Just wanted to say a quick "thank you" to everyone who has reached out to make me feel welcome on this board once again.
JIM
SanFranciscoJim
JoinedPosts by SanFranciscoJim
-
19
I have also returned.....
by SanFranciscoJim in.
after being absent from this board for a couple of years, at the gentle prodding of rayzorblade, i have come back.. although i am still going by "san francisco jim", i've since left california and am now living in pennsylvania.. while i am here, please allow me to make a shameless plug for the new message board for gay & lesbian exjws at: http://frost.bbboy.net/acommonbond.
kind regards to all...... jim.
-
-
-
74
Then Leave.com
by SheilaM in.
i love this website
http://www.asmincorp.com/thenleave/thenleave_001.htm
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
talesin said:
As an Atlantic Canadian, I wud like to sincerely apologize to you for the sordid treatment you rec'd at the hands of Canadian Immigration. DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT sell your home here. We loveour American cousins, and are equally angered by the policies put in place by BOTH of our countries re border crossings.
The US actually had the nerve to place their own people in Customs here because they accused Canada of allowing many terrorists access to yr country via our unprotected border. Was I p'd off? You bet! GWB administration just won't take responsibility for anything. OTOH, it is wrong for our government to retaliate by persecuting innocent travellers like yourself (and may I say, HUGE contributors to our economy).
I am heartbroken that we were turned away at the border. Our house lies empty, unoccupied. We are currently living in an apartment building surrounded by tenements and abandoned row homes. Our life has been pure hell since this happened. Neither of us have been able to go to work, I am suffering from high blood pressure and severe insomnia.
We have no choice but to sell our home (which, by the way, is in a quiet cove in Nova Scotia), since they won't let my partner across the border without obtaining a "certificate of rehabilitation" for an offense committed in the 1980s! We contacted the Canadian consulate for instructions on how to obtain the certificate, and they sent back a packet with a laundry list of things he had to do that made jumping through hoops of fire and crawling across a bed of hot coals look easy by comparison. Furthermore, some of the items Canada requires he do are in direct violation of U.S. laws concerning double jeopardy and prior bad acts. In other words, he is not welcome!
We do not blame the Canadian people for this. Many of our friends and neighbors there came to our rescue, and even put us in touch with 2 MPs. Unfortunately, all we got from the MPs was that they would try to expedite the processing of his application for the rehabilitation certificate.
We had hoped to spend the summer in Nova Scotia, and were strongly considering immigrating to Canada. We drove cross-country from California to the Maine border, where an overzealous immigration officer told us that if my partner tried to enter Canada, he would be re-arrested for the same crime he committed 16 years ago as if it had happened yesterday!! I made him repeat this twice to me because I could not believe my ears. After we were turned away, I called the Canadian embassy in Washington DC on my cell phone to confirm that what he had told us was true. The woman I spoke to told me that it was indeed true, and was being instituted in retalliation for Bush's policies in the Middle East, the establishment of so-called "homeland security", and his going to war in Iraq.
We had no place to go, and were not about to drive back to California, so we rented this apartment in Pennsylvania. I came here because I lived here when I was a JW 25 years ago. I feel like the proverbial dog who has returned to his own vomit.
Thank you for your concern.
-
28
"Sins of Sodom" What were they guilty of?
by Frank75 ini am new to posting here and thought i would get the ball rolling with .
a new thread.
lamentations 4:6 says the following (nwt):.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
Read the essay carefully, Joel.
The most destructive thing which ever happened to the Bible was when chapter and verse numbers were assigned to the scriptures. It allows any scripture to be taken out of context. (The WTBTS is notorious for this.)
In the same letter to the Romans, clearly in the same thought, Paul expresses his distaste for idolatrous worship. Just because the Bible does not specifically state the idolatrous fertility ritual practices of the temples of Artemis, Aphrodite, etc., that does not make it so. The letters from Paul were guides to the early Christians, just as the Watchtower and Awake are guides to modern-day Jehovah's Witnesses. You would never see a guide to how to practice pagan faiths in any WTBTS publication, would you?
One needs to balance the scriptures with accurate historical accounts.
-
28
"Sins of Sodom" What were they guilty of?
by Frank75 ini am new to posting here and thought i would get the ball rolling with .
a new thread.
lamentations 4:6 says the following (nwt):.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
Utopian Reformist,
Thank you for asking. More from my essay on what the Bible really says about homosexuality at: http://www.gayxjw.org/bible.html
But what of Paul's statement at Romans 1 where "females changed the natural use of themselves into one contrary to nature and likewise even the males left the natural use of the female and became violently inflamed in their lust towards one another"? The answer lies in Paul's words in verses 22 & 23: "Although asserting they were wise, they became foolish and turned the glory of the incorruptible God into something like the image of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed creatures and creeping things." Obviously, Paul's reference here is to idolatry. As mentioned above in examining the Hebrew scriptures, many pagan idol-worshipping religions of Paul's day taught that by granting sexual favors to the high priest, the one giving the favor would be rewarded with fertility of crops and offspring. It then becomes clear that Paul's reference was not to same-sex, loving relationships, but his condemnations focused on heterosexuals who, going against their own sexual nature, granted sexual favors to the leaders of pagan religions in expectation of reward by the pagan gods.
Hope this gives you a clearer understanding as to the true meaning of that passage.
JIM
-
19
I have also returned.....
by SanFranciscoJim in.
after being absent from this board for a couple of years, at the gentle prodding of rayzorblade, i have come back.. although i am still going by "san francisco jim", i've since left california and am now living in pennsylvania.. while i am here, please allow me to make a shameless plug for the new message board for gay & lesbian exjws at: http://frost.bbboy.net/acommonbond.
kind regards to all...... jim.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
Matty said:
....haven't joined on account of me not being gay. Do you have to be to join?
Certainly not, Matty! We have many non-gay ACB supporters. In fact, while I was toning down the colors of the message board, I added a new forum for straight friends (not that you're not welcome to post on all the boards, though).
By the way, next week, we're having the 5th international ACB conference in New Orleans. The conference web site is at: http://www.geocities.com/acbconference4/ - All exJWs are welcome to attend.
Smack asked:
I this the Jim that fixes stuff?
Fixes what? Ummm....I don't think so. I am not mechanically inclined, but if you need stuff broken....
-
62
Trekkies will not inherit the kingdom of God....
by drwtsn32 inthis is hilarious!
i am so surprised that the society has counsel on learning the klingon language.
*** g95 12/8 p. 8 a look at todays science fiction ***.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
Trekkies will not inherit the kingdom of God....
Has anyone bothered to let the brothers & sisters over at http://www.jwzone.org/forums/ know this?
-
193
Stupidest thing a JW ever told you
by Nosferatu inwhat is the stupidest thing a jw ever told you?
we all know that they say a lot of stupid things, but what really topped the cake?.
for me, it was an elder telling me i was progressing really well when my meeting attendance was down and my field service hours were slipping.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
(1) The elder who studied with me in 1974 told me that all I had to do was "stop being gay" for a few months, get baptized, and I was sure to survive Armageddon.
(2) When I was disfellowshipped, one of the elders on the judicial committee told me that in order to be reinstated, I had to come back with a wife and child of my own fathering to prove to them I was no longer gay.
(3) There was a brother in my congregation who could not shave because he would get horrible welts on his face, and maintained a very neat, trim beard. I actually heard one of the elders say to him "It would set a fine example for the rest of the congregation if you shaved your beard and suffered with welts on your face."
(4) At the last memorial I attended, the PO who gave the memorial talk said not to eat or drink any of the emblems while they were being passed "because there wasn't enough for everyone". I suppose he somehow missed the Bible verses telling the story of the loaves and fishes.
-
28
"Sins of Sodom" What were they guilty of?
by Frank75 ini am new to posting here and thought i would get the ball rolling with .
a new thread.
lamentations 4:6 says the following (nwt):.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
I have studied these scriptures for many years. Here is a partial text of an essay on my findings regarding the story of Sodom and Gomorrah:
The ancient story of Sodom and Gomorrah has been used throughout the centuries as a condemnation of homosexuality, to the point where certain sex acts have become referred to as "Sodomy". The verses in this story most commonly referred to as proof that the Sodomites were homosexual are verses 4 and 5: "Before they could lie down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, from boy to old man, all the people in one mob. And they kept calling out to Lot and saying to him: 'Where are the men who came in to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may have intercourse with them." Examining this scripture, the first thing we see is that all
the people, in one mob, demanded that Lot bring out the visitors to them. If we are to believe that the account of Sodom & Gomorrah is a condemnation of homosexuality, then we must accept the fact that the entire city consisted of homosexuals. If we look in the previous chapter, Genesis 18: 16-33, we see an account of Abraham negotiating with God to spare the people of Sodom, with the final outcome of God promising "I shall not bring it to ruin on account of the ten" (verse 33). God promised Abraham that Sodom would not be destroyed if only ten "righteous men" could be found I the city. If we are to accept the Watchtower's logic, this would mean that the "righteous men" referred to were heterosexuals. At this point, we need to ask ourselves: What would be the odds of less than ten people in the entire region of Sodom & Gomorrah being heterosexual? The obvious answer is: Impossible.
If homosexuality was not being referred to in this passage, then what was? Looking at the scriptures in Hebrew, we find an interesting usage of a couple of different words. When the mob cries out "Where are the men who came in to you tonight?", the Hebrew word translated men is 'enowsh which, literally translated, means "mortal". This indicates that the mob knew that Lot had visitors, but were unsure of what sex they were. The Hebrew word for "man" (utilized in this same passage in Genesis 19:8) is entirely different. One has to ask: Why would homosexuals want to have sex with two strangers if they were unsure of what sex they were?
The passage translated as "Bring them out so that we may have intercourse with them" needs further examination as well. Other Bible translations read "so that we may know them". The Hebrew word herewith translated as "have intercourse", or "know" is yada. This word, yada, appears in the Hebrew Scriptures a total of 943 times. In all but ten of these usages, the word is used in the context of getting acquainted with someone. Had the writer intended for his reading audience to believe that the mob wanted to have sexual intercourse with the strangers, he would have used the Hebrew word shakab, which vividly denotes sexual activity. The correct translation, therefore, should be rendered something to the effect of: "Where are the mortals who came in to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may get acquainted with them."
So then, if the story of Sodom & Gomorrah was not a condemnation of homosexuality, what was it trying to convey? Two verses elsewhere in the Bible sum up the story this way: "Look! This is what proved to be the error of Sodom your sister: Pride, sufficiency of bread and the carefreeness of keeping undisturbed were what happened to belong to her and her dependent towns, and the hand of the afflicted one and the poor one she did not strengthen. And they continued to be haughty and to carry on a detestable thing before me, and I finally removed them, just as I saw [fit]" - Ezekiel 16: 49, 50. It is commonly assumed that the "detestable thing" referred to in this passage is homosexuality. In fact, the Hebrew word utilized here is tow'ebah, which translated literally means "to commit idol worship". This can be seen in the original Genesis passage, chapter 19, verse 8: "Please, here I have two daughters who have never had intercourse with a man. Please let me bring them out to you. Then do to them as is good in your eyes." One must ask: If Lot's house was surrounded by homosexuals, why would he offer the mob women? Note that these women were virgins. Note also that the Sodomites were pagans. Virgin sacrifices to idols were a common practice Sodom. Therefore, it can be concluded that Lot was offering his daughters as a virgin sacrifice to appease the mob in an effort to protect the visitors.
In the Greek scriptures, the story of Sodom is summed up this way: "and by reducing the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them, setting a pattern for ungodly persons of things to come". This corroborates Ezekiel's summation, once again showing that these were "ungodly persons", in other words, idolaters, not worshippers of the true God.
The story of Sodom and Gomorrah, therefore, is a condemnation of idol worshippers, a greedy and inhospitable society. The judgement of this region had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with homosexuality!
The entire essay can be found at: http://www.gayxjw.org/bible.html
-
19
I have also returned.....
by SanFranciscoJim in.
after being absent from this board for a couple of years, at the gentle prodding of rayzorblade, i have come back.. although i am still going by "san francisco jim", i've since left california and am now living in pennsylvania.. while i am here, please allow me to make a shameless plug for the new message board for gay & lesbian exjws at: http://frost.bbboy.net/acommonbond.
kind regards to all...... jim.
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
If you want to know all about me, my story is posted at:
-
74
Then Leave.com
by SheilaM in.
i love this website
http://www.asmincorp.com/thenleave/thenleave_001.htm
-
-
SanFranciscoJim
I remember billboards and bumper stickers which read: "America - love it or leave it", back during the days of the Vietnam War.
In those days, anyone who wanted to leave could leave. This is no longer the case!! Thanks to the events of September 11th and recent occurrances in Iraq, the U.S. government has recreated the paranoia of the McCarthy Era. Now, instead of Communists hiding under everyone's bed, now there are terrorists.
When my partner & I tried to enter Canada this past spring to spend the summer in a house we own up there, we were summarily deported at the border due to an error my partner made 16 years ago, even though the case was closed in the U.S. 11 years ago. We had our car rifled through by 6 (SIX!) immigration officers, and we were treated like potential terrorists.
Americans have become so vilified because of the current governmental policies and actions in the middle east that those who want to leave (even if it is just for a vacation) cannot!!
I recently came across a quote by Benjamin Franklin, which I believe both the US and Canadian governments would do well to heed: “The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either.”
Anyone wanna buy a gorgeous 4 bedroom house with an ocean view in Atlantic Canada - cheap??