterwards, researches have found.. a study found that non-believers were more willing to discuss sexual fantasies and more satisfied with their experiences..... then went on to say that strict religions such as mormons ranked highest on the scale of sexual guilt.
their average score was 8.19 out of 10. they were followed closely by jehovah's witnesses, pentecostals, seventh day adventists and baptists.
interesting that catholics scored 6.34.. this article brought back memories for me as a newly married jw.
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MrMonroe
I can fully understand why JWs are guilt-ridden over sex. The WTS intrudes on every part of the lives of members, telling them how to do everything except how to wipe their butts. Stern directives have been made about what is and is not appropriate in the bedroom between married couples, which can only inhibit young couples in discovering their sexuality and make obedient Witnesses feel guilty about even wanting to do certain things.
The pressure to inform the elders of any behavioral aberration would also stop many partners from even voicing to their spouse a preference for any particular sexual activity lest their partner decide to "seek assistance," thus guaranteeing half the congo would know inside a week.
I recall some years ago a prim elder's wife commenting on a TV program she'd been watching which showed some sexual activity .... "The woman was on top, I mean, it was almost pornographic!"
And it all starts so young, with frequent admonitions in books, magazines and public talks (for God's sake!) about the "problem" of masturbation, telling poor young buggers to confess to the elders and, again, seek their help. The more they focus on it, the guiltier they feel and the more screwed up they get.
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Australia: Victorian Child Protection Inquiry Hears Evidence Against Watch Tower Society
by AndersonsInfo inthe following information was taken from steven unthank's facebook page:.
http://www.facebook.com/notes/jw-news/news-release-victorian-child-protection-inquiry-hears-evidence-against-watch-tow/208372889198519.
news release: victorian child protection inquiry hears evidence against watch tower society .
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MrMonroe
FYI, the Herald Sun website is running reader comments on this story: 20 comments so far, most of them critical of the WTS's "That law's for everyone else" stance. It's disappeared off the front page of the website, but still accessible via the link above, or search on their website.