TrueTomHarley

1 hour ago, FelixCA said:

It could be, that’s the problem. Loyalty. I wouldn’t lose my personal relationship with God, for the sake of writing a book...

Hopefully that has not happened.

1 hour ago, FelixCA said:

that is being collaborated by someone who is clearly a bad association and influence my decision to have an input of that book, right or wrong

Without weighing in on whether he is bad association or not, he is one of the very few who offered constructive criticism of CSA matters. Whether he should have done so on this forum is a matter for others to haggle over, but the fact is that he did and I benefited from it.

For example, the Philadelphia.com slimed JWs with a front page lead that must have been seen by everyone in the city and well beyond. It was too much for me.  I subsequently declared war on this sort of thing. I submitted a reply to them. This was a big deal for me, to reply at length to a prominent source and tell them they owed it to their readers to publish my reply as prominently as they published the slam. There was a chance that they would do so. I didn’t want to screw it up. I ran it by JWI privately, knowing he has Bethel experience, he reasons well, and he wants to see CSA matters resolved WITHOUT burning Bethel to the ground. (the solution of the opposers) He did not disappoint me. He made valuable suggestions, most of which I accepted.

What follows is what I sent to the Philly source, followed by the refined version that is an early chapter of TTvtAp.

https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2018/07/an-open-letter-to-the-philadelphia-inquirer-because-they-did-not-acknowlege-much-less-print-the-sent.html

https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2019/01/four-incendiary-articles.html

So he helped me. A lot. I don’t care if he is bad association or not. If I was worried about bad association, I would not be here. Nor would you.

1 hour ago, FelixCA said:

Could this be the reason TrueTom and JWinsider conspired to remove this Allen Smith JWI is so obsessed about? 

It takes a while to know the players & you do not know them yet. Both of us worked very hard to retain him on this forum. Besides, I am not sure that he is gone. As for JWI, he spots him everywhere as does the groundhog his shadow.

 I pleaded with @The Librarian (that old hen) that if for nothing else, Allen should be honored because he proves the resurrection.

As to your point about John being more obnoxious and still remaining here, THAT point is certainly valid.

On ‎2‎/‎1‎/‎2019 at 12:06 PM, FelixCA said:

. I'm, sorry friend, the world doesn't revolve around JWI, for as much as you admire his limited knowledge of Bethel.

I'm going to have another go at this.

I do not think that 'TrueTom vs the Apostates!' is a great book in its writing. It is adequately written. It gets the job done. It is even a little haphazard in its organization. Another person might do it better.

However, it is a great book in that it is the only one of its kind. And it should not be. There should be more, but there are not. I am convinced that there are many friends and onlookers who need such material. Maybe there shouldn't be, but there are.

@JW Insider, more than any single person, helped me in my writing of it. His input was very slight, no more than a sporadic word or two on occasion, sometimes publicly, sometimes not. Where I was too aggressive or undiscerning, his observations put me back on track. Where I was flat-out wrong on a few things, he bluntly corrected me and thereby made my work more effective. He knows where I am coming from. Where I ignored him I afterwards came to realize why I shouldn't have.

Whether it is wise for him to carry on at such length as he does here I do not know. But I do know why he does it and why he does it the way he does it. I respect him for it, and I cannot detect an ill motive. That is not to say that he might not be loony, but in my case, he has proven more valuable than he knows.

7 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Only that he sells books for a living   

He does not. He would like to, but his last two books, because they address things important, will always be available free in some digital format.

Obviously, this undermines any efforts to make a living via selling books.

On 2/1/2019 at 1:33 PM, Shiwiii said:

Not much, but some is better than nothing, 

In fact, the problem is solved and everyone not completely unhinged knows it.

Witnesses have always been free to report. The unsettling aspect of the CSA cases is that many chose not to do it because they thought they might be bringing reproach on God’s name. Now, beyond any possibility of misunderstanding, it is spelled out for them and for elders that they are not. The problem is solved.

There are always going to be ‘What ifs.’ At some point one must have some confidence in the power of parents to be concerned for their children. It is not easy to get between a mama bear and her cub. You make it sound like a walk in the park. Reporting to authorities has now been endorsed. The two witness rule becomes irrelevant, as it always was to outside authorities 

In the rare situation that nobody has payed the slightest attention to Christian values taught, if wrath or revenge is feared, mama bear may have to flee the house. This has always been the case with in abusive families. The point is that she now knows she has a green light to do it, and can summon whatever authority there is for domestic violence and she need not think she is failing God, the congregation, her family, or anyone else.

Sometimes I think that these virulent opposers will not be satified until there is a cop stationed in every Witness home.

7 minutes ago, Anna said:

You should know TTH sense of warped humour by now.

You have displayed that you know very little of Einstein. If you did, you would realize that my sense of humor is spot on and everyone else’s is warped.

3 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Showing a very Christian attitude Tom. Have a nice day. 

I am ashamed. Ashamed and mortified. As ashamed as my dog was when the cops found cats on his hard drive.

1 hour ago, Anna said:

(When I get around to it I want to make this a topic in the closed club, here is not the best place)

Yeah, @JOHN BUTLER, where you can’t come.

Nyah, Nyah, Nyah.

8 minutes ago, Anna said:

The internal struggles ARE what shaped "what Jehovah’s Witnesses as a people have done"

I suppose. 

But somewhere there is a story of some old-time Bethelite who, when the younger ones would start squabbling over something, would tilt back and marvel at how Jehovah was able to do SO MUCH with what little he had to work with.

I mean, there’s always going to be people. They’re always going to do things. How God pulls a rabbit out of his hat with them around I’ll never know, but he consistently does.

It’s not my area of focus, that’s all. If I was shocked at it, I wouldn’t be here.

You commented a while back about pulling back the curtain at Oz. The fact that GB members show themselves on TV indicates to me that they pull back the curtain upon themselves as well.

7 hours ago, Equivocation said:

I am on and off sometimes because of school.

Are you really still in school? Well well well. Most here are far older. You express yourself uninhibitedly.

7 hours ago, Equivocation said:

Right now I am we have a day off because of cold weather. 

What!? A day off? For cold weather??!!!

You kids are soft!

Why, back in MY day....

#WalkFiveMiles #Uphill #BothWays.  

6 hours ago, FelixCA said:

I am afraid I disagree with that assessment.

Okay. Still, you seem to indicate that you knew him, too. What was he like?

6 hours ago, FelixCA said:

for as much as you admire his limited knowledge of Bethel. 

Yeah. That’s fair. I guess I do. I mean, he’s been where I haven’t.

Whether it’s a good idea for him to blab away as he does, I have no idea. I was livid about it at first, but I have grown used to it. The point is, he is going to do it whether I am here or not, so I just glean what I can, always keeping in mind that it is through the eyes of another. That’s why I asked about how it looks through your eyes.

6 hours ago, FelixCA said:

Since you are an author, I would think your research is for the truth

I am probably one of the few here who has not read Ray’s book. I might someday but have no immediate plans. Such things are just red herrings to me, a distraction. I mean, if my books were about personalities, I would go there. But they’re not. My books are what of Jehovah’s Witnesses as a people have done, not so much the individuals in it. I tell a lot of stories, but internal ‘power struggles,’ if they are that, do not interest me.

11 hours ago, FelixCA said:

but some of us knew Fred in a personal level. 

Since personalities have become the topic, if you knew him, I’d like to hear your take - that is, if you think such is appropriate here, and you may not. JWI gives what seems to be his honest assessment, but it is still an assessment. I recall a verse somewhere about a first viewpoint carrying the day until a contrasting one is heard, that turns everything on its head.

11 hours ago, JW Insider said:

I enjoyed it. I learned a lot. Loved the work. I'm an artist and worked in the art department. Then I got a lot of research assignments, so I got to go to the library a lot.

This is true. He has said the substance of this many times. Doesn’t seem bitter at all. Alas, I am trying to keep up with too many things & don’t read everything closely.

BTW, does he know of a Chris K who worked the art department at about the same time, give or take, and who now streams his work on I-gram? (did I mention this before?)

Also, we were driving through the mountains & just to break up the drive, we stopped in a small town & discovered there a small art gallery. I got to chatting with the proprietor (a Gary someone or other - I have his card somewhere), and upon my identifying myself as a Witness, he said that his wife was out in service at that very hour. As to him, he had gone inactive, and we spoke a bit further about his reasons. Maybe he is on this forum now as one of the bad guys. (No particular reason for me to think it...I just threw it in. He could as likely weigh in as a closet good guy.)

7 hours ago, Anna said:

Jehovah's direction is to use the swifter rather than a mop and bucket to clean the floor in the restrooms". 

When cleaning the Kingdom Hall, there is nothing I like to do more than sing out: “A fine privilege opening up soon here in connection with cleaning a toilet!”

3 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

I think that is why many leave home and leave the Org asap when they get a job, to get away from parental pressure. 

To the extent that this is true, it is pretty much true anywhere. There is a well-known saying among religious persons that “the preacher’s kid is the worst kid in town.’ Either he chafes at being raised in a fishbowl, or he perceives a lack of attention because the preacher is attending to others.

In fact, it is not even religion, and perhaps it is more egregiously true elsewhere. Witness the kid who hates his successful businessman because his attention is everywhere but home.

There were a crazy number of mistakes - typos, misspellings, juxtaposed words, and so forth in No Fake News and Dear Mr. Putin. I was chasing those around for the longest time. It is ever so hard to proof your own writing, because you read, not what is there, but what you THINK is there.

There were very few in ’TrueTom vs the Apostate!’ because I wrote in a different venue, with no thought of connecting it at first, and proofed it as I went along. I have also discovered that putting it on a blog first and proofing it on a device- the smaller the better - is a tremendously effective tool.

22 minutes ago, Queen Esther said:

Elders have NO right, to overrule anointed brothers,  WHY  THAT ?

The trouble with this view is that the only way to know that a person is anointed is that he or she says he is.

44 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

It I s a minority of modern scholars who believe that Paul wrote the book of Hebrews. We have no evidence one way or another in scripture itself except style and content

 

Paul’s endlessly run-on sentences are unmistakable. I often imitate him, except I tend to lose my way in the middle and sometimes don’t emerge until days later, whereas he generally came out the other end without undue fuss.

Only recently did it dawn on me that Paul, as the scholar, connects all the dots to the Hebrew Scriptures in a way that fishermen could not be expected to, thus bringing his ‘gift to the altar’ to such an extent that persons who have never seen real unity, and thus cannot imagine it, credit him with practically forming a new religion.

7 hours ago, JW Insider said:

that link to "rapist" is to another snopes debunkable which has been told in versions quite similar to the Witness version:

I believe it was at a District Convention, and the speaker was exhorting those not to believe every dumb thing, when the he related the one about the sole Witness walking the gritty streets at night with all the Society’s money and how he escaped mugging on account of the huge angels walking alongside.

”What was he doing alone at night with all the Society’s money?” the speaker said. “I’m sure the Society would like to know.”

7 hours ago, JW Insider said:

it ends up sounding like the way people apply Dylan lyrics to their lives or Shakespeare quotes to describe an experience or a "moral" of a story

I’ll overlook this bit of clumsiness just once. The byline for ‘TrueTom vs the Apostates!’ is a Dylan line: “The game is the same, it’s just up on another level.”

5 hours ago, JW Insider said:

don't consider bad spelling and grammar to be any kind of "fail" on your part, 

It is best to blame things like this on autocorrect. May its inventor rot in hello.

On 1/29/2019 at 7:29 PM, BillyTheKid46 said:

Butler, I noticed you don’t downvote people like Anna, JWinsider, TrueTom, James Thomas Rook, etc. even though you disagree with them, and at times have a strong opinion of them. I can honestly state you are being obtuse. Do yourself a favor and grow up. I don't mean spiritually since you have already crossed the line on that, but mentally.

I’ll help you with this down vote. Bear witness that your actions mean nothing other than being a stain in your life. I feel sorry for you.

In fairness, he has downvoted me, and he will no longer have occasion to downvote @James Thomas Rook Jr.. For the next year, James says, we will hear nothing from him...zip...zero...nada...as he writes the successor to Asimov’s trilogy.

Of course, I am keeping a sharp eye out for that work. I may already have spotted it in a recent novel of a mysterious visit from a planet of apostates! “We come in peace,” they say slyly upon deboarding their craft. “See? We have shaved our beards. Take us to your leaders. How many are there of them now? Seven? Eight?” I don’t trust them.

There is a earthing character whom everyone likes named TrueTim. He approaches and extends a hand of welcome, only to be savagely rebuffed. “Get your hands off us, you damned dirty ape!” they bellow. 

On 1/28/2019 at 8:10 PM, Equivocation said:

whelp, I just see you as lukewarm or misguided, and a teaspoon of paranoia raising off of your skin. You can agree or disagree with Jehovah's Witnesses, but to be as  stale as chips in a bag..... Well, Pops, it fits the bill, and I just paid it and tipped it too.

Who is this newcomer so skilled in verbiage...

On 1/28/2019 at 8:10 PM, Equivocation said:

Oh does mío.....

and strange tongues?  

3 hours ago, JW Insider said:

You spelled sauna wrong. I won't marry you.

“Mornin boys,” Fred greeted the room. “They say it’s going to be cold in the MidWest for the next two days, mighty cold.” At once two thirds of those in the room voted with him that it would be so. And then....

sigh... I guess not.

6 hours ago, BillyTheKid46 said:

This means that TrueTom will have to change his writing skills as not to be seen the same as JWinsider. I wonder how many skeletons live in that closet

“I was hanging in the suana with Fred thumbing a soggy copy of Ray’s book that Dan had squirreled out of the safe, hoping Albert wouldn’t go off on some spiel on UFOs or whatever, and that he would postpone his latest jetting around the globe gig, where he always made me ride baggage class, when...” uh oh, I’m not that sufficiently gets the job done.

12 hours ago, Srecko Sostar said:

All in all, my prison time went well, working, going to school inside prison walls, not have problems with other prisoners, after 2 years get my first vacation to visit home. I am kind of introvert, and to be alone is not so harsh punishment  in my case :))) i like more to be alone in 3x2,5 cell than in crowd. Perhaps .... or certainly/ obviously.... i have some unsolved psycho and early childhood issues :))))   

There is a certain Paulesqe quality here that is not such a bad thing at all - the ability to be content with an abundance or a lack.

On 12/24/2018 at 11:39 AM, The Librarian said:

Very bad hombre.

He was after all head of the KGB in the Soviet Empire. Not cool.

How many people who have disagreed with the State have just disappeared under his watch?

Ok... so not as evil as Stalin or Lenin... but definitely is a part of the same organization.

“Western media excoriates him, but we should not let the propaganda of one king mold our view of the other. I was very careful, in writing the book, Dear Mr. Putin – Jehovah’s Witnesses Write Russia, not to do that. In the event it was ever read by anyone that mattered, I did not want to sabotage it by being disrespectful or accusing.

“It wasn’t that hard to do—for example, by spotlighting the two, likely three, times that Russia, not the United States, saved the world from certain nuclear war. Lieutenant Colonel Petrov spotted an incoming missile from the U.S, judged it a malfunction, and against orders, did not relay the report to the excitable Kremlin. Second-in-command Vasili Arkhipov refused to sign-off with his two fellow officers to launch a nuclear attack during the Cuban missile crisis—the decision had to be unanimous. Nikita Khrushchev arguably brought that crisis to a close with his last-minute telegram to President Kennedy.

”However, in refraining from criticizing Putin personally, I was not just being expedient. I honestly came to feel it not likely that he was one of the instigators. I admit that feeling wavered in view of the abuses of the last few months, with Witnesses physically accosted by police, but now it intensifies. Promisingly, he is not cut from the same cloth as many in high government. He was not born to privilege in the ruling class. He started from the ground up, as a regular office worker, and lived with his parents during the early days of his working life. He thus probably retains a feel for the interests of the ‘common man’ that his co-rulers do not. In the end, it hardly matters, because ‘the heart of a king is as streams of water’ inJehovah’s hands. But it helps if it is neither ice cubes nor steam to begin with.”

2 hours ago, FelixCA said:

I didn’t mean to imply anything negative. I have no knowledge of your personal relationships. If I made you feel uncomfortable, my apologies.

Not to worry. All is well.

1 hour ago, FelixCA said:

Is this why you told TrueTom you couldn’t find anything about Cynthia 

The reason I asked about her is that the brother who aided me into the truth later became an opposer. Along with his wife, they both left the congregation. They afterwards divorced. Years later his wife returned and she is an active Witness now in another state. So I wondered about Franz’s wife, not that I was in any way equating the two couples.

Dennis Christensen “has spent the last 20 months in a cold cell with suspected drug dealers and only been allowed to meet his wife, separated by bars and a corridor, twice a month. If convicted, he could spend up to a decade in jail,” writes Andrew Osborn for Reuters. How much do you want to bet that those drug dealers now know their Bibles quite well? Alas, that may make them more unwelcome in Russia than had they landed the area distribution franchise for Drugs-R-Us.

He must have his moments of despondency. He must. But you would never know it. He is serene in appearances, and sometimes even cheerful. Jehovah’s Witnesses could not have wished for better examples to face the Russian bear than he and his wife Irene. See how he typifies the spirit of 1 Peter 2:23: 

“Christ suffered...leaving you a model for you to follow his steps closely....When he was being reviled, he did not go reviling in return. When he was suffering, he did not go threatening, but kept on committing himself to the one who judges righteously.”

Has he wavered in his love for his adopted homeland? He “does not regret that he moved to live in Russia. ‘It is one of the best decisions that I have made in my life, and it brought me much happiness,’” he tells the Reuters reporter. This despite his being anything but starry eyed. “To call me or other peaceful Jehovah's Witnesses extremists is the greatest stupidity that I have ever heard!" he says. “Of course I hope that he (the judge) will be just," he said. "But I also know which country I’ve been living in."

Only a month ago, President Putin, when asked, stated that the equating of Jehovah’s Witnesses with terrorists was “of course...complete nonsense,” something “you need to carefully deal with,” and later, “so this should be looked into” since “Jehovah’s Witnesses are Christians, too.” We may soon learn just how carefully he means to deal with and look at it, as the time of Dennis’ sentencing has arrived. As for Irena, “I’m not afraid of anything and Dennis is not afraid either,” she told Reuters. 

I have never seen a picture of him in which he is not mild, even we’ll dressed. He actually broke into song at one hearing via Internet, before the guard told him to shut up. Could one ask for a better example? The symbolism is complete. His surname points to the one he follows. Even his carpenter profession lines up. Even his last project as a free man spotlights the idiocy of branding him an “extremist”—building a playground for the community children. Would members of the only other group in Russia officially designated “extremist,” ISIS, also build a playground for the community children? Maybe, but it would be a long time gaining my trust to let my children play on it. On January 23, the prosecutor requested a sentence of 6 years and 6 months in prison. Why not add 6 days to the request to make it a nice, biblical 666?

It's déjà vu for Jehovah’s Witnesses in that country, whose period of freedom has lasted only 17 years. “The only difference is that at that time [of the Soviet Union] they were called 'enemies of the people'. Now they are called 'extremists'," says Irena.

Journalist Osborn does what all journalists must do. He probes for the actual reason that Jehovah’s Witnesses are opposed. Usually all one must do in such cases is read the charges of the prosecution, but here in the Christensen case the charges are ridiculous, and the ‘crimes’ easily refuted. So Osborn hits on one spot of contention after another, but presently puts his finger on the real trigger: “Russia has been the most outspoken in portraying it as an extremist cult.” He refers, perhaps unknowingly, to a burgeoning anti-cult movement which finds conditions fertile in Russia for a perfect storm, but which is active everywhere. 

The reason that Putin declares it complete nonsense to call Witnesses “extremist” is because it is. As such, he and his in government would never have dreamt of doing such a thing. However much any of them may dislike Jehovah’s Witnesses, ISIS has taught them what extremism is. They are not so stupid as to confuse the two. 

Likewise, the dominant Russian Orthodox Church did not originate the ban against the Witnesses. That is not to say that some of them did not squeal with delight like kids on Christmas morning, but it was not their idea. The thinkers there are not particularly happy about it, for the same set of laws that declare it a crime to proclaim the superiority of one’s religion in the case of Jehovah’s Witnesses might easily be turned against them. 

No, problems with the Church and the suspicious government merely make for excellent tinder. The spark that sets it off Osborn identifies with: “Russia has been the most outspoken in portraying it as an extremist cult.” It is a determined anti-cult movement that sets the match to the tinder. It is not even Russian originated, but like Bolshevism itself, is a Western import. Religion writer Joshua Gill has outlined how a French NGO dedicated to protecting people from ideas considered socially destructive—the manifest goal of anti-cultism--sent a well-known emissary to Russia who spread that view with missionary zeal, maximizing his existing status with the Russian Orthodox Church.

The anti-cult movement ever seeks to extend its reach. Only in Russia does it find conditions ripe for the perfect storm, but its influence is afoot everywhere. The match was even literal in 2018 Washington State, where six attacks resulted in two Kingdom Halls burnt to the ground. Of course, that is not the intent—to incite violence. Anti-cultists speak against it, for the most part. But when you yell “CULT!” in a crowded theater, who can say what will happen? The correct term, non-incendiary and chosen by scholars for just that reason, is "new religious movement."

Assembling material in preparation for ‘Dear Mr. Putin – Jehovah’s Witnesses Write Russia,’ I became more and more convinced that the anti-cult movement was behind it all, and it is a conviction that has only strengthened since. In the book’s introduction, I wrote:

“Does Kuraev really mean to suggest that prosecution presented no intelligible arguments at the Supreme Court trial? An observer of the trial might well think it. He might well wonder just what does the government have against Jehovah’s Witnesses? There must be something, but it is not stated. At one point the judge asked the prosecution (the Ministry of Justice) whether it had prepared for the case. A decision had been plainly made somewhere from on high and it would fall upon the judge to rubber-stamp it. Of course, he did, perhaps because he wanted to remain a judge. The actual reasons behind anti-Witness hostility were never presented. So I have presented them in Part II, along with how they might be defended.”

I even went on to caution members of my own faith” 

“Some Witnesses, truth be told, will be uncomfortable with Part II and might best be advised to skip over it. They will love the idea of defending the faith but may be unaware of the scope of the attacks made against it, some of which are truly malicious. Deciding to sit out this or that controversy will earn them taunts of ‘sticking one’s head in the sand’ from detractors, but it is exactly what Jesus recommends, as will be seen. Not everyone must immerse themselves in every ‘fact,’ for many of them will turn out to be facts of Mark Twain’s variety: facts that “ain’t so.” You can’t do everything, and most persons choose to focus on matters most directly relevant to their lives.” 

That caution is repeated, with even greater applicability, in the newer ebook ‘TrueTom vs the Apostates!’ The book is not recommended to all Witnesses. Read it if you want a specific reply to charges laid against the faith. For those able to focus upon forward motion only, the book is not recommended. For those not, it is. The line that invariably gets the largest applause at Regional Conventions of Jehovah’s Witnesses is: “Would you like to send your greetings to the brothers in Bethel [headquarters]?” The hard work and integrity of these ones is appreciated by all. So not everyone will feel the need to check out every derogatory report.

In some respects, the Witness organization appears to this writer to be out of step with regard to the attacks it faces today. With a long history of persevering in the face of religious threats to stomp it out of existence, it seems slow to acknowledge that religions are mostly licking their wounds these days, and it is the irreligious world, with anti-cultists in the vanguard, that most vehemently presses for its downfall. 

See Reuters article, by Andrew Osborn

And one from BBC Russia, by Viktor Nekhezin