TrueTomHarley

I am through chapter one of this book, enjoying it much. There is an African way to tell a story, a lilting way that emphasizes the land and the people of the land. I am reminded of ‘Cry the Beloved Country,’ another African book (a novel) that runs parallel in some respects, with both tragedy and redemption. Do you know what is odd? Click on the link for RNS. Drop down to the list of faiths at the bottom. Every faith under the sun is listed. Not Jehovah’s Witnesses. Not under Protestant, Not under Evangelical. Not under ‘Unaffiliated. Not under Alternative. Not under Other. Reflect upon the irony of that. The religion, as evidenced by the reviewed book ‘No Greater Love’, that most plainly evokes John 15:13......“No one has love greater than this, that someone should surrender his life in behalf of his friends”....is not even listed as a faith (unless it is so well-hidden that I could not find it, but considering the validation of John 15, you would think it would be emblazoned) There is a lesson in this. I haven’t quite figured it out to put it into words, but there is a lesson. It may even be a good thing that it is as it is. Perhaps it is as though they say: “Here is a list of the religions of the world” and it is just as well that we are not on it.

Another sage statement from JTR—he is firing hot lately, I can hardly believe it—is the above. Yes. We want our people to be Rhodes Scholars who never misjudge, who easily hold their own among the brightest the university has to offer, and whose every utterance sweeps you away for its sheer brilliance. What we get is a bunch of yahoos who make all the blunders that yahoos have always made. We should not run from this. We should embrace it. It is because Christians are derived from—the very ones taking the lead were—‘uneducated and ordinary.’ (Acts 4:13) They always remained so, by the standards of greater society. We should embrace it because that is what God favors—“the uneducated and ordinary.” In the brilliant book ‘Tom Irregardless and Me’ (which, brilliant though it is, cannot touch ‘No Greater Love—How My Family Survived Genocide in Ryanda’) I wrote of how the great ideas of this world’s thinkers “all sounded good – heaven knows one can spin college degrees from them. But when put to the test – when placed under stress – they don’t work. One might suppose that the architect of ideas that don’t work would be discredited. Bizarrely, the ‘doesn’t work’ caveat doesn’t matter. It is just the fine print at document’s end which nobody reads....Surely it is the fault of the little people below and not the great idea!’....It is that way with the bedrock ideas upon which this world is constructed. Despite being lauded to high heaven, they don’t work. Those who have earned university degrees in them do not sacrifice any prestige on that account. Instead, they go on to master other ideas that don’t work. God laughs at the wisdom of this world, and in the passage above we see why. He says: “There is a generation that is pure in its own eyes, but has not been cleansed from its filth.” (Proverbs 30:12) Tell them: “Show us the just world that has resulted from your brilliance, and then maybe we can talk.” So we ought not run from our ordinariness. We should embrace it. When Celsus ridicules 2nd century Christians for being “labourers, shoemakers, farmers, the most uninformed and clownish of men,” don’t run away from that quote. Don’t try to mitigate it (as do most Christian apologists). Instead, say: “You don’t know the half of it!” A frequent trait of all my writing—which is not appreciated by all Witnesses—is to give away many a fault, particularly faults that make some look ridiculous, as when Tom Irregardless rattles on for ten minutes in that instruction talk about a woman’s ‘ministerial cycle’ because he has forgotten the word ‘menstrual.’ He recalls only cruder terms that he knows would not be suitable for the platform. (This really happened.) There is a joke about the sister who collected $6000 dollars by selling eggs every time her husband gave a bad talk—and brothers collapse upon themselves telling that joke—yet no one will tell it within 300 yards of Tom Irregardless because with him it is no joke—it is reality. You risk hurting his feelings, “Why would anybody ever take that risk? In all your days you will never find a more caring, generous person than Tom Irregardless. If you need help he is there. You can pop in at the Irregardless home anytime; they are delighted to see you. They don’t wonder why you didn’t call first. Tom is an excellent man through and through, but only in Jehovah’s organization would he be a public instructor.” [Actually, this is not nearly so true as it once was, since in recent years there has been more emphasis on speaker quality and less opportunity for them to mess up] The point is not to humiliate people. The point is to glorify God. When great things are accomplished and the workers themselves are great, you can say that was the reason. But when great things are accomplished and the workers are yo-yos, the glory goes to God. So not only do I not hide embarrassing things—I highlight and even exaggerate them—always with 2 Corinthians 12:9 in mind: “But he [God] said to me [Paul]: “My undeserved kindness is sufficient for you, for my power is being made perfect in weakness.” Most gladly, then, I will boast about my weaknesses...” I can now come to the main point of this comment, knowing that 4J will have stopped reading long ago and is now working up a retort about my being “long-winded yet saying nothing.” The brothers should have followed this strategy of admitting faults with regard to CSA as well. Rather than hope for the perception that CSA could never ever occur among a people devoted to God, they should have said: “Oh, yeah—tell us about it—we’ve had some of those slime balls, too, and let me tell you they are tough to deal with!” It would have all been good. We would not be having opposers who now carry on as though with the mission statement: “CSA among JWs is very very serious and must be exposed! CSA among the 99.9% that is everywhere else? Stuff happens—what do we care?” It would have been better if no one had ever thought it necessary to write that May 2019 article pointing out that the reproach of CSA falls on the abuser and not on the congregation. It’s a great article, and timely, but it would have been better if nobody had ever thought it necessesary. When I used to be a bad boy and interacted with the malcontents, I would point out that the CSA is not prolific among JWs. They (the more reasonable ones) would respond with: “Oh, so now you are saying that you have the same problems as everyone else!” They accepted my premise, that we do abhor it and it is not prolific—it was the perception of self-righteousness that got them incensed. It would have been better to have given no cause for that perception, and it would be nice if it is a lesson internalized for future guidance. It is very very difficult to be the required “no part of the world” and not be perceived as self-righteous, because the world automatically takes offense at non-participation. “If you were part of the world, the world would be fond of what is its own,” says Jesus. “Now because you are no part of the world, the world hates you.” Still, I think we do unnecessarily bring trouble upon ourselves sometimes, and the above is a prime example.

At least you will never hear the cry from heaven—‘nobody here but us chickens.’

And don’t get me going on how I read his interactions with JWI: “Dear JWI: I want to point out that you are wrong, but the trouble is—I don’t really know anything. Please supply some facts so I can tell you how wrong you are about them.” And JWI, with unlimited patience that is always hurled back in his face, obliges! Or maybe he is just like me—he wants to say what he wants to say, and he is not fussy as to what provides the pretext to say it.

‘T.A. Form Application’—the T. A. Is for ‘true anointed.’ It’s the best I can do under the circumstances. 4Jah floats the idea that maybe they are all to emerge from the present JW community. You might even apply yourself if you and I both didn’t know that you would insist upon taking your chickens with you. The very idea is so preposterous—a true anointed to appear out of who-knows-where at the final moments of this system of things, with just enough time for the true sheep of the earth to recognize, grab hold of them, and thereby save themselves at the final day. It’s just too ridiculous. And you emerge from it with some of the sagest remarks I have ever heard you make. This one, for example: “Those who expect perfection of others in all things, I strongly suspect will be judged by God, using those same standards... and their punishment now is having to live in a cartoon world of their ownconstruct, and being oblivious to reality.” A “cartoon world,” “oblivious to reality,” and all due to expecting perfection in others—it could not be better said. These extreme critics remind me of ones stuck in Phase 1 of ‘The Six Phases of a Project’ Phase 1: Enthusiasm Phase 2: Disillusionment Phase 3: Panic Phase 4: Search for the Guilty Phase 5: Punishment of the Innocent Phase 6:; Praise and Honors for the non-participants And why are they yet in Phase 1? Because they haven’t done anything. Their role is 100% limited to pointing to the faults of others. The moment their plans result in any action, Phase 2 will immediately kick in—at least if history is any guide. (and there certainly is no reason to think it should not be) What they should do is meditate on the book JWI cites: ‘No Love Greater Than This—How My Family Survived the Genocide of Rwanda.’ They should reflect on the study quoted within: “All the churches active in Rwanda, with the exception of the Jehovah’s Witnesses” were involved in the genocide. Let them state how their imaginary ‘true anointed’ is going to improve upon that! And do not let any of these whiners pull a “who needs organization?” question on you. It is as you say, they haven’t a clue as to how “hominoids behave in groups.” Without strong support from a god-fearing organization, there is no way that the individual will stand before the steamroller with the devil at the wheel. I have reflected upon your words ever since you first wrote them. You could not have said it better. They have judged without mercy. They will have their judgment without mercy. It may be true with other people as well, but it is certainly true with them. And in the meantime they become absurd caricatures of people.

I have downloaded this on Kindle. First impression very favorable. Much better than any of my ebooks, thoroughly professional grade and disciplined—none of the chattiness and meanderings that is me—much more on the order of good straight journalism—telling a story well that it’s about time somebody told.

Is there really a TA-57 form application making the congregational rounds? I’m not sure what the T.A. stands for, but maybe it will be a game-changer.

I kind of like this. The ol pork chop comes through with the comment of the day, or the week, or possibly even the year.

This is a win-win. Matt gets a nice new home with plenty of space to store his statue, Etsy gets a fine new headquarters, and JWs get to move on to where there is more space. "[Jehovah’s Witnesses] bought their buildings for their own use, not looking to cash out, at a time when the market was dead and you couldn't give real estate away in this area," said Andy Gerringer, managing director of Prudential Douglas Elliman Developments. "I don't know if it was savvy investing, luck or divine intervention."

I will know it is so when the year text is from the Book of BuffaloSpringfield: “Step out of line, the man comes to take you away.”

Yes, of course I am using the word “prove” loosely. This is apparent by looking at the other two factors offered as “proof”—that concerning the Drudge item and that concerning the application of torture in Russia. Of course it is evidence, not proof. Nitpicking. “Persons given authority” I might have said. Average, ‘sit on your rear end’ parishioners—in other words, the vast majority—how many of them have been reported? That is what must be known if we are to suppose that the comparison with JWs is apples to apples. It seems unlikely to me because if the brothers are as underhanded as you suggest, why not clean all of them up? Of the first 5 elders and MS on the list, one was convicted—of which there will be a public record. Why not “clean the others up?” In fact, nothing will be proven for anything until we shake down those carrying authority of every organization on earth, squeezing all their documents out of them, and assuming that if they have none, it is because they are covering up! Enough! What IS proven is that the Boy Scout of America took me camping, taught me how to tie knots, did their best to help me grow up, and in recent days declared bankruptcy because, while they may have striven to get a handle on those who would abuse children, they were not perfect In this regard, some slipped through.. At the time I first wrote of a huge settlement against them, at the time the largest cash verdict for CSA involving a single individual, the Boy Scouts were reported as having a strong anti-CSA policy—which was used against them! https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2011/01/pedophiles-and-smear-campaigns.html Look, just make it illegal for children and adults to be in proximity of each other! Outlaw it! Just think of how many children will be protected that way!

What it proves is that the CSA story of JW abusers is a relative nothingburger when compared to the CSA story of almost anyone else, where the abusers reported are 100% clergy, and where the abuse rate of ‘parishioners’ is unknown because those groups didn’t care enough about protecting children to look into it. It also proves that when Drudge runs a story of ‘Ten plagues that are hitting our planet simultaneously’ (today’s report), http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/10-plagues-that-are-hitting-our-planet-simultaneously that 4Jah’s ‘true anointed‘ that has yet to manifest itself and save the day had better hurry up, because it’s getting a bit tight here. It also proves that when you run reports of people tortured in Russia and 4Jah responds with a laughing emoji, Srecko a remark on how they ARE violating the law, so what do they expect, that it becomes clear how God can draw as with hooks in the jaws enemies inclined to war against those doing his will. Read the verses of Revelation 19 and wonder at the question—‘who would be so foolhardy to war against God and on what pretext’ We begin see the answer and methods unfolding.

In virtually every case except Jehovah’s Witnesses the ones committing the abuse were the ones holding authority or office within the institution With Jehovah’s Witnesses, that is rarely the case. Their organization is being asked to assume responsibility for any of their members who have ever committed the crime. It is not exactly apples to apples. https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2020/02/i-almost-wish-there-would-be-more-public-response.html

and you are so trigger-happy with the barbs, put-downs, and insults, not to mention the cartoons, that I hesitate to get close enough to find out.

I really honestly truly have no idea what you are talking about, as explained by my previous comment & only amplified since.. My bad, if you want to make it that way, but I don’t follow this at all. Are you upset that you didn’t fight in the big war—is that it?

A friend of mine used to say that he would never trust a willing military participant in the new system, for “he has proven in this system that he will pick up a gun and blow off my head if some man tells him to.”

Well, it doesn’t entirely fit, but the speaker yesterday drew the following contrast between knowledge and understanding: Knowledge: a tomato is a fruit Understanding: Don’t put it in a fruit salad.

Does he want to eliminate the requirement that Christians refrain from wars? Is that what he is driving at? I should take the time to figure out myself whether he is advocating that, I know, but he is not being particularly transparent, he is distracted by answering a number of dubious characters, I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop with him in the form of a staggeringly disrespectful cartoon or quote, and I am up to my ears in my own projects. Other than that, I have no excuse for not having deciphered this more accurately.

Cats go crazy with the red pointer ones. I’ve seen cats climb halfway up a room wall trying to catch that dot.

You idiot, the three examples you’ve given are all clergy—those in leadership capacity. Exactly my point. With JWs it is almost never those who would correspond to clergy—it is the ordinary member. The printing presses will run dry if they ever attempt to report on members of the other denominations—but they never will because hardly anyone other than JWs tried to do anything about the CSA problem. And there is Srecko giving you a ‘thanks’ for the ridiculous comparison you made. Silly as you may be, he does not here give evidence that he is any smarter.

A report on the torture of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia and 4Jah attaches an laughing emoji to it. What a nasty piece of work he is.

See how the report is about Jehovah’s Witnesses being tortured in Russia and @4Jah2me attaches a laughing emoji. What a nasty piece of work he is.

The online hate campaign against JWs is indirectly—in some cases even directly—responsible for their persecution, even with torture, as in the above story. I have submitted a separate post on it:

Isabella reports—this is the second occasion of it—Jehovah’s Witnesses being arrested and detained in Russia—and subjected to torture. With an active and prolific hate campaign being waged against Jehovah’s Witnesses online, it is reasonable to think that it indirectly instigates persecution of them in Russia—even escalating to arrests in which torture is applied, as in this case. It is reasonable to think that it indirectly instigates the torching of two Kingdom Halls in the United States during 2019, both of which burned to the ground. Many groups are harassed in Russia, but it is Jehovah’s Witnesses who are head-and-shoulders the primary target. Why? It boils down to Jesus’ words: “If you were part of the world, the world would be fond of what is its own. Now because you are no part of the world...for this reason the world hates you.” (John 15:19) It is no more complicated than that. Hatred against Witnesses may be cloaked as reports from a “whistleblower” or complaints of those who would advocate freedom from “mind control,” but at root the motivation is simply disturbance that ones should choose to be “no part of the world.” No villain on TV ever says, “I am the villain.” Instead, he paints himself the wronged one with a righteous score to settle—and the program director strives so that we all see it that way. We must not be obtuse. From TrueTom vs the Apostates!—“The book Secular Faith - How Culture Has Trumped Religion in American Politics attempts to reassure its secular audience through examining the changing moral stands of churches on five key issues. The book points out that today’s church members have more in common with atheists than they do with members of their own denominations from decades past. Essentially, the reassurance to those who would mold societal views is: ‘Don’t worry about it. They will come around. They always do. It may take a bit longer, but it is inevitable.’ Jehovah’s Witnesses have thwarted this model by not coming around.” What is Secular Faith is saying is that churches have ceased being “no part of the world”—and having done such, are not hated, since “the world is fond of what is its own.” Jehovah’s Witnesses, and almost they alone, are yet remaining “no part of the world”—and that is why they are hated. That is why they have “apostates” who are off the charts in expressing vitriol. “Apostates” (within the Christian context) can be expected to proliferate in direct proportion to how the main body stays separate from the world. As such, Jehovah’s Witnesses should almost be proud of theirs, for in them they are validated. A religion that has made its peace on the “five key issues” of Secular Faith—what’s to apostatize from? Anti-Witnesses scream “Cult!” like patrons scream ‘Fire!’ in a crowded theater. Are Jehovah’s Witnesses a cult? To the extent they are, it is because the Bible is a cult manual. The behavioral, informational, thought, and emotional “control” that anti-Witness activists complain about are no more than people living by the Bible, living peaceably in this world while they look to the righteous new one to come, the one the Bible describes as “the real life.” (1 Timothy 6:19) I am not even sure that Witnesses should run from the word. It may be well to point to its origin. It is the same origin as ‘cultivate’—which denotes ‘caring for something’—and in a religious sense it refers to ‘caring for the matters of the gods.’ Okay. I’ll take it. Jehovah’s Witnesses ‘care for the matters’ of God. They trigger opposition from ones who don’t want them to do that. They trigger opposition from those who have crossed over to embrace various aspects of the world—the world that Jesus says not to be part of. This is clear in the testimony of one witness testifying for the prosecution in the Russian trial that would ban the JW organization. She complained of “complete and total control of life by the Administrative Center.” Asked to give an example of this, she reported her expulsion from the congregations after she “began her close, but not officially registered, relations with a man.” She wants to violate, within the congregation, the Bible sanction of ‘sex only within marriage.’ The Witness organization does not allow it—and she spins it as “complete and total control of life,” hoping to get the Russian Justices riled up. Look, it is fine to adopt the standards of the world so long as one goes there to do it—don’t bring it into the congregation. She signed on for such Bible-based standards, now she wants to change them—and when thwarted in that attempt, she seeks to get the organization that got in her way banned at the Russian Supreme Court! It is no more than revenge. It is no more than insisting the standards of the greater world be accommodated in the Christian congregation. Disfellowshipping itself is a last-ditch attempt at discipline, when all else has failed, to ensure that a member not bring standards of the world, no matter how commonly accepted, into the congregation. Is it harsh? It certainly can be spun that way, but as ought to be clear by considering Secular Faith, no denomination can obey Jesus’ direction to remain “no part of the world” without it. Among the reasons Christians were viciously persecuted in the first century was that their rituals were said to include cannibalism—historians report such. Obviously they did not, but from where might the charge originate? Might one look to the following passage in the sixth chapter of John, which begins by quoting Jesus? “I am the bread of life. Your forefathers ate the manna in the wilderness and yet they died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that anyone may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever; and for a fact, the bread that I will give is my flesh in behalf of the life of the world. Then the Jews began to argue with one another, saying: “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” So Jesus said to them: “Most truly I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in yourselves. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has everlasting life, and I will resurrect him on the last day.” When they heard this, many of his disciples said: “This speech is shocking; who can listen to it?”...Because of this, many of his disciples went off to the things behind and would no longer walk with him. So Jesus said to the Twelve: “You do not want to go also, do you?” Simon Peter answered him: “Lord, whom shall we go away to? You have sayings of everlasting life. We have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God.” (6:48-69) What of the ones who did not “come to know” that Jesus was the Holy One of God? What of the ones who “went to the things behind and would no longer walk with him”? Did they thereafter leave their former co-disciples to worship in peace? Or did some of them draw from these words proof that Jesus would recommend cannibalism to his followers? Historians advance the notion seriously. And if some advanced the notion, might there not have arisen ones in the congregation who pinned the blame on Jesus himself, for uttering the words that got the persecution rolling; ‘what a blunder!’—I can imagine some saying (though not in his presence). It makes me think of the uproar over CSA within Jehovah’s Witnesses today. They are comparatively successful at preventing it—nobody, but nobody, has gathered every single member on earth (at the 2017 Regional Conventions) to consider detailed scenarios in which child sexual abuse might take place so that parents, obviously the first line of defense, can remain vigilant. But the world has little success at preventing CSA, so it focuses on punishing it after the fact. Constantly we read of individuals arrested over CSA allegations. The one detail that never accompanies such reports is that of the individual’s religious affiliation or lack thereof. Yet with Jehovah’s Witnesses, that detail is never lacking. Why? Plainly, it is that the Witness organization attempted to do something about child sexual abuse—they did not just close their eyes as is typical of groups today, be they religious or not—and now liars are trying to spin it as though they love the stuff. Jehovah’s Witnesses are well-known as a religion that “polices its own.” It is an attribute that used to be viewed favorably, but now in the eyes of critics, it is spun as intolerable “control.” Those taking the lead in the Witness organization thereby came to know of individuals accused of CSA, and their “crime,” if it be one, is in leaving it up to affected ones themselves to report rather than “going beyond the law” to do it themselves. Time will tell how vile that sin is found to be, but it plainly falls far short of actually committing the CSA themselves, which is the pattern elsewhere. As with Jesus and his remarks that can, in the scheming of dishonest ones, be spun into encouragement of cannibalism, so the JW policy on CSA is spun by similarly dishonest ones to indicate that the organization is determines to nurture and protect it, whereas nothing could be further from the truth. Three times before the Australian Royal Commission, Geoffrey Jackson of the Witnesses’s Governing Body pleaded for universal, mandatory reporting laws, with no exceptions—if that could only be done, it would make the job of the Witness organization in policing its own without raising the ire of those outside the congregation “so much easier.” Continuing his cross-examination, Justice Angus Stewart said: “Leaving aside the question of overriding mandatory law from the civil authorities...” I almost wish that Brother Jackson would have interjected at this point, “I wish you would not leave it aside, for it would solve the problem.” The greater world cannot make a dent in preventing childhood sexual abuse, and so it puts the onus on those who are trying to do something about it. Alas, our best lines invariably occur to us too late—had Brother Jackson picked up my line, it probably just would have got their backs up—and then (gulp) he would have looked at me with displeasure.

I liked him as governor—especially when he chided some colleagues to “not be girlie men”—in other words, step up to the plate on some issue or other. Turns out, though, that there were a lot of girlie men in California and they took issue with him. But my favorite celebrity turned governor was Jessie Venture of Minnesota. The bumper stickers read: “My Governor Can Beat Up Your Governor.” They asked Jessie about them. “Yeah, I’ve seen them, and they’re true, too. I’ve been to those governor conferences. I’ve looked those guys over. There’s not one of them I couldn’t take!”