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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:
Pruners · 07/09/2007 23:07

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Pruners · 07/09/2007 23:10

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Howdydoody · 07/09/2007 23:14

At the risk of sounding like we are in the playground Pruners, says who?

Sorry, it's just that my mind is to logical to just believe. I need proof and when scientist say "millions of years ago such and such happened" when no one can tell, it just staggers me that people accept it. Looking back now i really pity my poor science teacher, I must have been so bolshy!! Questioned everything

Howdydoody · 07/09/2007 23:17

Your dh is a what? !!!!

Oh boy, I had better bow out now then if you're gona get the big guns in

lisad123 · 07/09/2007 23:18

I felt for my RE teacher. Yes JW do take RE too .
He was a priest but agreed jesus wasnt born at christmas and would often agree witht the JWs. Poor man must have been hard teaching things that he didnt believe

Pruners · 07/09/2007 23:28

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Pruners · 07/09/2007 23:28

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Pruners · 07/09/2007 23:33

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potoroo · 07/09/2007 23:36

I didn't think many Christians actually believe that Jesus was born on Christmas (or that he was born in the year 0 either).

FWIW the Catholic Church accepts the theory of evolution (one of the pope's wrote an encyclical on it but can't remember who).

TBH as a scientist/engineer I've never had a conflict between religion and science.

beanbearer · 08/09/2007 00:52

"If you look at the way the earth,stars, space is designed its perfect in everyway. How could that be by chance? We are the right amount of distance from the sun, so not to burn or get too cold and freeze."

You're arguing that there must have been a creator because the universe is perfectly suited to life as it exists. This view says the way things are now was consciously planned and all stages necessary to its attainment were carefully thought out.

A less human-centric view might be "the conditions in which living organisms have evolved have determined the characteristics of those organisms." We humans, liking to think of ourselves as the highest and best organism, look around and find our surroundings satisfying, then bolster our own sense of importance by deciding that there must have been a master plan in order for such perfection to have been arrived at.

UnquietDad · 08/09/2007 10:14

I wasn't able to catch up with this last night.

lisa - your understanding of what evolution actually means is a bit shaky. You can't criticise it without having understood it properly. It's nothing to with with half men/half monkeys. Change is much more gradula and sophisticated than that.

howdydoody - you've got "survival of the fittest" totally wrong as well. It doesn't mean "tough mate, I'm stronger than you." It refers to the way natural selection works over millions of years - animals adpating to survive in theit environment. It's not "fittest" as in "strongest" - it;s as in "most suited", i.e best "fit".

Howdydoody · 08/09/2007 11:38

Seems to me UQD that you change the words to suit yourself. "Fittest does mean this it means that", "Darwin wasnt really a believer he just professed to be one" because of the culture at the time.

MrsSpoon · 08/09/2007 11:43

Evolution is of course a very suitable explanation to remove any belief/need for a God and therefore absolve ourselves from any responsibility to live our lives by the Bible.

singingmum · 08/09/2007 12:31

I was raised as a JW.I am no longer of any faith through choice and am of the belief that it doesn't matter where or how we cme to be than that we try to be good and act kindly.However-
On the issue of medical treatment and that of allowing people to die,may I tell you all a story of a child I once knew.
She was young and dying of a cancer.She asked her parents to stop treatment and the docs said no.She said she didn't want blood as she wished to die with the belief she had lived with and also knew that it would only prolonge the agony she was in.
The docs took the parents rights away in a court of law and though allowed to see their daughter were forced to stand back and let the docs do as they pleased.This is what the docs did.
They pumped her so full of blood that it literally oozed from the poors in her body.It leaked out of her and her parents could do nothing,but the girl did,she tried to remove the tubes herself telling the docs she was in pain.
They decided to use her as a g.pig and tested an as yet unpassed drug on her to extened her'life' as a last resort.This also caused her pain.She finally died and her agony was over.Not so her parents.
They only discovered afterwards that their dd was used to test this drug.They had to sit and hear how the docs said that they were only acting in the childs best interest while at the same time bitching at the parents about their religion.Does anyone feel this was ok?I don't.
So while bitching at one religion inparticular please think first and try to be nice even when asking them to leave.You all know that you wouldn't turn to someone of another colour and say get lost on that basis,but for some reason some here believe it's ok on religious grounds.This makes no sense and is more indicative of a lack of intelligence in this subject than any amount of faith related belief.

lisad123 · 08/09/2007 13:05

it makees me smile those of us who believe in a creator feel looking at the earths designs means its logical to believe it was designed. Those who nbelieve in big bang/evoluation believe that looking at design of livingthings is locial for this idea.
I think we could debate all day but those of us who are strong in our own beliefs will never to swayed.
At least this thread has moved on from JW bashing and a little more debate

potoroo · 08/09/2007 13:13

But 'fittest' does not mean strongest, it does mean "best fit".

I remember one example we learnt about at school. In London there was a type of grey moth that was nicely camoflaged on trees. Every now and again, a mutant black one (same species) would be produced which would be immediately detected by birds and eaten.

With the industrial revolution came a lot of smoke/soot that turned the bark of the trees black. The mutant black moths could now hide more easily and began to multiply while the grey ones would be picked off by the birds. So within a matter of a few years, the black moths became the dominant colour of the species - not because they were stronger, but because they could hide better.

Incidentally, Darwin in his theory of evolution never proposed that mankind evolved in this way - possibly because he knew his theory would be rejected if he did. But others, like Wallace, certainly did.

Also, I honestly don't see how a belief in evolution precludes a belief in God - as I said, the theory of evolution is officially accepted by the Catholic Church.

Original poster
Elasticwoman · 08/09/2007 15:01

Lisad, your post of 8 Sep 13.05 makes little sense. Would you like to re-submit it in something approaching clear English?

OP posts:
Original poster
Elasticwoman · 08/09/2007 15:04

And I agree with you Potoroo that a belief in Evolution doesn't preclude a belief in God.

Would a JW like to explain to me what abstaining from blood is, btw? Is it just not having (or allowing) a blood transfusion or is there a wider definition?

OP posts:
UnquietDad · 08/09/2007 15:31

Is it me, or is howdydoody totally twisting everything I say?? I try to give a considered answer and explain some things which have just been plain wrongly stated, and I get told I am the one being inconsistent. I'm getting a bit annoyed now.

Look at the posts by Pruners and potoroo which say the same things I have been saying in a different way.

MrsSpoon - youre just being ridiculous. Evolution isn't something people use to "remove" any need for a god. There is no damn god to begin with. "Absolve" in what way? Are you suggesting a system of morals is incompatible with a life free of imaginary deity friends?

Somwetimes I wonmder which century we are living in.

Aimsmum · 08/09/2007 15:57

Message withdrawn

Howdydoody · 08/09/2007 16:44

Sorry UqD - thought you wanted a debate as you found it so annoying when Jws didnt "argue, debate, and engage". Guess I was wrong

I suppose you now know how JWs feel when what they say has been twisted!! So I might have done a little bit of a service

I will now step quietly away from the thread, my questions still unsatisfactorily answered . Thanks for your thoughts tho

Mistymoo · 08/09/2007 17:00

Elasticwoman - abstaining from blood means not accepting blood in any form, transfusion or food, eg black pudding.

UnquietDad · 08/09/2007 17:28

I wanted a debate, not playing with words and wilful misunderstanding.

Typical woolly religious claptrap.

Caroline1852 · 08/09/2007 17:29

You are all wondering about life, the universe, and everything and I am wondering about JWs and oral sex. I wish I wasn't.

potoroo · 08/09/2007 17:46

Howdydoody - which of your questions have been unsatisfactorily answered?