Pudgy

... oh and don't forget, if you think you feel a stroke coming on, just double up on those fertility pills ....

Sen-yor Chavez ... if I may pose a relevant question ....
It seems that from what I have been reading in the past few months here on the Archive, that EVERYBODY without exception is mentally ill .... except you?
My Guardian is ASD .... he even labels my dog water bowl and food bowl with a tape label maker, which I have noticed is also labeled with a yellow tape "Label Maker" on the label maker.   And on the label of the label maker's label that says "Label Maker", is a tiny label that says "Label",
 

Correctly handling the "Word of Truth", is the same as correctly handling a saw, a hammer, a level, or any other tool. 
WORDS are the tools with which we think.
If we use tools in a wrong way, what we build will be crap.
If we use words in a wrong way, what we think will be crap.
My considered dogged opinion is that Sen-yor Chavez is on the verge of hysterical panic.

FINLAND - Jehovah's Witness Leaders Suspected of Fundraising Crime
News If you have a religion in Finland and want to raise money for a religion, you need a permission to do so. Permission must be applied for from the state. Jehovah's Witnesses have raised money in the Watchtower without permission, which is against the fundraising law. Religions in Finland are allowed to raise money without permission with collection (in practice this means passing of a collection plate at the religious event). Because Jehovah's Witnesses do not practice that kind of collection, they should have applied permission to raise money. Collecting money with a bank account number is prohibited without permission.
The case is all over the newspapers in Finland.
Google translator:
The whole article: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=fi&tl=en&u=https://www.is.fi/kotimaa/art-2000007917890.html
And the question of "why Jehovah's Witnesses have not applied for permission to raise money?": in order to obtain permission, a statement of religion financial policies is required. Possibly they didn't want open their financial policies.

I am 68 years old.  I worked hard in my lifetime - so I now relax and do what I like - such as field service.

Actually I'm only on the internet during my lunch hour, so I definitely don't have the free time you apparently do to take cheap shots at people and insult them.

I don’t recall the apostles conforming to the belief of three major meetings per year.   Their goal was to make the effort to move away from such traditions. (Col 2:16,17)    I use to swallow down the idea that three yearly meeting were “biblical”, but with the coming of Jesus Christ and the “new” way to worship – in spirit and in truth – I now see the organization reverting right back to beliefs before Jesus came to earth.  Is Jesus the organization's stumbling block? Is it caught between a hybrid of worship involving the nation of Israel, and its temple worship and traditions, while refusing to accept and recognize the "temple" worship that involves "Israel"?
  The anointed since Christ, “Israel”, do not need to observe an earthly pattern of worship, but only the heavenly, involving the heavenly Temple, and not the earthly desires for “organization”.   (Heb 8:3-6; Col 3:2; 2:8) (1 Pet 2:5,9; 1 Cor 3:16,17; Eph 2:20-22)
We need to keep in mind that God's dwelling/Temple today, has been trampled by men assuming to formulate their own form of worship.  (Matt 24:15,16; 2 Thess 2:3,4; Rev 11:1,2)
“When you come to appear before Me,
Who has required this from your hand,
To trample My courts?
13 Bring no more futile sacrifices;
Incense is an abomination to Me.
The New Moons, the Sabbaths, and the calling of assemblies—
I cannot endure iniquity and the sacred meeting.
14 Your New Moons and your appointed feasts
My soul hates;
They are a trouble to Me,
I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands,
I will hide My eyes from you;
Even though you make many prayers,
I will not hear.
Your hands are full of blood."  Isa 1:12-15
Rev 16:4-7
 
 
 
 

I read recently that China was taking Christians into custody that were regularly using zoom. I think the platform will allow for this type of government abuse.  In the end it could make all of us more vulnerable.  I do not know what is the solution because the JW app has now been banned in Russia.  So a JW meeting app may not work either.   
I think we are reaching a time where we all will have to be ready to stand up for our faith and even go to "re-education camps"  for it..... it is this serious. 
I have also heard of kingdom halls that were successfully sold.  There is a boom in property sales now (a massive bubble)- so the GB will get some money to go on from selling properties.  They must sell while the boom lasts. Halls cost money to maintain with no-one using it.
Inflation is going up and the stock market and housing market is artificially high (just as before the great depression).  The dollar has lost so much of its value that the food prices will soon be shooting up.
We really are close to a great catastrophe.....  The central banks will soon replace the physical money with digital money and start a new fiat digital  currency to keep the world gong. They want to centrally control all of us.  The money you have in your bank and the house which is yours may be nationalized.  Gold and siver can be taken away and bitcoin may be illegal. When we do not comply to their moral standards (being Christians) our "universal income" will be cut off.  The hate towards Christians is growing.  We are not the same as other Christians ... but to them we are part of that category.
The GB are smart to let kingdom halls go as we can no longer physically meet.  The vaccination will not stop (more to come) as it gives them control over us.  It is the beginning of a series of vaccinations. People are starting to wake up to the manipulation going on but we are like helpless little birds in a trap - only Jehovah can remove us from it by some miracle.
The Ezekiel book we did 3 weeks ago reminded me of our situation now.  The city (world) in lockdown and a third dying of hunger and pestilence - the rest by the sword. Those fleeing will also be pursued.  Pretty grim picture but I think it is very possible for our time.
The final climax of the world where science and tech (human pride for what they can achieve)  is the new god. They will use it for oppression because they are imperfect and they are all atheist. 
Keep the faith, attend the meetings as long as possible and stay true to Jehovah. Do not get the mark of the beast (any identification as putting trust in any part of the world political system.)  Human institutions are now all corrupt and soon will be obsolete. 

I think it’s pretty intriguing. You state the benefits well.
Can’t go wrong when you leave things in the pipeline, for others to pick up on or not.

ABOUT WHERE IT'S BEING HEARD...
@JW Insider has referred some comments for others. I have other sources as well. A Bethelite with many years at the world headquarters tells me that when they meet by chance some members of the G.B. half jokingly, half seriously, they comment aloud things like "how well the zoom meetings work, how well everything is working" or the like. I know that these brothers want the G.B. keep thinking that there is a new approach to celebrate meetings, that they consider it.
WEEKLY IN-HOUSE MEETINGS
The face-to-face meetings, held in a physical location, I see as absolutely essential. There are emotional, delicate and uplifting conversations that I myself cannot have with some brothers because I cannot touch or see them up close (perhaps things from my Mediterranean culture). This is only one of the negative effects of not having face-to-face meetings, among many others that could be cited. Now, where in the Bible does it say that there are to be one, two, or three weekly meetings? Do biblical principles prevent some of these meetings from being in an online format?
Real -positive- cases that are occurring due to the zoom meetings:
A brother who comes home late from work, often missed the meeting or was late, because it is not enough for him to just get home, he has to fix himself, go back to the K.H., park the car ... Now He says he's arriving, puts on his tie, and you're done!
Young couples with small children who used to return late from the meeting on weekdays. When he returned, it was his turn to feed the children and fix them for bed. Now he saves a lot of time.
Brothers who at the time of the meeting have some discomfort or another and do not see themselves with the strength to go to the meeting. Being less expensive (even if they look bad for health they turn off the video) they don't miss the zoom meeting at home.
Saving effort, time, money ... well, there would be more, but not to extend myself.
THE ASSEMBLIES
I think it is another anachronism: as Israel had three major annual conventions, so did we. As I have said before, many brothers attend the assembly and find out absolutely nothing: they take care of young children or relatives in poor health. They get up early every day to get ready and be at the assembly hall on time. They invest money in this process. Then you are asked to spend about 5 hours of attentive program, taking notes and everything.
The benefits of zoom assemblies have been impressive. We can listen, repeat the videos, absorb the information much better, save effort, money.
On the latter, thousands and thousands of brothers have invested hours of work for the preparations of the assemblies, or for the weekly care of the premises in the case of the assembly halls. Many of us have missed entire programs doing essential work for the operation of the program.
And isn't it nice that we see thousands of brothers in a beautiful assembly hall? Yes of course! That is why I say that, following the format of international assemblies, these face-to-face assemblies should be scheduled each year. Families and siblings whose personal and financial circumstances allow them to attend in a given year would simply sign up to attend. The rest would see the assembly at home, or in kingdom halls, in short, in zoom format, like last year.
THE PERSECUTION
The JWs believe that we will soon face a worldwide violent persecution that will affect our meetings (as now in Russia, but all over the world). Therefore, the ideal would be to continue having experience in this type of online format.
Well, I better not extend myself further. I don't know what you think. I'm sure that I left things in the pipeline, and I don't think I have the absolute truth, let me know!
 

BTW I hate the zoom crap. I want to feel the breath and spittle of the speakers on my face.

I, for one, would be interested and I'm sure many others would be too 💐

I am glad you shared this. I had a very similar experience just this past week with a memorial for an older sister that died. I was so impressed with the experience that I was almost moved to want to share it on here but then I thought nobody would be interested. So I'm glad you brought it up. 
Our memorial had only half the attendance of yours, but we had people I had never met, from various  states as far as NY and California. It was very interesting meeting everyone. The memorial talk was one of the best I had heard. It was presented by a relative, who was not an elder (although he had been an elder at one time). The family chose him because they felt he knew the sister the best. Although there was the regular "witnessing" part of the talk, it only occupied about 10% of the total. The rest was all about the sister's life and how we are all looking forward to seeing her again. Both prayers were again, very personal. Afterwards we were put into "breakout" rooms, to meet and talk with the family, and with each other. It was really nice,  and I too felt the love and genuine friendship and brotherly connection.
The whole thing lasted much longer than normal, nobody seemed to want to leave. We were expecting to be on for an hour, but we stayed on for well over 2.

https://dilbert.com/strip/2020-11-01 😁

On the other hand, maybe it isn’t:
https://bitterwinter.org/jehovahs-witnesses-the-worlds-most-persecuted-religion/
The BitterWinter article links to an USCRIF government report. It is remarkable that it should be this way, given Witnesses’ non-violence, non-meddling in politics, industriousness instilled in members, that individually they are nearly always described as “nice people.”
The scriptures speak so assuredly of persecution. For example: “All those desiring to live with godly devotion in association with Christ Jesus will also be persecuted.” 2 Tim 3:12.
And then the group that most notably fulfills that verse is Jehovah’s Witnesses. I even end a chapter of the new book, I Don’t Know Why We Persecute Jehovah’s Witnesses: Searching for the Why with: “When searching the field of religion, look for the group that is individually praised but collectively maligned.”

Reading through various histories, what seems to be absent is what was actually done to convince illiterate people that Christianity was true.  Lots of talk about conversions, but really light on the processes involved.
https://www.history.com/news/inside-the-conversion-tactics-of-the-early-christian-church
Found this. Interesting take. Of course Bart is an atheist.
Now in all this it strikes me that perhaps the reason the trinity garbage got promoted was because it was harder to argue w/the hoi polloi about not worshiping multiple deities when Christianity appeared to have two - namely Jehovah and Jesus though Jesus was a lesser deity (elohim) (325 had nothing to do w/the Holy Spirit). Then too, the bad practice of not using God's name Jehovah further confused these issues.
Of course, the Catholic Church also leveraged the gods of river, or corn or whatever by creating patron saints of this, that or the other thing. So then they could continue with the methadone of their polytheism weaning them off the real heroin of polytheism.
On the other hand, the Bible has always admitted that there ARE other gods. So some might say that to admit that there exist other gods is polytheistic, though that's not really the case, as we worship Jehovah (who is elohim, but not in the same sense at all as other elohim) Just that these are either impotent or unreal or shouldn't be obeyed. The word elohim applies to more than Jehovah in the Bible - it includes other beings. So "Elohim" is just a form of nonphysical life.

.... since Trump declassified ALL UFO information, it is my understanding from radio commentary that they have found HARD physical evidence, as well as thousands of reports from very credible witnesses, of extraterrestrial life.
If so, I am sure someone is already planning to dis-invite them to any future Memorials.

There are three things that we will always have in this System ... death, taxes, and busybodies.

The same way you tip a cow?
(... sneak up on them at night and push them over.)

cEEZAR
Do you not realize that by not making specific objections to JWI's account of life at Bethel, that you have validated it?
ALL of it.
Thanks for the validating!
.... don't forget to tip your waitresses.
Note, Question to the great washed masses: What ASCII code produces this ...  r⃗  ?
 

cEEZAR
Do you not realize that by not making specific objections to JWI's account of life at Bethel, that you have validated it?
ALL of it.
Thanks for the validating!
.... don't forget to tip your waitresses.
Note, Question to the great washed masses: What ASCII code produces this ...  r⃗  ?
 

cEEZAR
Do you not realize that by not making specific objections to JWI's account of life at Bethel, that you have validated it?
ALL of it.
Thanks for the validating!
.... don't forget to tip your waitresses.
Note, Question to the great washed masses: What ASCII code produces this ...  r⃗  ?
 

Of course, neither Dogs or Jehovah's Witnesses vote.
For Dogs it is because of the failed French Poodle rebellion of 1870, and we have had to eat from dishes on the ground, since then.

This is known as “jumping the shark“.

..... unless of course you are a man having a conversation with a woman .... then you are ALWAYS wrong.
The reason men play the Lottery more than women is that they think the odds are better at winning.
...... and the reason that men die almost a decade before women is .....
 
... they want to.