TrueTomHarley

Nevertheless, let us give PeterR the benefit of the doubt. I think he is devious as they come, but this is the internet - I could be wrong. There's no way the situation would have unfolded as he presents it. But it may not be as blatant as my hypothetical example with JTR. Peter pointedly says he will not spill clarifying details so to protect persons. Probably the persons who would most look bad with clarifying details are himself. But there may be others, and one must commend him if he shows restraint for that reason. We can't know for sure. On the internet one cannot settle these matters, just as we cannot settle matters when the media repeatedly plays a clip of this or that wrong, everybody makes up their mind about it, and then raises hell when the jury later gets it 'wrong,' notwithstanding that the jury alone has heard all the facts from all the parties. Still, let us grant Peter his premise that he was wronged. No one would say it is impossible. Human secular justice fails all the time, with penalties much more severe than family and friends shunning you for a time period mostly under your own control. These days there are many who have been imprisoned for years, even decades, now declared innocent based upon DNA evidence. Since human justice is imperfect, should we suspend all attempts to apply it? Why doesn't he just 'do his time' if he must? There is a mechanism under which he will unfailingly be reinstated in time, should that be his desire. (assuming he is DFed, which he has not said) Nothing is going to hinge on his swallowing or not swallowing the overlapping generations. Unless he is unhinged with paranoia, or contaminated with GIGO reading, he knows this. Of course, if he is truly the victim of injustice, as we are here granting his claim, he can always says: 'screw it! I was right! These guys are jerks.' I would say it, at least for a time. It would be hard not to. The reason such a person eventually comes around and suffers injustice if they must, is because that is the course the Bible disposes one towards. It is either that or devolve into a collection of loose cannons, still believing the dominant church teachings of Trinity and hellfire, most likely, for it is the GB that is most responsible for our breaking free from those false doctrines. And, as far as doing Christ's assigned work of preaching the good news of the kingdom? Forget it. Each one will be too concerned about their own individual beefs to collectively get the job done, insisting their own complaints be resolved before anyone can move forward. In the end, it is: 'Do I want to be part of the apparatus advertising the new system of things, declaring this good news of the kingdom to all the inhabited earth, or am I content with being a sanitized subset of this system of things?'

Given that you agree, simply pull up one of many Bible verses about reviling or abusive speech - the kind that Bible writers say congregation members should be disciplined for - and you have answered your own question. Your beef was never with the GB at all. It was with Christianity as described in the Bible.

Usually, it works something along the lines of this: JTR posts this graphic on his congregation's information board. It is taken down. He posts a similar one, for he has hundreds. In time, he is disfellowshipped for violating one of the many verses discussed here and on other threads against public rabble-rousing in the congregation. Then he TELLS everyone he was just minding his own business one fine day, when he casually let slip he didn't buy the overlapping generations' explanation, and he was summararily DFed for that reason alone.

This is absolutely incorrect. He was ignoring prevailing opinion at the time. His quote specifically states it was not the organization's view at the time. (hence, not in Watchtower print) I didn't drill down any further, seeing no need to challenge every word from trustworthy persons. But frankly, I thought is was their view at the time, with regard to Bethel service. If you want special privileges anywhere, you may have to conform to some rules. These are not binding for Christians in general, but only for those who wish to officially represent JWs, as elders and MS's do. With Bethel service, I believe it is more a matter of conforming to family headship, Bethel often being called 'the Bethel family.' Among actual families, one family head decrees this or that rule for family members, another does not, or has different ones. Nobody has to serve in Bethel. Nobody has to pioneer. Nobody has to serve as an elder or MS. But if you do, there may be additional requirements beyond that which apply to Christians generally. It is that way with representing anyone anywhere.

Sigh....tell me about it. It led to my Scarlet A.

Without watching the video, I would not hand a tract to a child, or would do so only with asking the child whether he thought that okay. Even then it can backfire, but if you've laid the groundwork is easy to mitigate trouble. at one door in the evening, I met a teenager. After brief innocuous discussion, I told him my quandary: some parents don't like unknown visitors showing anything to their kids, and did he think I should or not? He said 'yes.' I should him the video on social media, a video that cannot even remotely thought to be proseletizing. I returned a week or so later, caught his brother, and did much the same. Finally I returned and met the mother. She was miffed that I had shown things to her kids. I told her I had never wanted to speak with them in the first place - it was she I was looking for. Besides, I had specifically asked them if it was alright to speak, and they had said it was. "you know kids - they will say anything," she responded. I assured her I would not call again, she relaxed at that, and I was able even to explain why we come in the first place, referring to Matt 24:14. 'Obviously, the ones who will do this are those who believe in it - who else would be expected to?' To another teenager, years earlier, I had said I would return later when her folks were home, and left. I was with a Spanish sister, not long in this country, who said she would have witnessed to her. It is that way in Latin America. Children take on responsibility at a very young age, and few have any problem with their kids being addressed with the Bible or anything else. They mature far more quickly than do American kids, who are sometimes still silly as can be at age 30.

Uh oh. There is an ad hominem attack that I will let slide.

I shouldn't do it. Apologies to @Annaand others engaged in serious discussion. I will not do it again (ideally). I certainly will not if this character does not misrepresent me, and I am too petty not to respond.... I did not fold. I did explain it. What I could not do - could anyone? - is rise up to the additional condition that he added: "explain the "overlapping generations " in such a simple manner that EVEN AH could understand it" There! No more. Even if he (predictably) chimes in with something equally outrageous and insulting. My apologies to everyone else present.

He needn't worry. I nudged him over the edge. If someone would pay for advertising tattoos, I would get several. It is an area in which I would be able to beat out the kids, since older people tend to aggregate more space over time.

I just saw a fox wolfing down a Big Mac yesterday. Or was that a wolf foxing down one?

Answer dutifully noted and appreciated. Now it is time to expand upon it with addendums, footnotes, and JTRisms. Time for anyone who has a lick of common sense to leave the room. In a mellow mood, I once strolled into a tattoo parlor and asked the artist whether, when a tattooist is doing intimate areas of the body, they 'get off' on it. Or is it just art? "It's art!" he responded angrily.

You could easily be right. I sometimes think it is possible that 'eating straw' will go the way of the heart, once thought literal, later conceded as figurative. I will hunt you up in the new system to shake your hand if it turns out you are right. (and I will ride my giraffe to find you) For that is the ultimate answer to many a question: 'Be there, and you will find out.'

With outdoor temps in the 90s, I was at the swimming hole yesterday. A lot of young people were there. Tattooed have never offended me, but the kids do look like walking billboards these days. I once knew a young woman of artistic bent who was heavily tattooed, including her neck and face. She came to regret it because people formed an instant impression of her different from what she wanted to project. I refuse to even wear a tee shirt with printing on it, though I may one day have one printed up with an image I like a lot.

I wouldn't be shocked if all this animal stuff is blown out of the water someday, (probably in the new system, when reality confronts us all) with all that remains being animals retain their instinctive shyness to man. You'll be able to pal around with them, but only if you work at it. All the hay that JTR is setting aside for them he will have to eat himself.

I'm clearing my throat as we speak.

A note for @James Thomas Rook Jr., [Trutom, are you nuts? Why are you flagging him? He just carries on like Kathy Griffin at a Trump birthday party!] Note that all evils discussed here are before the 'clear and present danger' GB. As is, of course, the Joseph example from ancient times, and the Peter example and one other from next week's material. And don't get me going about Rutherford or Miracle Wheat Charlie. Or the twelve disciples always doing dumb things - even the one who got to be big cheese having run out on the Lord during his hour of need. The treasure is in earthen vessels. (2 Corinthians 4:7) Always has been. Always will be, until those vessels are made perfect, scheduled for a time well ahead of ours.

It's all interesting. But now I have to go watch Perry Mason on ME TV

I, too, have been victim of an injustice that beats them all - a certain old hag that won't let me sell my books in her library.

Though some carry on about it more than you think they should, nobody can ever say that in a lifetime of service to God, you won’t experience some injustice. It is not business-as-usual routine, but when it does happen, it can be serious. All the more so because you expect trouble from the general world, but not from the brotherhood. When it comes, it throws you for a loop. It is like the verse quoted in the Watchtower study this week, Psalm 55: 12-14: “For it is not an enemy who taunts me; Otherwise I could put up with it. It is not a foe who has risen up against me; otherwise I could conceal myself from him. But it is you, a man like me, my own companion, whom I know well. We used to enjoy a warm friendship together; into the house of God we used to walk along with the multitude.” The study article was illustrated with one real-life injustice, and one from the scriptures. A Brother Diehl from 1949 is mentioned. He caught all kinds of heat when he decided to marry. Brothers were all serious back then about single persons in the circuit or Bethel work remaining single, a situation that was not resolved, legend has it, until Brother Knorr himself married. Now THAT’S human! Let nobody say that these guys aren’t. Diehl could certainly be understood if he bellyached about it, but it wouldn’t do him any good. All he could do was get others stirred up. So he waited it out. He was right, but he didn’t make a big deal over it. Eventually, everyone came around. He took it on the chin for a while. The example from scripture is more serious. Joseph was sold out by his brothers and ended up in slavery. A silver lining eventually materialized and he became a big cheese in Potipher’s house, then he was slammed again and sent to prison for 13 years. Believe me, I would whine plenty about it, but if Joseph did, there is no record of it. What the record shows is that overall he allowed it to mold him: But now do not be upset and do not reproach one another because you sold me here; because God has sent me ahead of you for the preservation of life … So, then, it was not you who sent me here, but it was the true God, in order to appoint me as chief adviser to Pharoah and lord for all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt. (Genesis 45:5-8) He didn’t know he would be appointed chief adviser to Pharoah until he was, and had he moaned forever about his kidnapping and later imprisonment, he wouldn’t have been. Everyone could have understood him bitching, but it wouldn’t have done him any good. People screw things up. Usually, their motive is not bad, but sometimes it is, as in Joseph’s case. Often, you don’t have the power to fix things. You do have the power, however, to make them worse. (‘The Judge of the Earth Always Does What is Right;’ the Watchtower, April 2017 – study edition)

The next day, ISIS, too, went out to clean up a park. City leaders showed up to give them an award. As they got close, a bomb went off and killed them all, and ISIS staff ran snickering to the bushes. This happened because ISIS is an extremist organization.

The taking of innocent life is despicable. I have heard the rationale, however, that since citizens of the Western world vote, they thereby empower the leaders whose military policies may have claimed their innocent children (or other relatives). Thus, terrorist attacks are a twisted form of 'payback.' But had I a dead father in my hands, or a dead mother, brother or sister, a victim of foreign actions, perhaps I would not think it so twisted. It's a vicious world, that turns us all into mad dogs. Curious what @James Thomas Rook Jr. might think about this. He has weighed in strongly on family ties.

Could it be that someone thinks the place has become a terrorism magnet?

Micah logs onto a site that bills itself ostensibly as a meeting spot for JWs. He hurls incendiary charges about everything under the sun. When he finds some find him unwelcome, he carries on above love! - the love he has positively oozed from his pores. He even charged that the WTS tries to dictate what ones do in the bedroom. What in the world is he talking about? He provides no backing for his charge. Yes, it is only his time that matters. It is only his time that is too valuable to squander. Let us see if, having declared his mission over, he can resist appearing for an encore.

Somehow my comment got put before this remark, and not after, where it equally fits.

Caution, my brothers. There is a FALSE APOSTATE in our midst. I know Vic Vomidog. We once pioneered together, before he went bad. He's as bad as they come now. If I am checking out a book from @The Librarian, he shoves me aside, me and all the other patrons! If some, like me, have, for whatever reason, chosen to hang out where there are apostates, it should at least be TRUE apostates. Vic Vomidog is a FALSE apostate!