Friday, May 20, 2005

Where I Am Today

For 26 years, I have associated with and considered myself to be one of Jehovah's Witnesses.
At the start of 2005, I suddenly started once again questioning my religious beliefs. Although I still attend worship services with this religion, I'm mainly doing this to keep from confusing my family. They're still devout, and they don't know that I've started having doubts.

Here's my dilemna: Since I'm an "insider" within the organization, I became aware of a contemptible scheme that the leaders of Jehovah's Witnesses are involved in. The ingenuity and deviousness of their plan is so astonishing, that most of the believers aren't the least bit aware of how they're fleecing the congregations for BILLIONS of dollars each year.

Here's how it works: About 20 years ago, the Watchtower Society started a program where congregations would obtain financing for building projects directly from the organization. The organization charges the local congregation interest. Furthermore, the headquarters instituted a "Kingdom Hall assistance fund," where most of the congregations in the United States would automatically send the headquarters a monthly donation to help "needy congregations" to build new buildings.

On the surface, this seems ok; however, you've got to understand this fact: For years, our organization has bragged that they don't pass a collection plate. However, they've quietly started skimming money from every congregation--plus, they now hold the deeds to most of the places of worship in the United States, Canada, and Europe. And when the buildings are paid off, they start encouraging the congregations to build new ones, so just about all of the congregations are now financed through the headquarters.


Let me sum this up as follows:

1) The Watchtower receives monthly payments from every congregation in the US--based on their number of members (called "publishers"). This translates into millions of dollars going into the Watchtower's coffers every month.

2) The Watchtower uses some of this money to fund the building of new Kingdom Halls. They loan this money back to congregations, and make more money on the interest. These loans have terms from 5-10 years.

3) By the time the congregation pays off their loan to the Watchtower, they're strongly encouraged to either build a new Kingdom Hall, or do a "major remodel," which almost costs as much as building from scratch. Of course, the Society by default finances the work. Therefore, most of the congregations in the US are endebted to the Watchtower for their property.

My organization has never publicly announced how much money they pull in through this scheme. However, I estimate that they're probably pulling in at least $1.5 billion each year.

In my opinion, they're probably not doing anything that would put somebody in jail; however, they're not telling anyone about the enormous sums of money that they're handling either--which makes me suspect that a lot of the money is "disappearing."

The above realizations triggered the old doubts that I had in my mind before: If God isn't with these guys, then does he exist? If there is no God, then how can there be such order to the universe? Et cetera, et cetera...

One of the things that I've learned over the last several decades is that our universe couldn't possibly be the result of happenstance. However, I've begun to question whether the Bible is truly inspired by God--or for that matter, whether it's possible to communicate with the Creator. I guess that moves me squarely into the "agnostic" column.

All my life, I've felt that the true answer to the universe's origins has to be logical and sensible--just like the universe's design. I also don't feel that we should simply accept things that we don't understand based on "faith". If it doesn't make sense, then it's wrong. Some of the stuff that I've been told doesn't hold water. Therefore, I've got to resume my search for the truth.

Therefore, from this moment on, I'm going to pursue the truth with all my energy. I am going to document this search on this blog. As time goes on, I hope to invite others to participate here.

posted by The Student @ 9:44 AM 4 comments

Wednesday, May 04, 2005

Update

It's been over a month since I've posted. Since that time, I've resolved several issues in my mind:

1) I no longer feel that my former religion (Jehovah's Witnesses) is right on HARDLY ANYTHING.

2) God--as most Judeo/Christian/Moslems believe in--doesn't exist.

3) There is, however, an intelligence behind all that we perceive in our universe. It didn't get here by accident.

As it stands, I'm still attending meetings at the Kingdom Hall; I'm still an elder in the congregation, so I still have responsibilities. However, I'm only involved in congregation matters because of my family: I don't want to cause any religious confusion for my children--nor do I want to cause conflict with my wife.

Right now, I'm reasoning with my wife, trying to subtly convince her that many of the concepts that she still holds onto are wrong. However, I don't want to push too hard: If I go too fast, she could end up completely losing everything--her family, her friends, and worse yet, her faith in God. The results could be disastrous. I'm going to have to help her to see that there's a world outside of the closed Witness Community, and that she can flourish in it. Only then can I begin to move her into everyday society.

Before I can help my family, however, I've still got several unresolved issues myself:

1) Is the Bible an inspired book? Right now, I don't think so. Many of the Bible writers had brilliant insights into how things really are; there's quite a bit of practical advice on how to be happy within the Bible's pages. However, I now question the historical accuracy of many of the accounts found there. Furthermore, most of the prophetic sections are so cryptic that there's room for endless speculation.

2) Is Jesus relevant to the scheme of things, or was he merely 1 of many people who had special insights into the makeup of our universe?

3) What is my purpose in this life?

As I get a handle on these issues, I'll better be able to help my family.

Right now, I feel that the answer to all my questions--and ultimately, the solution to my Search for the Man Behind the Curtain--is going to be found within a field of endeavor that's relatively new on the scene of man's understanding. I've already looked into this field, and so far, I've gotten some satisfactory answers there. I'm going to devote a great deal of time on this topic:

QUANTUM PHYSICS.

posted by The Student @ 8:00 AM 5 comments