StopTheInsanity
Well-known member
Just got finished studying the lesson to be studied on 6/4/23 and these kinds of lessons really get to me.
It's all about John 13:35, Christian love, putting up with one another and forgiveness. 'Cause ya know, we all make mistakes and EVEN YOU have offended others, so you must be forgiving if you want Jehovah to forgive you---blah, blah, blah.
I've always had a problem with WT's take on these issues. It's license to just sweep wrong-doing under the rug and not deal with it. No one is ever expected to apologize and YOU always have to be the bigger person. Nothing is ever resolved and people do not change because they are never held accountable.
Setting boundaries is always labeled as "selfish" and "unloving" and "holding a grudge". You are never allowed to protect yourself from unsafe people who are "growing". Their unsafe behavior always gets painted with the "imperfect" label and it's always presented as just "something you have to live with".
Hey, I'm all for letting people grow, but there needs to be some frank discussions about what happened and what needs to change, and apologies need to be made, and people need to support the one who was wronged and back them up.
This last year's District Convention about Peace was a perfect example. There was a series of videos with Hailey and Emily where Hailey was having a bad day and in the parking lot to the KH and didn't want to talk just then and yet Emily pushed the issue and then Hailey exploded. WT took the position that HAILEY was wrong for exploding despite the fact that she asked Emily not to bring it up right then, and not Emily for not being more understanding of the pressures that Hailey was going through and disrespecting her wishes and recognizing that it was bad timing.
Then, in the back room, both of them were supposed to admit wrong doing, when it was only Emily who was imputing bad motives, jumping to conclusions, gossiping and being judgmental and self-righteous. Hailey was just trying to support herself, take care of her grandma and pioneer. That's a lot on anyone's plate.
And in the congregation, even bigger sins are more blatantly ignored and minimized all the time. It's maddening.
Fortunately I knew enough to know that this was wrong, but still, there's a lot of peer pressure to conform and not be a "trouble maker".
And the organization's view of 12-step groups and seeing therapists is atrocious as well. The mantra is "all you need is the Bible".
Now, I realize that there are some really bad therapists out there who give really bad advice, but so what? There's some really bad doctors who push blood transfusions and yet you don't see JW's not gong to doctors because of it.
Discernment is needed and I think a lot of these CSA lawsuits could have been avoided if some more emotional intelligence and empathy and skillful direction was used in handling these cases. As a group, JW's are very dysfunctional and there's a lot of judging, gaslighting and fakeness because people are not allowed to be real, make mistakes, or express genuine feelings. Everyone has to put on the "spiritual paradise mask", and yet, out of the other side of their mouths they will say that we are living in "critical times hard to deal with" and to be compassionate and be a good listener.
I have rarely seen that. Instead, when you share a problem with someone, they are like a robot spouting out a scripture or some regurgitated WT platitude about how the New System will fix all that, yada yada yada, that never works. You rarely feel better after one of those talks.
Now, notice I am not saying that the Bible's counsel doesn't work, it's just that, like a lot of other things, the counsel is misapplied and then you see a lot of people leaving the organization or their marriage mates out of sheer frustration and even rage.
I'd love to hear from you guys on Bible passages that refute the WT's syrupy misapplied "forgiveness and unity at all costs" rhetoric and replace it with a more healthy, scripturally sound approach.
It's all about John 13:35, Christian love, putting up with one another and forgiveness. 'Cause ya know, we all make mistakes and EVEN YOU have offended others, so you must be forgiving if you want Jehovah to forgive you---blah, blah, blah.
I've always had a problem with WT's take on these issues. It's license to just sweep wrong-doing under the rug and not deal with it. No one is ever expected to apologize and YOU always have to be the bigger person. Nothing is ever resolved and people do not change because they are never held accountable.
Setting boundaries is always labeled as "selfish" and "unloving" and "holding a grudge". You are never allowed to protect yourself from unsafe people who are "growing". Their unsafe behavior always gets painted with the "imperfect" label and it's always presented as just "something you have to live with".
Hey, I'm all for letting people grow, but there needs to be some frank discussions about what happened and what needs to change, and apologies need to be made, and people need to support the one who was wronged and back them up.
This last year's District Convention about Peace was a perfect example. There was a series of videos with Hailey and Emily where Hailey was having a bad day and in the parking lot to the KH and didn't want to talk just then and yet Emily pushed the issue and then Hailey exploded. WT took the position that HAILEY was wrong for exploding despite the fact that she asked Emily not to bring it up right then, and not Emily for not being more understanding of the pressures that Hailey was going through and disrespecting her wishes and recognizing that it was bad timing.
Then, in the back room, both of them were supposed to admit wrong doing, when it was only Emily who was imputing bad motives, jumping to conclusions, gossiping and being judgmental and self-righteous. Hailey was just trying to support herself, take care of her grandma and pioneer. That's a lot on anyone's plate.
And in the congregation, even bigger sins are more blatantly ignored and minimized all the time. It's maddening.
Fortunately I knew enough to know that this was wrong, but still, there's a lot of peer pressure to conform and not be a "trouble maker".
And the organization's view of 12-step groups and seeing therapists is atrocious as well. The mantra is "all you need is the Bible".
Now, I realize that there are some really bad therapists out there who give really bad advice, but so what? There's some really bad doctors who push blood transfusions and yet you don't see JW's not gong to doctors because of it.
Discernment is needed and I think a lot of these CSA lawsuits could have been avoided if some more emotional intelligence and empathy and skillful direction was used in handling these cases. As a group, JW's are very dysfunctional and there's a lot of judging, gaslighting and fakeness because people are not allowed to be real, make mistakes, or express genuine feelings. Everyone has to put on the "spiritual paradise mask", and yet, out of the other side of their mouths they will say that we are living in "critical times hard to deal with" and to be compassionate and be a good listener.
I have rarely seen that. Instead, when you share a problem with someone, they are like a robot spouting out a scripture or some regurgitated WT platitude about how the New System will fix all that, yada yada yada, that never works. You rarely feel better after one of those talks.
Now, notice I am not saying that the Bible's counsel doesn't work, it's just that, like a lot of other things, the counsel is misapplied and then you see a lot of people leaving the organization or their marriage mates out of sheer frustration and even rage.
I'd love to hear from you guys on Bible passages that refute the WT's syrupy misapplied "forgiveness and unity at all costs" rhetoric and replace it with a more healthy, scripturally sound approach.
This appears to imply that if you leave the org you also will stop serving Jehovah? Just something I quickly noticed from the wording used in the foreign language version.
