fulltimestudent

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Posts by fulltimestudent

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  25

  CO said; “Friends (plural) who’ve been raised in the truth are beginning to have doubts regarding their faith”

  by pistolpete in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  here is what a co said at the elders and ms meeting.

  it goes to show that no matter how hard the governing body tries to instill fear of apostates, it's just not working on the young crowd of jws.. it's a new generations of born in jws--------and they don't buy this shit anymore.

  it's really over for the watchtower.

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  fulltimestudent

  I doubt that this phenomenon applies only to witnesses. It's likely a global trend.

  Here's a gallup poll headline from March 2021, describing the down trend in the USA:

  U.S. Church Membership Falls Below Majority for First Time - BY JEFFREY M. JONES

  
  

  
  

  STORY HIGHLIGHTS

  
  In 2020, 47% of U.S. adults belonged to a church, synagogue or mosque

  
  Down more than 20 points from turn of the century

  
  Change primarily due to rise in Americans with no religious preference

  WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans' membership in houses of worship continued to decline last year, dropping below 50% for the first time in Gallup's eight-decade trend. In 2020, 47% of Americans said they belonged to a church, synagogue or mosque, down from 50% in 2018 and 70% in 1999.

  Link: https://news.gallup.com/poll/341963/church-membership-falls-below-majority-first-time.aspx

  The trend is clear. A majority of Americans are now NOT Xtian.
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  135

  Serious Question: Are You Hearing About Anyone With The Flu Anymore or A Cold?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  for years everyone was told they had to get the flu shot.

  because the flu was dangerous and it could even kill you.

  now, hardly anyone talks about the flu or having a cold.

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  fulltimestudent

  Some may find this discussion in The Scientist informative:

  Link: https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/the-pandemic-crushed-the-flu-what-happens-when-it-returns-68951

  Titled: The Pandemic Crushed the Flu—What Happens When It Returns?

  It discusses the so-called disappearance of flu and possible implications/\.
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  135

  Serious Question: Are You Hearing About Anyone With The Flu Anymore or A Cold?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  for years everyone was told they had to get the flu shot.

  because the flu was dangerous and it could even kill you.

  now, hardly anyone talks about the flu or having a cold.

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  fulltimestudent

  minimus: (quote): "Funny thing, my girlfriend at the end of 2019 developed what the doctors called “the flu”. She had respiratory issues suddenly and they prescribed an inhaler."

  It's impossible (without tests) to identify the respiratory problems experienced by your girlfriend.

  However, it may have been covid19. The USA based journal The Scientist published this report, under the heading. "New Evidence Shows COVID-19 Was in US Weeks Before Thought." (The Scientist-21/17/2021)

  Here's more from the article: "In a study published in Clinical Infectious Diseases June 15, researchers analyzed blood collected between January 2 and March 18, 2020, and found antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in samples from nine people in five US states, meaning that the virus was likely present in the US in late 2019.

  “We suspected that there were probably cases that preceded the ones that were diagnosed and confirmed. This is very suggestive that there were probably multiple exposures prior to those initial cases,” says Ashley St. John, an infectious disease researcher at Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore who was not involved in the study. "

  Link:

  https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/new-evidence-shows-covid-19-was-in-us-weeks-before-thought-68906?fbclid=IwAR2Ev_4aqkPDIZcjM20qqbBPUXMdF22npRTcapNDzOsTWvp5KTQliv8yC_8#.YM2GzOCQiZM.facebook

  
  
  
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  2

  Did Australia Just Miss an Outbreak of Disease Caused by a Bat Virus.

  by fulltimestudent in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  did australia just miss an outbreak of disease caused by a bat virus.. .

  the story of the hendra virus.. .

  shared from abc news ( abc media is a government owned news service).

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  fulltimestudent

  Did Australia Just Miss an Outbreak of Disease Caused by a Bat Virus.

  The story of the Hendra Virus.

  
  

  Shared from ABC News ( ABC Media is a Government owned News Service)

  
  

  
  

  
  

  https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-05/covid-19-science-started-with-hendra-outbreak-brisbane/100237938
  
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  12

  Delta Variant task force

  by DATA-DOG in

  1. social
  2. current

  are you ready for the delta variant task force, funded by bill gates to come to your home?

  after mass censorship and in some cases arrests ( australia ) for speaking out against lockdowns, or the dangers of untested medical procedures, we now have morons who want to send people to your home, to remove infected family members.... how will you know you’re infected??

  a pcr test cranked up to detect anything of course!

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  fulltimestudent

  Quote: "Why haven’t more American citizens suffered the abuses taking place in Europe, Australia, India, or Canada? Because we have guns."

  Sorry, cant help doing this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tkYdi81IKI
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  27

  Devout JW's Beat Their 12 Year Old Daughter to Death

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i know this happened several years ago but.... holy christ!

  they beat the poor girl 160 times with a 3/4 inch cable!

  "in a slow, steady voice, assistant state's atty.

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  fulltimestudent

  Not my story, ( I was a teen-age convert) - but the physical abuse of a young girl by her father.

  This happened back in the early 1960's, another Jw father decided to move his family to another little country (under the Aussie branch office), under the "Serving where the need is Great" program. There was a small existing congregation, and at one meeting for field service, the father lost his temper with his (about 17 y.o.) daughter who according to my informant (another JW) was quite a well-behaved girl. The father picked up a length of timber (3"x4"-according to this eye-witness) and started bashing into his daughter. He did so with such anger that other brothers present had to physically restrain him.

  What caused this display of brutality? It seems the daughter had attracted the attention of a young witness from the local congregation, and the father had forbidden her to talk to him. At that FS meeting they had smiled at each other, the father had seen that and that caused him to lose control.

  Not exactly the right way to guide young ones !!!
• 
  36

  Converted Greek Philosopher Explains Christianity in 125 AD

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i ran across a pretty early treatise.

  we were all taught that "real" christianity was lost to history and was only restored once russell and then rutherford restored it so that the wt could be appointed as god's "mouthpiece".

  but, aristides wrote to the emperor hadrian and gave a pretty good synopsis of core christian belief in 125 ad.

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  fulltimestudent

  Disillusioned JW - I read, in a book by the Jewish scholar named Hugh J. Schonfield, that during the intertestamental period the Hellenistic Jews made pious frauds to promote Judaism.

  All true, DJW! That's the point that Sea Breeze missed in his reaction to my post about that document.

  The document being discussed exists, but what evidence exists that the Apology of Aristides was written by him at the time claimed? If we project out minds back and imagine life in that era we would find that life was different, the ways we prove something is genuine today was not possible then,

  G. C. O'Ceallaigh in his review,""Marcianus" Aristides, On the Worship of God," claims to have found evidence that the document started its existence as a "counter attack on polytheists and their religious notions and secondarily, as a defense of the monotheistic worship and the morals of the Jews " by a convert to hellenised Judaism. And then, that document was. "interpolated and “edited” by a Christian writer," in the late 300s CE and re-titled as the Apology of Aristides as a defence of christianity;

  Geza Vermes, a recognised scholar of the Dead Sea Scrolls, (in his 'The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English' points out that similar editing occurred among the cultic group that produced the DDS.
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  36

  Converted Greek Philosopher Explains Christianity in 125 AD

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i ran across a pretty early treatise.

  we were all taught that "real" christianity was lost to history and was only restored once russell and then rutherford restored it so that the wt could be appointed as god's "mouthpiece".

  but, aristides wrote to the emperor hadrian and gave a pretty good synopsis of core christian belief in 125 ad.

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  fulltimestudent

  In passing, its interesting to know that the Emperor Hadrian established and supported another cult religion.

  Here's Wikipedia description (an extract from the fuller entry on Hadrian):

  Hadrian had Antinous deified as Osiris-Antinous by an Egyptian priest at the ancient Temple of Ramesses II, very near the place of his death. Hadrian dedicated a new temple-city complex there, built in a Graeco-Roman style, and named it Antinoöpolis.[227] It was a proper Greek polis; it was granted an Imperially subsidised alimentary scheme similar to Trajan's alimenta,[228] and its citizens were allowed intermarriage with members of the native population, without loss of citizen-status. Hadrian thus identified an existing native cult (to Osiris) with Roman rule.[229] The cult of Antinous was to become very popular in the Greek-speaking world, and also found support in the West. In Hadrian's villa, statues of the Tyrannicides, with a bearded Aristogeiton and a clean-shaven Harmodios, linked his favourite to the classical tradition of Greek love.[230] In the west, Antinous was identified with the Celtic sun-god Belenos.[231]

  Hadrian was criticised for the open intensity of his grief at Antinous's death, ....] Nevertheless, his recreation of the deceased youth as a cult-figure found little opposition.[233] Though not a subject of the state-sponsored, official Roman imperial cult, Antinous offered a common focus for the emperor and his subjects, emphasising their sense of community.[234] Medals were struck with his effigy, and statues erected to him in all parts of the empire, in all kinds of garb, including Egyptian dress.[235] Temples were built for his worship in Bithynia and Mantineia in Arcadia. In Athens, festivals were celebrated in his honour and oracles delivered in his name. As an "international" cult figure, Antinous had an enduring fame, far outlasting Hadrian's reign.[236] Local coins with his effigy were still being struck during Caracalla's reign, and he was invoked in a poem to celebrate the accession of Diocletian.[237]

  Why did Hadrian do that, because the handsome young man. Antinous, was his his devoted lover.
  
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  36

  Converted Greek Philosopher Explains Christianity in 125 AD

  by Sea Breeze in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i ran across a pretty early treatise.

  we were all taught that "real" christianity was lost to history and was only restored once russell and then rutherford restored it so that the wt could be appointed as god's "mouthpiece".

  but, aristides wrote to the emperor hadrian and gave a pretty good synopsis of core christian belief in 125 ad.

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  fulltimestudent

  I havn't been following this discussion - but would like to comment that in all the writings that form part of what now forms the intellectual foundation of christian thought - nothing may be as it seems.

  And that may well be the case for this sample of Apologetics (from Gk ἀπολογία, "speaking in defense") which is the religious discipline of defending religious concepts through systematic analysis and argumentation and discourse, (this one known generally as The Apology of Aristides) as posted in full by Terry, to the approval of Sea Breeze

  In 1958 an interesting analysis of this sample of apologetics was published in the Harvard Theological Review (Vol. 51, Issue 4, October 1958, pp, 227-254). The author, G. C. O'Ceallaigh called his review,""Marcianus" Aristides, On the Worship of God."

  An extract (as published by Cambridge Core) says:

  Careful inspection of all external and internal evidence reveals that the Apology of Aristides, known since 1889 as the long-lost “earliest extant apology for the Christian Faith,” mentioned by Eusebius and Jerome, was written by a proselyte to Hellenist Judaism, probably in the time of Hadrian, not as an apology for Christians at all, but primarily as a counterattack upon polytheists and their religious notions and secondarily, as a defense of the monotheistic worship and the morals of the Jews.

  This definitely Jewish work of the second century was interpolated and “edited” by a Christian writer, probably of the late fourth century, and was thus converted into what passed as an apology for Christianity.

  So what seemed to be the earliest defense of christian beliefs is actually a re-write of an earlier document, edited to reflect the post Constantine doctrines of the early church.

  
  

  To read the full article ( and all the author's reasons for his conclusions), you will likely need access to a good library

  The link to the Cambridge Core copy is at https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/harvard-theological-review/article/abs/marcianus-aristides-on-the-worship-of-god/E82BA3C0F42673A88421E2B27B8575E4
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  18

  Canadian Residential School Deaths

  by Simon in

  1. watchtower
  2. child-abuse

  in case you haven't heard, they just discovered the remains of some 215 dead children at a so called canadian residential school.

  they couldn't call it a death-camp could they ... it would be too obvious.. these were where indigenous children were taken, forcibly, in order to "educate" them out of their native customs and languages and make them integrate with society.. unbelievably, this was still going on in the 60s to 90s.. of course the catholic church has their sticky fingers all over it.

  what is it about those creepy bastards?

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  fulltimestudent

  LoveUniHate Exams:

  You commented, that my statement, "These efforts to eliminate the native peoples can only be described as genocide" - that - in your opinion - those terrible deeds were not actually genocide.

  I imagine that you're possibly correct, that genocide could be graded, or we could say, not all attempted genocide succeeds, so its not genocide

  But, what are the usual definitions of genocide?

  A google search finds this definition by the Definitions from Oxford Languages

  "the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group."

  Another entry from that search is from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum:

  Quote: "Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. These acts fall into five categories:

  1. Killing members of the group
  2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
  3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part
  4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
  5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group"

  The problem in both North America and Australia, is that the Native Peoples held Land Ttitle under a tribal system, maybe similar to the way Nations today define their ownership of land within claimed borders.

  The invading British ( in both the above examples) claimed that there was no land ownership system in existence, therefore the could just walk in take the land over. Am I correct?

  When the native peoples protested and attempted to resist the takeover the British solution was extermination, For your interest the map below indicates all the known (and attested) sites of massacres of aboriginal by white settlers in Australia, The article found at

  https://www.newcastle.edu.au/newsroom/featured/true-extent-of-colonial-frontier-massacres-revealed-as-new-sites-added-to-interactive-map

  has more information.

  

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