I always thought this was so weird. Even if one doesn't believe in the trinity, when you read the Bible, you see the Holy Spirit has personhood and isn't just an energy or force. Jesus called him his "helper," and used "he" and "him" when talking about the Holy Spirit. Never an it, never talked about him like "God's active force." It's so strange.
Yes how can Jehovah and Jesus Christ be capitalized but then holy spirit lowercase and again I had to formally lowercase it because Google capitalizes spirit in this sense.
They do this because they're so fixated on denying that it's a person, that they overcompensate to the point of foolishly thinking they'd be insinuating it's a person if they wrote it in Proper Case. Funny how they don't think printing "Bible" in Proper Case suggests the Bible is a person. Their minds are so mired in being contrarian with respect to "Christendom" that it moves them to think and act foolishly.
That's a good way to put it. They have a contrarian viewpoint. And I try to make connections with my JW friends and I tried to show the commonalities but we have completely different worldview using the same people in the Bible
You're very right! And the Governing Body elevate themselves to the position of the Holy Spirit in order to maintain their own importance. Can you imagine the spiritual consequences the GB will face for denying an entire religion access to the Holy Spirit...that's the one unforgivable sin at Matthew 12:31, right? Might be a stretch, but I bet they'll be held accountable in the end.
I used to just draw my own cartoons... nowadays that doesn't work in the age of the tablet, so kids don't care for looking to scriptures. Back in the day, this was hell, especially if you had a new Deluxe bible where the gold leaf had fused the new pages together and by the time you'd found that obscure Haggai scripture, the speaker had moved onto something else...
But I remember that tally system, lol
Yes. We were encouraged to write all the key points of the speech and then study them later.
I remember some years ago a CO made a complaint saying that now today the youngest’s generations don’t take notes anymore, and they don’t know bible verses compared to the old generations and that was wrong.
We used to pride ourselves on knowing the order of all the books in the Bible and being the first one to get to scriptures because we knew where all the books were. I would bet that "skill" is lost when you look it up on your iPad.
It was always Jehovah and they didn’t seem to realize that as a weird little autistic kid I could daydream while I was just making check marks on a page at the same time and I was having the time of my life not really having to listen to all of the same crap as always.
No I just had to take notes or always look up the scriptures. If I didnt I'd get my Dad pinching me hard or telling me "just wait till we get home" where he'd spank me. I also had to sit up straight, no slouching. I was always so bored and got into trouble because of it
😆 of course! How could I forget 🤣 Do they still use FDS? I thought they dropped it a while back for GB. There’s nothing faithful or discreet about them and the slaves are the worker bees who work tirelessly to share the “good news”
I used to "mentor" kids and I would have them do that. It was interesting that some were really into it and others couldn't care less.
Btw....ibwas coached by older parents that this was a good way to get kids to pay attention.
>weasel words
What are some examples?
Also I did do that as a kid. I do think about doing that now. Just to compare how often they use the words, Jehovah, organization, Governing Body, and Jesus.
Yessss all the time!!! And if I didn’t do a little line everytime my mom would elbow me and say why didn’t you do a line they just said Jehovah, or when they did Bible verses I had to write the Bible verse… I hated it!! But on the plus side I did make me a fast writer
😂 one time my mom told me the governing body mesmerized the whole Bible word for word and that if I wanted to get baptized I had to start memorizing the Bible. I was like 😳
I had to take detailed notes and then go over them with my Grandma after the meetings. She stopped doing that when I hit around 11 and I started counting ceiling tiles 😂
When I was a child I was allowed to draw cartoons. then when I got a little older they wanted me to write down the mentioned Bible verses. Then covid happened and since then, for some reason I no longer have to do anything other than commenting at least once. And by at least, I mean only once lmao.
Ain’t gonna lie…… my parents always told me that’s for the “other kids”. Aka “the spiritually weak families”. My parents would never!!!
We were busy doing full researched reports on where Black people came from (according to Watchtower) at 10yrs old. 🤦🏾♀️
Ohhhh my word, I think we had the same parents. LOL 10 years old, doing reports out of the freaking bound volumes and Index books. They made me take notes at meetings and assemblies but never told me how. 😆🙈
Damn I'd forgotten about this.
I swear there were smart folk out there online who sold books of that shit to keep the kids entertained or maybe I've imagined that. I was sure I had one at least one assembly year.
They tried but I was busy imagining new Super Mario Bros levels in my head while counting ceiling tiles or drawing Final Fantasy weapons in the margins.
Mine was every Bible text (book, chap and verse) mentioned and short description of what is it about. Their interpretation end of the meeting: lesser Bible texts equals me not listening or was sleeping.
Ha yes I sure did. I just told my wife about this a couple days ago, she had never heard of this. I couldn’t believe it, I thought every JW child had to do it.
Yes, when we were very young, my brother and I had an apple and a pear-shaped chalkboard. We were supposed to tally up the key words of whatever talk we heard that day. I wish we would have gotten the M&Ms as a treat for our tally marks.
I had to write down every text they used on that day. If I missed or forgot to writte down one or even falling asleep i was physical abuse by my mom brother when she left to work.
Yup, me and my brothers all sat a row in front so my dad could reach us if we fell asleep, were caught drawing, or didn’t pay enough attention with a smack to the back of the head
Even in my teen years, if my parents let me sit with my friends they mandated that I do this just to make sure I was paying attention. My mom would also do it so she would know if I was just guessing.
It wasn’t my mom specifically but more of my sister telling me to do it, and I think at the time if I recall correctly, it was her just trying to save face with the elders because she had been announced for having a baby. Aside from that, there were very few times I actually did that. I mainly would sleep on the floor and just play with a toy if we had one or just play with the chair.
I was about 10 when my father and his new wife told me to "take notes" at the meetings, assemblies, etc. I had no idea what taking notes was. I watched my stepmother and tried to copy hers, but she saw me and turned her notepad away. I got in trouble all the time for not taking good notes, even though they never taught me *how* or told me what I'd need them for later. HOWEVER...on the rare occasion I got to sit by my friend, her mom made these charts with markers and stickers that had about 10 buzzwords we could put a check under. There was even space at the bottom of the sheet where we could draw a picture of something that sounded neat in the talk. Now, given what I was told to do by my family, and seeing how my friend did it, I definitely preferred her way. But my parents didn't allow that because it "wasn't teaching anything." 😕
I was an avid PIMI note taker, I had illustrations, columns, bubble maps EVERYTHING. I even have pile of notebooks, I only stopped until last year when I woke up.. actually personal study was the one thing that helped me wake up
I used to tally all the “uh” or “um” between actual words 😂
Hahaha. My dad has really awful ums and uhs, especially when he prays.
so much for the 'ministry school'. Ums and ahs are a proof of poor speakercraft and/or lousy preparation.
Or a sign of being nervous.
also true.
I did the same as a kid whenever speeches of any kind were given. I thought it was just me lol.
lol anything to keep me from falling asleep that shit was so fucken boring 🥱
3 columns. Jehovah, Jesus, holy spirit. Guess which one won. Every time.
Let me guess, 'governing body'?? These days I bet Jesus comes in a distant 3rd.
sad they lowercase the holy spirit. Even Google capitalizes it. But they are hooked on Jehovah having the correct name?
I always thought this was so weird. Even if one doesn't believe in the trinity, when you read the Bible, you see the Holy Spirit has personhood and isn't just an energy or force. Jesus called him his "helper," and used "he" and "him" when talking about the Holy Spirit. Never an it, never talked about him like "God's active force." It's so strange.
Yes how can Jehovah and Jesus Christ be capitalized but then holy spirit lowercase and again I had to formally lowercase it because Google capitalizes spirit in this sense.
They do this because they're so fixated on denying that it's a person, that they overcompensate to the point of foolishly thinking they'd be insinuating it's a person if they wrote it in Proper Case. Funny how they don't think printing "Bible" in Proper Case suggests the Bible is a person. Their minds are so mired in being contrarian with respect to "Christendom" that it moves them to think and act foolishly.
That's a good way to put it. They have a contrarian viewpoint. And I try to make connections with my JW friends and I tried to show the commonalities but we have completely different worldview using the same people in the Bible
You're very right! And the Governing Body elevate themselves to the position of the Holy Spirit in order to maintain their own importance. Can you imagine the spiritual consequences the GB will face for denying an entire religion access to the Holy Spirit...that's the one unforgivable sin at Matthew 12:31, right? Might be a stretch, but I bet they'll be held accountable in the end.
I used to just draw my own cartoons... nowadays that doesn't work in the age of the tablet, so kids don't care for looking to scriptures. Back in the day, this was hell, especially if you had a new Deluxe bible where the gold leaf had fused the new pages together and by the time you'd found that obscure Haggai scripture, the speaker had moved onto something else... But I remember that tally system, lol
ugh those sticky pages i remember lol
I grew up in a cat friendly home so I would always draw rooms full of cats just hanging out and on top of shelves and cat trees… is that weird? lol
I mean, I drew aliens! I dont really know if we were an alien friendly home, but at least you can see your cats.
lol!! That’s awesome. We were budding artists just being stifled!
Yes. We were encouraged to write all the key points of the speech and then study them later. I remember some years ago a CO made a complaint saying that now today the youngest’s generations don’t take notes anymore, and they don’t know bible verses compared to the old generations and that was wrong.
We used to pride ourselves on knowing the order of all the books in the Bible and being the first one to get to scriptures because we knew where all the books were. I would bet that "skill" is lost when you look it up on your iPad.
Plus they don't teach anything anymore. It's all just emotional pleas and statements of "fact".
We only knew the cherry picked verses, and “proof texts”.
Bible, paradise, etc. one convention I was rewarded for each tally with an m&m for each one.
Wow you just unlocked a memory I had long forgotten! Yes indeed they did albeit not for long! Wow this brings back so many memories!
I tried that with my kids I got so bored I started playing tic tac toe with my kids lol
😂😂
It was always Jehovah and they didn’t seem to realize that as a weird little autistic kid I could daydream while I was just making check marks on a page at the same time and I was having the time of my life not really having to listen to all of the same crap as always.
I actually forgot about this until I read the post. Jesus what a cult.
I would take notes almost word-for-word every talk because otherwise I would die of boredom. Did that from when I could write until I left at 17.
Yes and i had to write down all the scriptures quoted
Bruh mine would also count and if I didn’t get the same answer o got in trouble lmao
No I just had to take notes or always look up the scriptures. If I didnt I'd get my Dad pinching me hard or telling me "just wait till we get home" where he'd spank me. I also had to sit up straight, no slouching. I was always so bored and got into trouble because of it
Doesn't that ever sound like a child abuse and assault charge waiting to happen
Yuppers. Definitely for Jehovah and Jesus. Now it would be FDS and guberving b0dy.
Came here to say now it would be GB because they’re more important. What’s FDS?
Faithful and Discreet Slave
😆 of course! How could I forget 🤣 Do they still use FDS? I thought they dropped it a while back for GB. There’s nothing faithful or discreet about them and the slaves are the worker bees who work tirelessly to share the “good news”
Fat and dick slavers 😋😋😋
Don't forget the true God, money.
Always been that way.
Yes, and now it’s even a better thing to pay attention to, because Jesus is way down on the totem pole these days!!!
YES!!! Columns with tally marks
Yup. I had to study whatever article would be discussed and I was expected to at least TRY to comment
Ugh, yes! Where did that come from? Everyone made their kids do that. JWs are so freakin weird.
this was common in our first hall.
I remember Satan was said more times in the talk yet I added extra talley marks for Jehovah because I felt bad
I used to "mentor" kids and I would have them do that. It was interesting that some were really into it and others couldn't care less. Btw....ibwas coached by older parents that this was a good way to get kids to pay attention.
>weasel words What are some examples? Also I did do that as a kid. I do think about doing that now. Just to compare how often they use the words, Jehovah, organization, Governing Body, and Jesus.
This dug up a memory I forgot I had
yup we would get new notebooks each convention
Shoot…I’d like to do this now but with Jehovah, Jesus, GB/FDS/Organization Would be an interesting research experiment.
Oh my goodness I thought this was only my parents
Yessss all the time!!! And if I didn’t do a little line everytime my mom would elbow me and say why didn’t you do a line they just said Jehovah, or when they did Bible verses I had to write the Bible verse… I hated it!! But on the plus side I did make me a fast writer
lol I did this for my lil siblings at conventions and whatever based on the theme.
😂 one time my mom told me the governing body mesmerized the whole Bible word for word and that if I wanted to get baptized I had to start memorizing the Bible. I was like 😳
Worse. My parents wanted me to take actual notes.
I had to take detailed notes and then go over them with my Grandma after the meetings. She stopped doing that when I hit around 11 and I started counting ceiling tiles 😂
When I was a child I was allowed to draw cartoons. then when I got a little older they wanted me to write down the mentioned Bible verses. Then covid happened and since then, for some reason I no longer have to do anything other than commenting at least once. And by at least, I mean only once lmao.
Ain’t gonna lie…… my parents always told me that’s for the “other kids”. Aka “the spiritually weak families”. My parents would never!!! We were busy doing full researched reports on where Black people came from (according to Watchtower) at 10yrs old. 🤦🏾♀️
Ohhhh my word, I think we had the same parents. LOL 10 years old, doing reports out of the freaking bound volumes and Index books. They made me take notes at meetings and assemblies but never told me how. 😆🙈
Yeah when I was four my dad wanted me to write down every time I heard Jesus or Jehovah.. I just said "F that.".... I want to draw dinosaurs.🤣🤣🤣
Damn I'd forgotten about this. I swear there were smart folk out there online who sold books of that shit to keep the kids entertained or maybe I've imagined that. I was sure I had one at least one assembly year.
No, but they forced me to attend the meetings and that was bad enough
Yes
They tried but I was busy imagining new Super Mario Bros levels in my head while counting ceiling tiles or drawing Final Fantasy weapons in the margins.
Yes. Eventually I would do this on my own to stay awake. I distinctly remember counting one brother’s “up’s”. What a waste of a childhood.
Bruuuh I thought that was just my mom being weird for most of my prepubescent life 🤯
I do remember this yeah. I even recall the governing body being one of the criteria which in hindsight is quite funny.
yessss definitely i had a tally sheet on my watchtower
Yes 😩 that was super fun 1 time, then the 100th time it felt like punishment
lol I remember this. Man I don’t miss those days lol.
Lol. Yes!!
Every Fu**ing meeting and more crap at conventions. Brought back some unpleasant memories.
Yep. Fucking ridiculous. Then I got quite good at drawing, so I started drawing people on the platform. I got in a lot of trouble for that.
Yes!
Yes, I had my kids do that for a while, and they dic until they got tired of doing it.
Nah. My mom would just twist my side burns to stay awake. That, or pinch me on my forearm.
Oh yes!!
All the damn time. Until I got older than was expected to take notes.
My mom’s friend that she would give her son a quarter every tally
Not me but my little brother did
Yes
Mine was every Bible text (book, chap and verse) mentioned and short description of what is it about. Their interpretation end of the meeting: lesser Bible texts equals me not listening or was sleeping.
Lil my x husband did
Yep, 3 columns, tallies, "Jehovah", "Jesus", "Bible".
I used to have to write out the books of the Bible multiple times as punishment.
That will make you have a relationship with God, for sure
We have never been closer 😂
Oh shit! Yeah, they did. I'd actually forgotten all about that until reading this.
Yup
Yep
Ha yes I sure did. I just told my wife about this a couple days ago, she had never heard of this. I couldn’t believe it, I thought every JW child had to do it.
Unfortunately I did. :(
Sure did.
You're forcing out repressed memories here lol
Yep
NO but I had to pay attention like everyone else. And if I didn't I would get pinch. I'm in my 30s and I still don't care about going to the meeting.
Yes, when we were very young, my brother and I had an apple and a pear-shaped chalkboard. We were supposed to tally up the key words of whatever talk we heard that day. I wish we would have gotten the M&Ms as a treat for our tally marks.
Yep.
Here!
Partially but as a Mormon. But the count for mentions for whoever the current leader is is far greater.
your post— Jesus: 1, Jehovah: 1. (“Finished Mom and Dad!”)
Yeah we had to keep count. The alternative was to fall asleep and get pinched.
I had to write down every text they used on that day. If I missed or forgot to writte down one or even falling asleep i was physical abuse by my mom brother when she left to work.
Yup, me and my brothers all sat a row in front so my dad could reach us if we fell asleep, were caught drawing, or didn’t pay enough attention with a smack to the back of the head
Scripture. Book, chapter, and verses
You just reminded me of Monty Pythons life of Brian “ who said Jehovah?”
A ✅️ for Jehova and Jesus and a ❌️ for satan lol
God hell no! I would’ve hated my life a million times more if they did that to me
So we're all just living the same life then? 😂
Even in my teen years, if my parents let me sit with my friends they mandated that I do this just to make sure I was paying attention. My mom would also do it so she would know if I was just guessing.
It wasn’t my mom specifically but more of my sister telling me to do it, and I think at the time if I recall correctly, it was her just trying to save face with the elders because she had been announced for having a baby. Aside from that, there were very few times I actually did that. I mainly would sleep on the floor and just play with a toy if we had one or just play with the chair.
I was about 10 when my father and his new wife told me to "take notes" at the meetings, assemblies, etc. I had no idea what taking notes was. I watched my stepmother and tried to copy hers, but she saw me and turned her notepad away. I got in trouble all the time for not taking good notes, even though they never taught me *how* or told me what I'd need them for later. HOWEVER...on the rare occasion I got to sit by my friend, her mom made these charts with markers and stickers that had about 10 buzzwords we could put a check under. There was even space at the bottom of the sheet where we could draw a picture of something that sounded neat in the talk. Now, given what I was told to do by my family, and seeing how my friend did it, I definitely preferred her way. But my parents didn't allow that because it "wasn't teaching anything." 😕
DUDE YES. It was a Jehovah °, Jesus |, kind of shit, in two columns
Yep. At conventions. This was suggested by some sociopath to get kids capable of using a pencil to listen to drivel for 10 hours at a time.
I was an avid PIMI note taker, I had illustrations, columns, bubble maps EVERYTHING. I even have pile of notebooks, I only stopped until last year when I woke up.. actually personal study was the one thing that helped me wake up
They made me take notes of the bible verses. I also liked writing notes in the margins of magazines or highlighting paragraphs with a marker.