Posts by Saintbertholdt

24

Introduction

by shattered_origins in

i joined the forum yesterday and made 2 angry posts which received encouraging replies.

i spent a good chunk of time today browsing various posts, and i can't get enough!

i'm doing things backwards now and taking a moment to introduce myself.

Prince: How the rock legend turned his life around

by Dogpatch in

jw
friends

what is your opinion of prince nowadays?.

one of the worlds raunchiest rock stars, prince is in his stacked heels and flamboyant suit strutting from house to house around an ordinary suburban estate.. from: http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/2010/07/06/prince-how-the-rock-legend-turned-his-life-around-115875-22384807/.

flanked by minders, he goes up a garden path, knocks on a door and politely asks the householder: would you like to talk about god?.

Saintbertholdt

I like his early stuff like 'Dirty Mind'

Its a very groovy track.

Seems that a rep for the show claims that it was a joke.

372

On respect for the belief of others. Sorry for the long post

by StarTrekAngel in

i am inclined to start this thread in response to some comments made in other threads.

i have been coming around these forum for quite some time now so whatever you find in here is not just related to something someone may have said this week.

it can go months back as well.. i have seen many who claim to respect the belief of others but when it comes down to applying it into practice, things take a whole different tune.

Saintbertholdt

Personal attacks are unnecessary and cheapens any debate.

I haven't seen that too often on the forum.

What I have seen is that there are 'sparring partners'. People who have engaged each other in the past and jump on each others comments. Well you can usually detect it a mile off and you can either ignore it or pass the popcorn and relax while you watch it unfold.

33

The thousand mile bullshit stare

by bohm in

jw
friends

anyone else tired of this wt cliche?.

"a certain young man named eutychus sat in the window, weighed down with deep sleep.

as paul spoke still longer, being weighed down by his sleep, he fell down from the third story and was taken up dead".

Saintbertholdt

Bah my pic didn't have a thousand mile stare... wait wait...

105

New Watchtower Propaganda and hate speech destroying families (Feb 2016 WT)

by Daniel1555 in

the following is a paragraph from the new february study watchtower article "learn from jehovah's loyal servants.".

7 a conflict of loyalties may arise when a close relative is disfellowshipped.

for example, a sister named anne [1] received a telephone call from her disfellowshipped mother.

Saintbertholdt

done4good,
There is some serious loaded language in this article, almost brazen. For those of you that point out this is a more disturbing article than usual, it is not your imagination...Providing an example of what to write in a letter to a dis-fellowshipped relative or friend and how to handle a non-JW funeral is not only over the top, these are deliberately placed control mechanisms. As reprehensible as the WT is, this was not the norm not too many years ago.

Yep its gotten down to prescribing not only exact actions but exact wording also. This is some seriously repugnant shit.

48

Your thoughts on Halloween , yes, no or maybe ?

by Finkelstein in

well its that time again when the ghouls come out to play.

i personally think halloween is a bit irresponsible and inappropriate from a sociological perspective.. there's something about the intent of frightening young impressionable children minds with frightening objests.

and feeding them candy which most likely cause tooth decay and stomachs is irresponsible activity conducted by adults.

Saintbertholdt

How about dressing up as the magical wizard SPARLOCK!??!

Been done.

47

2015 Jehovah's Witnesses Annual Meeting Lett warning about apostates CLIP

by Watchtower-Free in

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja4z2-sf4ky.

Saintbertholdt

I know the comparison was probably already made but...

4

Truth light and Truth Express could just lead back to Truth v1.0

by Saintbertholdt in

truth light and truth express could just lead back to truth v1.0.

the following is just shooting the breeze, so take the following with a tablespoon of salt:.

i've been thinking about the "something interesting!

Saintbertholdt

Hi Edenone, nicoulaou and _Morpheus,

Edenone I have a totally different versioning method than yourself:

0.5 - Release Russell - Conditional immortality, Unitarianism and 1914 Armageddon.

0.70 - Release Rutherford - Organizational focus and legally establishing the blah blah. 1914 bug workaround . Major Pyramid bug removed. Some new bugs introduced (1925,1935, 1941)

0.90 - Release Knorr - Last of old buggy beliefs removed (Aluminum hatred, Inoculations etc.). New no-blood feature.

0.95 - Release Franz - 1975 bug introduced but removed with a patch. Fixed date setting is now regarded as the known cause of fatal system errors.

1.00 - Release Henschel - Attempt at 1914 generation bug. Still needs work. No-blood feature causes crashes but workarounds are implemented. First stable release.

1.05 - 2.00 - Release Adams - Attempt at a major upgrade on the 1914 generation. New desktop and widgets. Developers are running low on funds.

Nicolaou,

Dead horses never benefit from flogging..

... but v1.0 was the last stable release.

_Morpheus

Saint, i think your missing the obvious, the first rule of power: those that have it never want to give it up.

I was actually thinking that it may be a way to keep them from losing their power.

New Coke vs. Classic Coke. They had to scrap New Coke in the end.

...

But this is just shooting the breeze anyway :)

4

Truth light and Truth Express could just lead back to Truth v1.0

by Saintbertholdt in

truth light and truth express could just lead back to truth v1.0.

the following is just shooting the breeze, so take the following with a tablespoon of salt:.

i've been thinking about the "something interesting!

Saintbertholdt

Truth light and Truth Express could just lead back to Truth v1.0

The following is just shooting the breeze, so take the following with a tablespoon of salt:

I've been thinking about the "Something interesting!" thread started by John Aquila where he posted the observation and personal experience that currently an old guard is slowly forming within the Watchtower organization, essentially a fifth column. The membership is currently restricted to older senior witnesses who obviously remember how things used to be and who don't really like the technological/dumbed down 'Truth light' that has slowly gained momentum over the past couple of years.

These adherents claim they are faithful witnesses, and shun the idea that they are apostates but who also feel that the Watchtower leadership has lost its way. Now when these unsanctioned meetings eventually comes to light, as these things tend to do, the organization in the past could have afforded to lose these members, referring to this nascent rebellion as a "harvest sifting", the term used by Russell and also exploited by Rutherford.

But there's a rub. The financial problems brought about by the current Governing Body may very well intensify which could also threaten the viability of the organization. The governing body would have to look for an excuse for why God has supposedly withdrawn his spirit (money). They could now argue that they lost sight of the original goal of being personal Witnesses to Jehovah and this new path was a ploy of Satan's system. This would play nicely into this old guards ideas, consoling them and giving the governing body an emergency parachute for why they financially screwed up so badly. Therefore to make amends they would just return to Truth 1.0:

1. Literature carts will be discarded because sooner or later it will filter upwards that the people manning these carts are just counting time.

2. JW.org will be de-emphasized and the video broadcasts reduced to a trickle.

3. There will be a re-emphasis on using the Bible to personally preach and a return to Witness fundamentalism.

Now this scenario is just a possibility and perhaps not a strong probability (to paraphrase Frederick Franz), but I have to ask: Is this not a reasonable way for this to play out in the foreseeable future?

49

Dissenters in Watchtower History: Differing Departures

by slimboyfat in

i'm reading an excellent book about defectors from the mormon church called differing visions: dissenters in mormon history.

through a collection of essays from many academic authors it looks at the life stories of dissenters and reasons for departure, as well as analysing the impact of their dissent on the church itself.

fascinating stuff and makes me wish there was a similar volume looking at the key dissenters from jws/watchtower and the impact they had.

Saintbertholdt

Two additional names I'd like to toss into the hat:

James Penton and

Jerry Bergman