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Patiently waiting for Truth

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  1. Downvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from César Chávez in Conscience individual and collective   
    And what therefore of a God ( so the GB pretend) that would kill you for not being a baptised JW ? 
  2. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from Kick_Faceinator in Conscience individual and collective   
    The Bible doesn't use the phrase 'Governing Body' either.  Or 'Jehovah's Witnesses'  
    The 'name' for God seems to be YHWH. 
    And it is you that goes on and on about the True Anointed 
    When you know full well that they already exist.  When the GB are no longer ruling a dozen or so Orgs / Societies, then the True Anointed will be revealed to mankind. 
     
    Would Jesus choose such a man ?  Yes i know that Jesus reads 'hearts', but if Matthew was as you suggest. 
  3. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to JW Insider in Conscience individual and collective   
    xero has been rightly criticized for condescension with respect (or lack of respect) to some Witnesses and their IQs, and prior references to Witness obesity, gluttony, lack of exercise, etc.
    But this is nothing compared to the near constant condescension of a couple of others who have graced this forum under names like John and Billy.
    So I thought that I would join the fray of critics and point out that even TTH shows some condescension above by implying that freed slaves are somehow prime examples of those who are not necessarily bright. It's true that doctors were not necessarily well respected. Even a character on PBS' Downton Abbey was looked down upon for his choice to become a doctor. And it's true that many scholars say that Luke himself may have been a slave, as they were commonly forced to serve as someone's private physician.
    But slaves (before capture, during, or after being freed from captivity) were not necessarily less bright than their captors. And some "particular training" does not necessarily make someone bright, either.
  4. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to Srecko Sostar in Conscience individual and collective   
    emotional incontinence .... I found some of your wording, vocabulary choice here and in other places as strange.
    some internet explanations are: Pseudobular affect (PBA) goes by many other names—pathologic laughing and crying, emotional incontinence, emotional lability. It refers to a condition whereby patients display brief, involuntary episodes of laughing or crying, which may be emotionally congruent or incongruent and are typically provoked by seemingly trivial events. - https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/emotional-incontinence
    Emotional incontinence (EI) is a perturbing condition characterized by uncontrollable outbursts of exaggerated, involuntary facial expressions and pathological crying or laughter. There is increasing evidence that serotonergic neurotransmission may be damaged in EI. - https://neuro.psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/jnp.10.4.453
    + your last comment about "low IQ of JW faithful people", it leaves a weird impression of the JW members as a group, but also about you who feel that way about your brothers, about brothers who are "more and who are less faithful than ...(you ?, or than other JW people perhaps). 
    Perhaps some real names and real persons and real situations about who are faithful despite low IQ can explain perception?  You can use Biblical examples too. 
  5. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    As usual, you have it backwards, in your cloying acceptance of how the world categorizes things. 
    Physicians were not necessarily bright. A few years ago the Wt publication stopped using the phrase Luke, “the respected physician” upon realizing that they weren’t. Often they were freed slaves with no particular training at all. A contemporary news item of the time refers to one man who used to be an undertaker, was now a physician, “and does the same for his new clients as he used to do for his old.” (not the exact quote)
    Tax collectors were glorified thugs who simply beat money out of people.
    Fishermen, on the other hand, ran a business, which easily might call for more intelligence than the other two examples.
    In this case the mentally ill might be those who carry on and on about the True Anointed soon to manifest itself out of nowhere, a phrase the Bible itself never uses, much less Capitalizes. (Rise, for I too am a man)
  6. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from Kick_Faceinator in Conscience individual and collective   
    And what therefore of a God ( so the GB pretend) that would kill you for not being a baptised JW ? 
  7. Like
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from Srecko Sostar in Conscience individual and collective   
    Xero takes scripture totally out of context of course.  Matthew 6 : 5 & 6. 
     5 “Also, when you pray, do not act like the hypocrites, for they like to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the main streets to be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 6  But when you pray, go into your private room and, after shutting your door, pray to your Father who is in secret. Then your Father who looks on in secret will repay you.
    Jesus was saying do not pray on display to get rewards from men.  Jesus was not saying, do not pray together in unity.  Remember that Jesus said to the anointed, 'when two or more of you are gathered in my name, i am among you'. So Jesus wanted them to gather together to pray.  
    Matthew 18 : 20
    For where there are two or three gathered together in my name, there I am in their midst.”
  8. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to JW Insider in Physical attendance at meetings/assemblies and "Zoom" attendance   
    A CO who talked to my father about a requested upgrade to the sound system in the KH and who recommended that this upgrade effort go towards a different need in the Norco Assembly Hall. I heard something like it from a trusted elder in NYC. He claims it's talk from "higher up," and I didn't press him.
  9. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to JW Insider in Physical attendance at meetings/assemblies and "Zoom" attendance   
    As an aside, here, I keep hearing more talk that the WTS is transitioning to no more KH at all, just assembly halls and larger conventions perhaps. It's not just us, but churches, too, have spoken about the success they have had with Zoom in terms of attendance. I fear that it would be a losing decision about the KH's if this rumor is true, but attendance numbers on Zoom have normalized and even risen for some churches.
    For us, I fear that less physical gathering would result in more drifting, too much video content, less local participation and enthusiasm. Even --dare I say it?-- more marriages to unbelieving mates!
  10. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    Yes and no. Obviously the head is not nothing, but it is the heart that recoils at a trinity making God unknowable and a hellfire doctrine making him cruel, someone you would not want to know.
  11. Downvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from César Chávez in Conscience individual and collective   
    And this is why people say, and this proves the point, that congregants ARE controlled / ruled over by the GB / WTS.
    This really proves that JWs serve and put their faith in the GB and the W/t / JW org. 
    And it's good to see that you recognise  that THREAT of disfellowshipping hanging over the congregation. 
     
     
     
  12. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to Anna in Conscience individual and collective   
    Yes, true indeed. On the other hand one has to use the head to be able to distinguish the truth from non truth. Evangelicals are led by the heart, but they are obviously misguided. 
  13. Downvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to xero in Conscience individual and collective   
    I've been told that. It's a baked-in personality trait. I have high-low self esteem. My biggest fear is that people will be too stupid to realize how brilliant I am.
    This reminds me of an elders meeting where one brother said to me "Other people have ideas too!" and my response was "Well if we could knock it off with the fake humility and speak as men, maybe we could get these meetings done more quickly. Just spit it out already."
    Edited to mention
    I remember one brother (was it me?) who said in a meeting in response to the phrase "speaking as men" ..."Oh, you mean like now when we're being rude and tactless?"
  14. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    I know where you’re coming from, but I agree with Anna. I think it is not good to describe the brotherhood this way. I think it because the scriptures lay no emphasis at all on this “deficiency,” if it is one. Instead, they goes out of their way to show favor to such ones. They pay no attention to the head. They only pay attention to the heart. 
    “Wisdom cries aloud from the street,” the Bible says. “Hogwash,” comes the answer from the learned ones. “It cries aloud from the quadrangles. Only ignoramuses are to be found in the street.”
    It is their bad, for it cries aloud from the street. 
    I like the counsel to Philippians to keep regarding the other as superior. If it seems to me that I truly am superior towards another with regard to smarts, I look for another way in which he truly is superior to me. I usually don’t have to look too hard.
  15. Downvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to Anna in Conscience individual and collective   
    You are a little condescending here, but I know what you mean
  16. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to Srecko Sostar in Conscience individual and collective   
    I completely agree with what was said .... 
    ... also, I am of the opinion that “blood fractions” cannot enter the realm of conscience. Because of the "do not eat blood" itself, as a commandment, it is essentially set as a prohibition, not as a moral dilemma. "Blood transfusion" has become a dilemma (religious, doctrinal, moral dilemma, etc.), because the question arises whether receiving blood for the purpose of a medical procedure can be reduced to just "eating" something that is prohibited in Bible .
    “Blood fractions” are not a matter of conscience because there is currently no religious dilemma about it in the WTJWorg official position. (Same is with blood transfusion. This is not matter for conscience of JW member, but only matter of obeying WTJWorg doctrine)  The question of "blood fractions" is a question of the desired choice, similar to the example of "what color of carpet" do you want, or do you not want a carpet in general, but you want ceramic tiles.
    The question of conscience is not just a question of whether we will be guilty of something or not. Or, will the social environment accept or reject us. It is also a question of how we will feel ourselves if we do or do not do something.
  17. Downvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to xero in Conscience individual and collective   
    Well there are certainly mundane things pertaining to conscience. Like minor blood fractions. Quite mundane as the term applies to the earthly realm. One could imagine all manner of things there. Suppose one were to imagine that it would be possible like a Ted Talk I saw, where they were able to manufacture or culture meat, that they were also able to manufacture all that blood is. Would this be allowable, if it were completely indistinguishable from actual blood?
    Also, it would seem that IQ and conscience are also related. I would imagine that certain nuance in the exercise of one's conscience might get a jaundiced look from low IQ brothers and sisters. Let's face it, some of our most faithful brothers and sisters have IQ's about the level of a hamster.
    I was thinking that once when my wife and I were giving a ride to the circuit assembly for a sister and her daughter. They sat happily in the back eating chips offering nothing in the way of conversation or adding anything to the discussion until they ran out of chips and fell asleep until we got to the assembly hall.
    I can't imagine these could ever get stumbled out of the truth by some fancy-pants discussions surrounding relative vs absolute dates in the Hebrew scriptures.
  18. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to JW Insider in Conscience individual and collective   
    It sounds like you are applying "conscience" to very mundane matters of getting along with others. You are then generalizing these mundane things so that they might apply loosely to matters of spirituality and "sin." Nothing wrong with that of course. It's also what many of Jesus' illustrations and parables do.
    But the mundane matters in themselves are not about conscience. If a brother wants a grey carpet in the new Kingdom Hall, and you want a beige carpet, it is not a matter of "conscience" for you to say OK to the grey. It's just a mundane decision. There are no grey areas of right and wrong -- unless it's a very cheap carpet.
    Our KH once had wallpaper in the bathrooms with a light fleur-de-lis pattern. Someone mentioned the political, religious, even possible Trinitarian associations, but he was not in the least personally offended; he just wanted to show off his knowledge of history. Since no one else really cared, the COBE decided that when it came time to change it someday, they'd remember not to repeat the pattern.
  19. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    This final sentence should have ended with a question mark but did not. 
    I’m stumbled.
  20. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to JW Insider in Conscience individual and collective   
    I liked your KH building experience. We've all had that experience when we would have made different decisions if we were in charge, and then we are glad we weren't.
    But I can't seem to fit your musing on conscience into what I thought was the most common use of the term "conscience" in the Bible. Of course, it might be right anyway, depending on what you mean by consequences. For example:
    Let's say that you would love the experience of eating roast beef a couple times a week, but depending on your location (and your time in history) the only viable source is the meat shop just outside the local pagan temple where they sacrifice animals and then sell the meat. In this case, the consequence of eating meat is something you would want to experience, but perhaps you'd rather not experience the consequence of spiritual brothers and sisters who react to your attitude by:
    their own revulsion that you would dare be associated with idolatry. talking behind your back and gossiping that you are not a serious Christian because you would dare go against the counsel of the Jerusalem body of elders who declared that you should not eat meat that had been sacrificed to an idol. their being shaken in their faith or even stumbled that you would do this openly in front of them and even defend it as no big deal (because idols are no big deal). Or perhaps you are not truly convinced in your own mind that eating meat sacrificed to an idol is OK. Therefore you think it might be a sin, and are therefore going to suffer the future consequences of judgment against yourself for continuing in sin.
    This is probably the way most Witnesses look at blood-sourced medical therapies. Most Witnesses will accept the full range of "allowed" blood products (smaller fractions) that the WTS has identified as OK "if your conscience allows it." What the WTS has currently identified as "not allowed" (whole and larger fractions) are not considered to be a matter of conscience. They are simply not allowed without the potential consequences of disfellowshipping.
    But as regards the "conscience" matter of those allowable fractions, the Witness wants the consequences of the therapeutic medical advantages including longer and healthier physical life in this system. You will not be gossiped about behind your back nor will brothers and sisters be shaken in their faith by your decision to take these blood products, because there is trust in the WTS decision that you have made a decision that properly falls under the range of decisions that are allowed by your own conscience. One could argue that this really has nothing to do with conscience, and comments from HLC elders (including one of my cousins) would appear to bear this out.
    There have been several comments in this thread where the subtext, at least, shows that we might be confusing conscience at times with guilt or "reasonable" choices regarding sin, or just "reasonable" choices regarding not wishing to offend people.
    It occurs to me that the apostle Paul would rather eat vegetables (instead of meat) in front of brothers who might be offended/stumbled. Yet he was willing to write a letter that publicly declared that it was OK to eat meat sacrificed to an idol. Which is worse, eating in front of one who might be stumbled, or writing a letter that offends 10,000 brothers who might be stumbled at hearing your flippant attitude about meat sacrificed to idols.
  21. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    Long ago I was on a committee to explore building a new Kingdom Hall. A brother as you describe, also on the committee, carried on and on about how we would put a baby changing table in the men’s room! Why should it be just sisters who have to change the infant? Times were changing! Equal work for all! And it was not just work, it was part of the privilege of rearing children—spread the joys and the drudgery evenly! It shouldn’t only be the sisters who have to.....” He discussed brands, the fold=down type, which were sormewhat new at the time. On and on he went, so enthusiastic.
    For crying out loud, we hadn’t even located land yet!
  22. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to xero in Conscience individual and collective   
    Musing - Conscience only seems troubled by the acceptance or rejection of thoughts or ideas which have consequences to us which we'd rather not experience.
    Neither here nor there, but for some reason this popped into my mind. Back when we were building our hall, a certain  brother who was slated to be our PO was a bit hyperactive and impatient as we were waiting for the concrete trucks to arrive for our parking lot. Now it would have been normal to construct the forms and tie the steel as these arrived, but noooo brother hyperactive-impatient came up with an idea to create the forms w/the steel already tied!
    I immediately thought this to be a really bad idea, a bad idea that I assessed to be a function of his unwarranted enthusiasm and exuberance. I said "So this is the first brilliant idea you decided to run with as new PO?...Mkay..."
    I thought it was a really dumb idea, but as it turns out, I was wrong. It sped the whole thing up. Nevermind this brother wasn't some professional steel-tier.
    So maybe we imagine bad consequences at times flowing from going along w/something we think is wrong or stupid, but then we find out it's our imagination that's wrong.
  23. Haha
    Patiently waiting for Truth reacted to TrueTomHarley in Conscience individual and collective   
    That’s too bad. You would have hit the nail on the head in that event. As it is, go directly to jail, do not pass Go, do not collect $200.
  24. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from Kick_Faceinator in Conscience individual and collective   
    But the funny thing was, i wasn't sugesting CC was you Tom.  I was suggesting CC was xero.  
    I am now thinking that CC is not good with English. 
  25. Upvote
    Patiently waiting for Truth got a reaction from Kick_Faceinator in Conscience individual and collective   
    Ah CC so you are xero. Ok fine.  That is why you are so upset with my 'thinking aloud'.
     
    I note here that you say I make accusation. That in itself is an accusation aimed at me. 
    As for me, I only use one name or one aka on this forum.  One is enough. 
    I'll put the kettle on then to make tea for the Police you pretend to be sending. 
     
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