Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To refuse to take the Watchtower and send Jehova's Witnesses away with parish magazine?

378 replies

Elasticwoman · 05/09/2007 22:34

They said: hey, you've got to take a Watchtower, it was a deal!

But I welshed on it.

Was I unreasonable, and what do other people do when the God Squad come to their door trying to sell God to them?

OP posts:
SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 18:33

UQD, I understand that there are atheists who are that way just by default, as it were, like you've described, but I think caroline was talking about militant atheists, which there undoubtedly are, and they are, like Mr Dawkins, somewhat evangelical. I don't really have a problem with that, but they do come across as rather 'religious' about in a broad sense.

Mellowma, I really, truly believe your MIL and FIL are genuinely lovely people. All the witnesses I've had the pleasure of knowing, from school upwards, have been that way. Tremendously kind. I've not experienced any of the negative things that other people have talked about.

So when I talk about their beliefs, it's not because I think they're rotters, I just think they're wrong, just like they think I'm wrong. It's not a value-judgement, it's just a disagreement. But hey ho, you're not coming back, so I suppose I'm typing into empty cyber-space.

MrsSpoon, I know what you mean about taking kids with you and their enthusiasm. I know when we've done leafleting and other church things with ours they've been very bouncy about it, and people do find it hard to believe they are.

Aimsmum · 07/09/2007 18:46

Message withdrawn

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 18:56

Brain-grubbying?

Mistymoo · 07/09/2007 19:05

What is wrong with people when they feel they have to go on the attack because someone knocks on their door to discuss religion?

It would appear JW do at least have the courage of their convictions and wish to discuss it with others. I don't know the last time I had a Catholic, Wee free, C of E, Hindu, Muslim Taoist or shinto call on me. Mormons a couple of times and I did discuss with them, but they made little impact.

I'm sure that some JW do struggle with certain aspects of their religion, and may not be the worlds greatest orators, but at least they try. It seems to me that most people can't be bothered talking to anybody about what they actually believe. Why would this be - is it because they lack the courage of their convictions? Are they so unfounded in their beliefs that they risk being undermined? Or is it because they do not have the decency to spend 5 minutes in discussion with a stranger?

Folk are so keen to rely on science. Yet by it's nature science implies design. Laws govern science and laws require a lawmaker.

Next thing you know they will be claiming to have cracked the unified theory of everything as the answer. Scientists disagree on so many basic things, it impossible to take what they say seriously. Look at how upset folk are over MMR.

Science cannot explain everything. Not even close.

weebleswobble · 07/09/2007 19:12

I haven't read the whole thread, but I can't see a problem with JWs knocking on my door. I'm more than capable of a polite "no thank you", but please, if you're going to knock try after 10am on Sunday. I need my weekend lie-in and a polite "no thank you" won't happen if you wake me up.

Howdydoody · 07/09/2007 19:16

I wish people would make their minds up

either the JWs are soooo clever they can brainwash people into believing something they didnt before (maybe certain organisations should ask them how they do it!!)

or people think they are so thick they just go round believing "total rubbish" because it's in the Bible

They cant win can they?

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 19:17

lol, Howdydoody, love it

Howdydoody · 07/09/2007 19:19

I thenk you

lisad123 · 07/09/2007 20:07

I cant really understand the brainwashing part really, do we all look like we are on drugs, or have they locked us in a room for hours till we crack

Misty thank you for the comments, we have had mormans knock on our door and want to discuss the bible but they have not been able to rely on their bible for the answers and i think i have only had 2 calls in my life.
My DD teacher today called me inot the classroom and asked me about how i wish to handle the birthday and christmas things that are going on in the school in future (DD only started on weds). It was nice having someone ask my views without being rude.

L

TellusMater · 07/09/2007 20:08

Do you mind if I ask how you do want to handle it?

You can ignore me if you like. I'm just curious.

lisad123 · 07/09/2007 20:14

well one of the questions was about birthday assebilies, the children get up and get a sticker on their birthday. I said i didnt mind her sitting in there as she is aware they others have birthdays and they arent asked to sing, so therefore not "celebrating".
Christmas play is a no no, of course will play something nice those days with some of the other JW parents in the school.

Christmas cards, she does winter ones to send to IL's and instead of christmas trees she will do snowman or snowflake. She is aware of others beliefs, my sisters and their families celebrate birthdays.

We try and teach the children to know when they should be joining in or not and to make their own decisions. I rememeber at the age of 12-13 walking out of a film i had gone to see with friends as i knew it would displease god, it was a hard thing to do, but as my paretns had taught me to stand up for what i believe, it made it easier, plus i had some lovely friends.

TellusMater · 07/09/2007 20:17

Thanks

lisad123 · 07/09/2007 20:28

anytime

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 20:57

Well done you for walking out of a film on conscience grounds.

mellowma · 07/09/2007 21:04

Message withdrawn

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 21:06

erm, is 'well done' the new 'I think you smell', then?

UnquietDad · 07/09/2007 21:08

"Scientists disagree on so many basic things, it impossible to take what they say seriously. Look at how upset folk are over MMR.
Science cannot explain everything. Not even close."

But that's the good thing about science. (Pausing just to note that, simplified debate aside, there is not really any one thing called "science".) It recognises that discovering about the world is an ongoing process and that theories are constantly being tested and refined. And scientists agree on a lot more than they disagree on.

Sometimes, it's not that one scientist is "wrong" and another is "right" - more often than not, understanding of a subject is incomplete and each new book and article moves the debate on, further in the direction of a complete understanding.

Science has never claimed to be able to "explain everything". You may find that some scientists, if pushed, will express the fervent hope that one day, science will give us a more-or-less complete understanding of the Universe - but they all acknowledge that this is, at present, a long way off. And that's a good thing too. The fact that there's so much more to discover. Science, unlike religion, doesn't pretend to give easy answers - it is a tool for researching the universe and asking questions. Religion is totally at odds with the questing human spirit and desire to strive to find out new ways of understanding the world and the universe - however incomplete they may be.

However, not being able to explain everything does not preclude you from dismissing some things. That's what building up a body of evidence is all about.

There's a wonderful anecdote in "The God Delusion" about one of RD's colleagues who has, for his whole life, been working on some particularly recondite area of biologial research - can't remember what, as I don't have the book in front of me. One day he invites an eminent colleague from overseas who works in the same area to come and give a university lecture - and halfway through, the professor realises that this guy's theories and evidence blow his own away - his colleague has found answers to this problem and they are totally different from the ones he himself has been working on, and moreover they make more sense. At the end of the lecture, he goes up, shakes the other guy's hand and says "My dear sir, thank you for proving me wrong."

To tumultuous applause.

Now imagine that happening in a church.

Quite.

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 21:12

Religion is totally at odds with the questing human spirit and desire to strive to find out new ways of understanding the world and the universe - however incomplete they may be.

---------

Oh, I so disagree, UQD. For that to be blanketly true, you'd have to have never had scientists who were also Religious believers. Plenty of scientists have had their faith in a deity as the driving force behind their curiosity about the created world.

(and, actually, I have seen that scenario play out between Christian believers about a point of theology)

looks nervously around to see if mellowma is about to clobber me for adding to the thread

UnquietDad · 07/09/2007 21:16

I think it'd be true to say scientists who are also religious believers are in a minority, though.

How does it work? In religion you are told "here are the answers" - science is all about "where are the answers?", and indeed, "what is the question?" and, often, "why this question and not that one?"

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 21:23

See, I wouldn't put it that way at all. Certainly some religions are like that (as are some people).

I would have said it was about worldview. We all look at the same picture, we just come to it with certain preconceptions. Decent religion, and decent science both require us to be willing to change our viewpoint.

UnquietDad · 07/09/2007 21:27

I agree some religious people can change their standpoint. But there are "truths" in most religions, aren't there? A core of things one is required to believe in order to call yourself a member of that religion? Nothing wrong with that in itself - it wouldn't be a religion if not - but that's where it differs from science. In science, everything is up for grabs if new evidence comes to light.

Howdydoody · 07/09/2007 21:31

Darwin believed in God, and always called evolution a "theory" never a fact

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 21:31

Yes, I'll grant you that. There is a concept of 'truth' which science doesn't have. I just don't see them as two competitive disciplines, tbh, more like two things which intersect in places.

Anyway, I'm off to take my medication and get an early night, s'been a biatch of a week.

SueBaroo · 07/09/2007 21:33

btw, I wasn't really thinking of Darwin - Faraday was the first name that came to mind, actually.

UnquietDad · 07/09/2007 21:35

It would have been difficult, culturally, for Darwin, as an eminent man of Victorian England, not to at least profess a faith in God. Much the same way that you can't get elected to office in the US at the moment without being a believer.

Of course he called it a theory - that's the scientific term. He offered it for debate, with evidence.

And theories are good - it's the evidence which stacks up behind them which gives a theory weight, not what you call it.

Swipe left for the next trending thread