I am a little late reporting how things went because I was away on my second week of vacation...a 4500 km motorcycle ride with a friend. My wife's relatives came and stayed with us for a week. They had not seen us for a few years so we heard the usual comments on how we haven't changed much except for my one week old beard. Then there was the catching up on the latest news and plans for the next few days. Every thing went well and the girls went out grocery shopping. As they were going out the door my wife's brother asked about the DC and I told him I didn't go because I stopped attending meetings 2 years ago...My wife made the comment to leave it alone, but as soon as she left the guys were curious about why I am inactive, especially since I was probably the most zealous JW in their family. I just told them that while researching various subjects for public talks I found out that the WTS was badly misquoting secular sources to make them say the opposite of what they actually mean. I said that if it was only once or twice I could see it as a mistake, but in their case it is almost always. I told them a few from the "reasoning book" where they misquote the Catholic encyclopedia in regards to the trinity...the made up statistics to support an increase in earthquakes since 1914. That lead to an interesting comments from my BIL...I asked him how could the WTS know how many earthquakes there were from JC until 1914 if no records exist? Better yet, how could anyone know how many earthquakes they were before in the Americas before they were discovered? He replied that there are more earthquakes since 1914 to which I replied that expert say there is no increase at all...even the WTS agreed with this in a recent magazine by saying that JC never said they would be more occurances...his comeback was that today we "hear" more about earthquakes than ever before because of our modern ways to communicate and that was what JC meant. At that point I realized that whatever the WTS taught before didn't matter to him even if it was all lies or bullcrap...now this is what they teach and it's the truth. I told them that deciding factor for me was when they "explained" the new meaning of generation at the 2010 DC...which is the 6th change to this teaching. JC did know how long a generation was because the destruction of Jerusalem came some 40 years after he said those words. Deer in the headlight looks from both cousin and BIL was the only reaction. I told them that all the old folks that were sitting at ice level in the arena that gave up having a career, raising kids, saving for their old days, never buying a home because the end was near would be dying off while we are slowing replacing them...Imagine what it would be like if I had listened. I wouldn't have grand children that I live for today! I mentionned 607...not a clue that historians do not support this date...BIL said that 1914 is the proof...I said 1914 was a world war as 1939. I also told them that our great WTS "scholars" didn't know there was no year 0 when they calculated the years leadind to JC kingdom...so when they found out they just pushed the date of the destruction of Jerusalem from 606 to 607...how convenient! I closed by telling them that in 1919 when JC chose them as his people they believed the time of the end started in 1799, that JC became king in 1874, that the end was going to be in 1914, then postponed to 1925 and that they even built a house for the princes that would be resurected...Beth-Sarim...they didn't know about that and I told them to do research on the WT CD...they celebrated Christmas, birthdays, used the cross....still how could JC approve them when today anyone holding these beliefs would be labelled apostate? Finally the blood issue came up since BIL had major heart surgery...he does not agree with accepting fractions...so I asked then why would the WTS make these concessions if it is wrong to collect blood or accept fractions? They could only repeat what they read in the WT publications...how bloodless surgery is so great...that there is the resurrection if you die...by that time the wifes were coming back so that was the end of our discussion. My BIL asked if they still could pray at the table before meals and I said it was OK, but they did it only once...and that was it. The rest of the visit was pleasant and it seemed like nothing at all was said. We will see in time if they avoid me in the future.
