1. Prodigious amounts of misinformation acquired wittingly/unwittingly.
2. Constant guilt due to thinking one is not pleasing God. This occurs when old religious fears are not properly cremated.
3. The loss of cognitive thinking skills, an inability to think for oneself.
4. An insatiable need to have other people or groups do one’s thinking.
5. The inability to articulate well-thought-out religious/philosophical beliefs.
6. A potentially unhealthy attraction to high-control fundamentalist groups promising God’s truth & the correct interpretation of the Bible.
7. The inability to tolerate the insecurity of anything outside the sphere of physical science and a person’s conscious experiences.
8. A need to control other people. (When you’re abused, you can abuse)
9. A lack of self-control related to sex, alcohol or drugs.
10. The inability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time.
11. Black and white thinking, as answers were always found in the WT.
12. Difficulty understanding that the only things a person can control are one’s beliefs about events, people, circumstances, etc.
13. Difficulty assimilating into mainstream society due to JW phobias.
14. Stuck on constantly blaming the organization for robbing the best years of one’s life and unable to acknowledge one’s duplicity.
15. Obsessive time and energy spent on projects intended to topple the organization. (Expose them, yes. Toppling them isn’t going to happen as JWs fill a market niche for people in need of heavy-duty structure.)
16. A propensity to underline in ink key points in magazines and books.
17. Suffering persistent shunning by JW family and friends. (For many people, this is the most brutal ghost, and can be severely debilitating.)

I believe the most invasive of the ghosts is misinformation. Shedding “things a person knows that ain’t so” is a very challenging task. It requires cremating old religious fears. It may take years. But it can be done. If I were to leave the organization today, my recovery plan would include reading the following six books, in this order, and here’s why:

1. Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl. The author gives a moving account of his life in Nazi death camps and his discovery of logo therapy—a positive approach to the mentally/spiritually disturbed person. His treatment focuses on the freedom to transcend suffering and find a meaning to one’s life regardless of circumstances.
2. The Source by James A. Michener. A great bit of storytelling based on factual data about early civilization in Israel, debunking JW myths.
3. The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. Okay, he’s an atheist, but a person coming out of a group like JWs will appreciate and relate to his hard-hitting, factual observations about the imbecilities of religious fanatics and the dangerous rise of superstition in today’s world. (This is a good book to test your ability to hold two opposed ideas in your mind and still retain the ability to function.)
4. Jesus, Interrupted – Revealing the Hidden Contradiction in the Bible by Bart D. Ehrman. Jehovah’s Witnesses are completely in the dark as to what scholars have been saying for 200 years about Bible history, forgeries, and contradictions. Whichever side a person sits on biblical inerrancy, this is an eye-opening read.
5. The Sins of Scripture by John Shelby Spong. This book exposes the evil done by people who use the Bible like weapons in the name of God. It points out texts that have been used to discriminate, oppress and distort the truth of Christianity, casting doubt on God’s love.
6. Why Evolution is True by Jerry A. Coyne. I hate the title, but after years of hearing non-scholarly JW evolution rebuttal, this well-written explanation by a knowledgeable scientist gives the reader a fresh, nonthreatening perspective of how old our earth is and how new species evolved from previous ones. And, it makes a good case for the fact that God is not a micro-manager, as JWs claim.

If you read these books, you will have lots to think about. It will help to get outside yourself and subconsciously cogitate about what you’ve read. Take walks, meet new people, do random acts of kindness, volunteer for charitable work, engage yourself in a hobby, be a friend to someone, etc. Remember, great thinkers can hold two opposing ideas in their minds at the same time and function quite well.

You will also be rewarded with the satisfaction that you have acquired real truths—liberating, factual information—which have heretofore been censored for you by the organization. Embrace this wonderful opportunity to learn about things from a rational perspective. In the end, do not forget that you have the freedom to decide what you want to believe.

She had married a disfellowshipped JW and early on made a non binding verbal agreement with her husband that the kids would not be raised as JWs. After their divorce, the dad had a change of heart. He was reinstated and began attending meetings sporadically. Several months ago, he started taking the kids to the Kingdom Hall on the Sundays he had custody. As soon as the mom found out, she filed a complaint.

The mom did her homework and provided good documentation to the court to support her concerns. And, she petitioned for me and another ex-Bethelite to be her expert witnesses. The questions and our testimony were to be as follows:

State your name for the Court: Richard E. Kelly

Briefly describe your experiences and expertise related to the Kingdom Hall and the Watchtower Society:

I was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness after my mother became a convert when I was four years old. I was baptized at ten. In 1958, my family answered a special calling to “serve where the need was great” and we moved to a small rural town in Nebraska. I started giving one-hour public talks at 15, appointed a ministerial servant at 16, and began to “pioneer” (a special 100-hour per month door-to-door ministry) at 17. At 18, I was invited to live and work at Bethel, the world headquarters for JWs. While there, I was selected to serve with an elite group of public speakers.

After two years, I left Bethel to get married. A year and a half later, I officially resigned from the church. Since my wife decided to stay, we worked out an amiable agreement on how to raise our children. However, in September 1981, a new policy of “shunning” was instituted. Because I was baptized and no longer a believer, I, along with thousands of ex-JWs, was shunned. My parents and siblings refused to speak to me.

In 1998, my youngest sister was murdered by her husband. My mother didn’t inform me until a week after her death. I soon began to write articles and a book about, “Growing Up in Mama’s Club – A Childhood Perspective of Jehovah’s Witnesses.” In 2008, I printed a revised, third edition. I am currently writing a sequel called, “Ghosts from Mama’s Club.”

State for the court within your experiences, what beliefs were of concern for you, not only from your own life, but for that of your children:

• As a child: 1) my grandparents and I would meet a violent death at Armageddon if we didn’t believe the way JWs do. My mom tried to give it a positive spin, saying I would live forever in a paradise-like new world after God destroyed the world, but I knew in my heart that I wasn’t a true believer, so if Mama was right, I wasn’t going to live in paradise with her; 2) I would not be able to go to college; 3) in order to please God, I could not celebrate holidays, my birthday, or associate with non believers; 4) the country I lived in was demonized and serving in the military, pledging allegiance to the flag or standing when the national anthem were cardinal sins; 5) I could not challenge or question church beliefs or policies without being made to feel guilty and I was often told that this kind of reasoning was a sign that I didn’t really love Jehovah God.
• As a parent: I reached an agreement with my wife that: 1) our children would receive blood transfusions if their life depended on it; 2) they could not be baptized until they were adults; 3) our religious beliefs were personal decisions based on research and spiritual needs and I didn’t love God less, and my actions and beliefs were not controlled by the devil, because I wasn’t a JW. 4) While my wife respected our agreement, behind my back, relatives and other well-meaning JWs would send our children letters, talk to them on the phone, or tell them in person things like Armageddon was close and they needed to go to the meetings and read the Watchtower if they didn’t want to be destroyed, etc.

Is it in your knowledge then, that if indoctrinated in the beliefs of JWs, that my children will be taught that the end of the world is near, and that in the end, I myself, or anyone not conforming to their beliefs, will not be saved? :

• Yes!

As a school aged child while part of the organization, what were some of the organization’s beliefs that were challenging to your success as a student? :

• Because Armageddon was supposed to occur before I reached twenty, I was told that a worldly education was of no value. Instead, I needed to study literature published by JWs and participate in the door-to-door ministry if I wanted to please God and earn salvation.
• I could not participate in extra curricular school activities.
• I was not allowed to take elective classes in math, science, and history.
• I was not allowed to have worldly, non JW, school friends. I was told that though they may be well-meaning kids, they were bad association.

If after being baptized as a JW my children decided to embrace the beliefs that I raised them in, what actions of the organization would they be subject to? :

• First of all, “baptism” for JWs is a unique experience. Before one can be baptized, which is accomplished by total water submersion, he or she must make a verbal oath in front of witnesses pledging total allegiance to Jehovah God and His earthly organization, the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society. If the baptized person breaks that oath, like attending another church, challenging JW beliefs, smoking cigarettes, etc., they will be disfellowshipped (excommunicated) and shunned by all JWs including immediate family. The emotional damage can be devastating for an adult raised as a child to believe that the end of the world is just around the corner, and isolated from mainstream America, only to find that he or she does not possess the skills and education to be productive, stable citizens in today’s world. That was the case with my sister and thousands of ex-JWs.

The other expert witness’ response about her experience and expertise with JWs was to be:

• The children will be taught that blood transfusions are forbidden by God. If a child is baptized, he would have to refuse a transfusion. Otherwise, he could be disfellowshipped/shunned by JW family and friends if he accepted it as his wish. Many baptized JW teenagers are dying, Dennis Lindberg, age 14 is the most recent example, for refusing a needed transfusion. And then, they are praised by the organization for making their stand on the blood issue.
• To be disfellowshipped is worse than death to a JW. Once they are baptized and openly disagree with anything in the Watchtower literature or anything considered loose conduct, they are shunned. All JW friends and relatives would not be able to even say “hi” to them; except if they are under 18, and then only their immediate household family could speak with them, but they could not speak regarding anything considered “spiritual,” “Bible”, or “organizational.”
• There are twelve no nos’ for JW school aged children, making it very difficult and embarrassing for them in the classroom, often resulting in social isolation. They are: not being able to salute the flag, no patriotic songs, no art or music with holiday, nation anthem, or patriotic melodies, no birthdays or holiday parties, no organized sports after school, no extracurricular school programs or clubs, no voting, cannot have non-JW friends outside of school, and a four-year college is demonized, even if they could have qualified for scholarships.
• The five weekly JW meetings and door-to-door work are very boring for children. The learning objectives at meetings for them are unrealistic. And yet, they take top priority when it comes to how children can best please a JW parent.

To our surprise, the judge had done his homework and decided our testimonies were not necessary. After some deliberation with the mom and her ex, he ruled that she would have to be informed at least 90 days in advance before any of her kids could ask to be baptized by JWs. If that happened, the court would interview the child and the judge would make a judgment based on his discretion if the child was “mature” enough to make such a decision, emphatically stating that a child between ten and twelve was not mature enough. And, he did not stop there. Per the mom’s request, he stated that if one of the children requested knowledge of JW beliefs and wanted a “JW Bible study” that only their father was allowed to do so. No other JW, elder or other, could study one-on-one with the children.

While Helen was never disfellowshipped, her JW siblings treated her departure like she was. When my step father passed away in 2001, Helen and her JW sister had a pleasant two-hour conversation after his funeral. Still miffed by the silliness of it all, Helen said sarcastically as her sister announced it was time to go, “See you in another fifteen years Esther.”

In July of this year, I organized a meeting with my JW brother, who is ironically married to Helen’s sister, to persuade my JW mother to move into an assisted living facility. Esther joined us and the hour-plus conversation preceding family business went well. Lots of laughs, hugs, and conversation you’d expect from family members. It prompted my mother to say to me later, “You could really see the love Helen and Esther have for each other.”

Two months later, Helen received a letter from Esther and a copy of the September 2006 Watchtower, featuring the article on page 17, “When a Loved One Leaves Jehovah.” Esther wrote, “My intentions in sending this is not to upset you, but rather is out of love and concern for you and Dick, (me) especially in view of the worsening world conditions and the nearness of Armageddon.” She went on to underline the following expressions:

…when a person chooses to leave Jehovah and the way of life set out in the Scriptures, faithful family members typically experience deep anguish. ‘I love my sister very much and I would do anything to see her come back to Jehovah. This has been hard for me to bear because in every other respect she has been a wonderful sister to me.’

Why does the spiritual loss of a child or other loved one cause such deep distress to Christian relatives? Because they know that the Scriptures promise eternal life on a paradise earth for those who remain loyal to Jehovah. They look forward to sharing these blessings with their mates, children, parents, siblings, and grandchildren. How it pains them to think that their loved ones who have stopped serving Jehovah may miss out!

Are such Christians overreacting? Not necessarily. In fact, they may to some extent be reflecting the qualities of Jehovah, in whose image man was made. He implanted in humans the capacity for having similar loyal attachments, and the bond between family members can be especially strong. So it is not surprising that humans would grieve over the spiritual loss of a beloved relative. Indeed, the spiritual loss of a loved one is among the most difficult of trials that come upon true worshipers.

Do not give up hope. Love “hopes all things.” Indeed, experience has shown that many who have left the truth eventually do return.

Respect Jehovah’s arrangement for discipline. (Hebrews 12:11)

Have you left Jehovah? If so, whatever the reason, your relationship with Jehovah and your eternal prospects are at risk. Remember, the storm clouds of Armageddon are swiftly approaching. Moreover, life in this system is short and uncertain. You cannot know if you will be alive tomorrow. If you have left Jehovah, now is the best time to return.

Esther’s letter, and especially the Watchtower quotes, were too much for my normally tacit wife. Her dander was up and she needed to respond. To do otherwise would make her culpable. So here is Helen’s response:

“Dear Esther, I don’t like discussing religion or politics. People generally believe what they do, not because of objective research, but because that’s what they want to believe. If anything, people look for evidence to support what they already know to be true and they aren’t comfortable when those beliefs are challenged. Having said that, I’m going to make an exception as you took the time to show your “love and concern” for me by sharing your beliefs. Hopefully, as you said, my beliefs will not upset you.

“I’m personally embarrassed by the number of years I allowed a group of self-anointed men, the Governing Body and writers of the Watchtower, to tell me who are Jehovah’s friends and how to please Him. If you’re interested, I’ve attached a list, Telling It Like It Is, of things I believe about Jehovah’s Witnesses. If not, you can toss it. Although, I read the 2006 Watchtower you sent me.

“As you observed during our recent visit in Mom’s house, I’m a very happy person. I lead a good life and am grateful that I can use my mind, without being made to feel guilty, to challenge beliefs that aren’t healthy for me or my family. I’m proud to have broken free from the bondage the Watchtower put on me. It’s opened up windows of opportunity I wouldn’t have experienced as a JW and I’ve had a full life that’s been productive and satisfying.

“Esther, you will always, irregardless of the big differences in our beliefs, be my little sister that I love very much.”

Telling It Like It Is
(An edited copy of a September Freemind’s post based on this original article.)

1. Joining Jehovah’s Witnesses is a one-way street. They will pretend to intensely love you while you walk in and they will openly despise you if and when you choose to walk out.

2. They love to say only they are from God and to point out that everyone and everything else is from Satan.

3. Flattery is one of the tools they use to win people over. They like to make potential converts feel special, so that they continue to ‘feel good’ about studying the Bible with them.

4. They also frighten. They don’t want you to realize this, but they subtly and effectively use Fear as an ingredient in many of their teachings. You see, nothing else controls as Fear does! (i.e. “…especially in view of the worsening world conditions and the nearness of Armageddon.”)

5. Eventually, they will only accept you if you ‘disown yourself’ and submit entirely to what they call ‘Jehovah’s Organization’.

6. You will only be allowed to have friends who are Jehovah’s friends. The Governing Body decides who Jehovah’s friends are. This practice also ensures that if you ever consider leaving the Watchtower, you will have to deal with a terrible social vacuum in your life, because all your Jehovah’s Witness friends will have nothing to do with you.

7. They love to exhibit mock humility. They take immense pride in saying they are the most humble lot. They want you to be proud and have this humility too.

8. While they theoretically believe that acts of kindness should not be publicized, you will notice that they actually crave the adulation and praise that result from publicizing their own self-proclaimed acts of godly devotion.

9. As an extension of the previous point, while they say Jehovah’s Witnesses are not men pleasers, any thinking person knows better!

10. They take great pleasure in contemplating the destruction of billions of people who have not responded positively to the message they preach. They routinely portray (in pictures) the painful deaths of unbelievers at Armageddon in their publications, and they find such artwork tasteful.

11. To a sane mind, the previous point may fall into the same genre of hate and destruction found in certain other groups that foster world terrorism, but of course, they don’t want you to realize that.

12. Their own congregations, outside the symbol of love and harmony, are as full of gossip, slander, distinctions, prejudice and even hate, as any other part of Babylon the Great, the false religions they condemn.

13. They would have you believe that the brothers love each other. In actuality, rivalry is widespread among congregation members, as each tries to out-do and outshine the other. After all, there are ‘privileges’ on offer, and these will only be yours if you tow the Watchtower line.

14. The more hours you put into field service, the more ‘spiritual’ you will be called. Of course, on the face of it they appear to say that even service that is comparable to the widow’s mite is precious to Jehovah, but know them for a long enough time and you will know that is not true.

15. You may not realize it is disparaging, but it is not uncommon for them to categorize believers as Bethelites, Special Pioneer, Auxiliary Pioneer, Elder, Ministerial Servant, Spiritually Weak or a Marked Person.

16. Naturally, the circuit overseers, elders and other prominent members of the congregation are attracted to those members who are materially well-off. They will never expressly state this, but observe them closely, and you will find that’s true.

17. Please say good-bye to a good education, rewarding career, etc. You are in the Watchtower now.

18. Look closer and you’ll discover that they are like any corporate organization. The rewards and privileges you enjoy in the organization is proportional to the ‘value’ you bring into it, in terms of new converts, hours spent, etc. And, your money is important to them.

19. You can bequeath any such wealth that you own to them, be that gold, financial securities, property, and real estate. They welcome it all.

20. Their love for you, the esteem and value that they hold for you, all actually comes at a heavy price, with many strings attached. But they hope you never realize that.

21. They have many organizational secrets which they don’t want you to know. Those who have ‘left them’ often know these secrets. That’s why they forbid you from ever speaking with them. Similarly, they will try and do everything possible to convince you that the internet is a Satanic trap, so you’ll never read online the things they don’t want you to read and know.”

• We do not have the original writings of the New Testament. What we have are copies of these writings, made years later—in most cases, many years later. And none of these copies is completely accurate since the scribes who produced them inadvertently and/or intentionally changed them in places. All scribes did this.



• There are more differences among preserved manuscripts than there are words in the New Testament.
• The twenty-seven books we call the New Testament were not gathered into one canon and considered scripture, finally and ultimately, until hundreds of years after the books themselves were first produced.
• We do not know precisely how old the New Testament is. It could be 1,200 years; we just don’t know. But we do know that it’s not 2,000 years old as I was taught growing up as a Jehovah’s Witness.
• The third-century church father Origen, made the following complaint about the copies of the Gospel at his disposal: “The differences among the manuscripts have become great, either through the negligence of some copyists or through the perverse audacity of others; they either neglect to check over what they have transcribed, or, in the process of checking, they make additions or deletions as they please.”
• The story of Jesus and the woman taken in adultery in John 7:53 – 8:12 is arguably the best known story about Jesus in the Bible. It is a brilliant story, filled with pathos and a clever twist where Jesus uses his wits to get himself—not to mention the poor woman—off the hook. However, to the careful reader, the story raises many questions. To name just two:
  • If Jesus did teach a message of love, did he really think that the Law of God given by Moses was no longer in force and should be obeyed?
  • Did he think sins should not be punished at all?
• Good questions, but as it turns out, the aforementioned verses were not originally in the Gospel of John. In fact, they were not originally part of any of the Gospels. Scribes added these twelve verses later. This story and these verses are not found in the oldest and best manuscripts of the Gospel of John and the writing style is very different from what is found in the rest of John.
• The last twelve verses in the Gospel of Mark were invented by a scribe many years after it was in circulation, and absent from the two oldest and best manuscripts of Mark’s Gospel. It’s a mysterious, moving, and powerful passage and used by Pentecostal Christians to show Jesus’ followers could speak in unknown tongues. Ironically, it’s also the principal passage used by “Appalachian snake-handlers” who take poisonous snakes in their hands to prove their faith in the words of Jesus.
• Paul did not write verses 34 and 35 in 1 Corinthians 14. They were added by a scribe, possibly influenced by 1 Timothy 2, which we know was written by a follower of Paul, not by Paul. (1 Timothy was forged in Paul’s name by someone living later.)
• The anti-Jewishness of some second- and third-century Christian scribes played a role in how the texts of scripture were transmitted. One of the clearest examples is found in Luke’s account of the crucifixion, where Jesus is said to have uttered a prayer for those responsible: “And when they came to the place that is called ‘The Skull,’ they crucified him there, along with criminals, one on his right and the other on his left. And Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.’” (Luke 23:33-34) As it turns out, this prayer of Jesus cannot be found in the oldest manuscripts which date back to about 200 C.E. It’s first found in manuscripts produced during the Middle Ages.
• The Christian scribes—whether of the early centuries or of the Middle Ages—not only copied scripture, they changed scripture. Sometimes they didn’t mean to – they were simply tired, or inattentive, or on occasion, inept. At other times, though, they meant to make changes, as when they wanted the text to emphasize precisely what they personally believed about the nature of Christ, or about the role of women in the church, or about the wicked character of their Jewish opponents. (In the 1950s, Jehovah’s Witnesses rewrote the Bible, calling it The New World Translation, to make it fit their unique beliefs. So it should not come as a surprise that this type of thing happened many, many times in the long history of the Bible.)

How the Bible was finalized -- a basic history…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXFYgI5kld4

I did my research and talked to several friends. As it turns out, Rick and his wife, Inez, are fully committed to a very unique ministry that exposes the false teachings and hypocrisy of the Watchtower Society. It didn’t take me long to decide to appear on his show.

Fearon’s site, along with FreeMinds.org, Ex-JW.com, and BRCI.org , to name just a few, are all doing a great job sharing the truth about this dangerous cult.

I dialed into the show at 6:35 PM and listened in on an active conversation between several ex-JWs and people studying cult behavior. One of the alarming observations came from a disfellowshipped woman whose son was a known pedophile. She knew that he and society would be better off if he was in jail, but his local congregation’s elders were protecting him. They had no intention of reporting him to the local police because they believed his confession and resolve to stop his sordid behavior was enough evidence for them to forgive him of his sins.

At 7:00 PM, Rick closed the outside lines so that only the two of us could talk while assuring his phoned-in audience that there were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of listeners already listening to the call.

Rick spoke for twenty-five minutes, sharing the goals for the Six Screens Ministry and reporting new developments in the activity and loss of members for Jehovah’s Witnesses.

Promptly at 7:25 PM, Rick began the interview. For well over an hour he asked me questions about why I wrote my book, Growing Up in Mama’s Club, what my childhood was like, what I liked and disliked about Bethel, etc.

During the interview, he expressed his belief in the inevitable demise of the Watchtower Society in the very near future – which I took exception to. While I would certainly love to see such a thing happen, cult-like religions exist because they appeal to a certain type of people who cannot find what they are looking for in mainstream religion. All in all, I found Rick an enthusiastic and gracious host.

Finally Rick reopened the telephone lines to allow listeners to ask questions, which I found interesting and challenging. One caller from Kansas asked me to share some of the humorous events that occurred during my childhood. One woman, who had never been a Club member, called to tell me how entertaining my book was. She really enjoyed learning what being a Jehovah’s Witness was like. A caller from Washington expressed concern about the high incidence of child molestation among members of the Club. Another caller from Georgia asked when my sequel, Ghosts from Mama’s Club, would be published. I told him that it would be available in six months.

I enjoyed the nearly three-hour experience on the phone and look forward to hearing good results from Rick and Inez Fearon’s ministry on “Six Screens of the Watchtower” in the months ahead.

Shortly after the conference call, I checked my emails and was pleased to receive the following message from one of my good friends who encouraged me to be on Rick’s show: “I’m two hours into your call and you are doing great. You really hit the ball out of the park. You are calm, logical, and very friendly.”

I’ve been invited to be a guest on an open telephone conference call moderated by Rick Fearon at “Six Screens of the Watchtower” on Saturday, September 26, 2009 at 7:00 PM (EST).

You can get specific information about how to join in and listen to the call at Six Screens of the Watchtower – Conference Calls. Access to the call is free (except for your own long distance call charges, if any), and you will have the ability to participate during the question and answer segment.

Here is the site’s official announcement:
“Richard Kelly author of the book “Growing up in Mama’s Club” will be our guest this Sat. Sept. 26, 2009 7PM EST. What can happen when a child is forced to adhere to strict religious ideology that he or she is unable to comprehend or believe? “Growing Up In Mama’s Club – A Childhood Perspective of Jehovah’s Witnesses” answers that question by disclosing the rare insights of a boy and his day-to-day life experiences grappling with religious confusion for over sixteen years.”

Six Screens of the Watchtower is a good source of information about Jehovah’s Witnesses and the history of the Watchtower Society. It has a wide readership and its bi-weekly conference calls are attended by hundreds of former and current Jehovah’s Witnesses. The website has an audio collection of many of their past calls, many of them that you might find interesting and want to listen to at your leisure. I recommend that you take a few moments and check out Six Screens of the Watchtower.

If you have time, be sure to listen in on Saturday. I’d love to read your comments and impressions of the show.

Instructions on how to join the call:
Call (712) 432-8710. When asked for pin number use #9925. It’s easy to participate. When you come into the conference, you may have to hit *1 to unmute yourself. The conference call takes place every two weeks on Saturday night at 7pm EST.

Check it out…

www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMDbTB6YNAg

He also shares the following 1981 quote from the father of the USA conservative movement, Barry Goldwater: “There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious beliefs. There is no more powerful ally one can claim in a debate than Jesus Christ, or God, or Allah, or whatever one calls this Supreme Being. But like any powerful weapon, the use of God’s name on one’s behalf should be used sparingly. The religious factions that are growing throughout our land are not using their religious clout with wisdom. They are trying to force government leaders into following their position 100 percent. If you disagree with these religious groups on a particular moral issue, they complain, they threaten you with a loss of money or votes or both. I’m frankly sick and tired of these political preachers across this country telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in A, B, C, and D. Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me? And I am even more angry as a legislator who must endure the threats of every religious group who think it has some God-granted right to control my vote on every roll call in the Senate. I’m warning them today: I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of conservatism.”

Today, Douglas Adams says that respected writers and politicians, particularly in the United States, are no longer willing to challenge religious ideas. They are not allowed to say those things. And yet, when you look at it rationally there is no reason why those ideas shouldn’t be as open to debate as any other. Fortunately, it was a Brit, Richard Dawkins, who had the courage to speak up, fervently believing that religious extremists are a serious threat to democracy and human betterment. His book, The God Delusion is easy to read and loaded with facts to support those assertions.

“Oh, but he’s an Atheist,” some will say. But be reminded that people like Einstein and Carl Sagan, to name just a few, did not believe in a personal god. However, that didn’t diminish the scientific data they accumulated and shared in their lifetime.

My mother, a hard-core Jehovah’s Witness, won’t read the book. Her church leaders tell her that it is “the work of the Devil.” That’s a pretty good reason why I think a thinking person would want to do otherwise.

What Richard Dawkins has to say and how he says it in The God Delusion is not only an important work of science, but a clear, articulate warning of what could happen if the current wave of passionate religious irrationality is allowed to continue unchecked. It is one of the best books I have read in the last ten years and I agree with the New York Times Book Review when it said that The God Delusion contained “Lots of good, hard-hitting stuff about the imbecilities of religious fanatics and frauds of all stripes.”

As a boy of fifteen, Samuel Clemens had an acquaintance he was very fond of – a delightful young black man named Jerry – a slave – who had the daily habit of preaching sermons from the top of his master’s woodpile. He imitated the pulpit style of the clergymen of his day, and did it well. One of Jerry’s favorite texts was, “You tell me whar a man gits his corn pone, en I’ll tell what his ‘pinions is.”

It seems that the black philosopher’s idea was that a man is not independent, and cannot afford views which might interfere with his bread and butter. If he was to prosper, he had to train with the majority; in matters like politics and religion, he had to think and feel with the bulk of his neighbors, or suffer damage in his social standing. In other words, he had to restrict himself to corn-pone opinions – at least on the surface. He must get his opinions from other people; he must reason out none for himself; he must have no first-hand views.

Mark Twain thought Jerry was right, in the main, but he did not go far enough. It was Twain’s belief that a man conforms to the majority view of his locality by calculation and intention; that a coldly-thought-out and independent verdict upon a fashion in clothes, or manners, or literature, or politics, or religion is a most rare thing – if indeed it ever existed. Basic human instinct moved one to conformity. It is man’s nature to conform; it is a force which not many can successfully resist. The cause is the inborn requirement of self-approval. And its source is the approval of other people.

We get our notions and habits and opinions from outside influences; we don’t study them. We are creatures of outside influences; as a rule we do not think, we only imitate.

The outside influences are always pouring in upon us, and we are always obeying their orders and accepting their verdicts. Morals, religions, politics, get their following from surrounding influences and atmospheres, almost entirely; not from study, not from thinking.

Why are Catholics, Catholics; Baptists, Baptists; Jehovah’s Witnesses, Jehovah’s Witnesses; Republicans, Republicans; and Democrats, Democrats? Mark Twain believed it is a matter of association and sympathy, not reasoning and examination, that hardly a man in the world has an opinion upon religion or politics which he got otherwise than through his associations and sympathies. Broadly speaking, there is nothing but corn-pone opinions. And broadly speaking, corn-pone stands for self-approval.

Men think they think upon great political questions, and they do; but they think with their party, not independently. They arrive at convictions, but they are drawn from a partial view of the matter in hand which is of no particular value.

We all do no end of feeling, and we mistake it for thinking. Its name is Public Opinion. It is held in reverence. It settles everything. Some think it’s the Voice of God.

Now I don’t know if my awareness of corn-pone opinions is why I have no religious affiliation or why I can’t join a political party. But I’m not ashamed to admit that a lot of what I believe, I learned from Mark Twain. Like he said, “The trouble with the world is not that people know so little, but that they know so many things that ain’t so.”

Who can it be knocking at my door?
Go ‘way, don’t come ’round here no more.
Can’t you see that it’s late at night?
I’m very tired, and I’m not feeling right.
All I wish is to be alone;
Stay away, don’t you invade my home.”

(Lyrics by Men At Work)

“Easily recognizable by their tracts and immaculate appearance, Jehovah’s Witnesses have been going door to door for decades, spreading religious dogma, doing their bit to share their interpretation of the bible, and looking for converts.

“For obvious reasons this isn’t the easiest task in the world, and when you consider that this is all done on a voluntary basis, ( in the sense that you don’t get paid) it becomes even more remarkable that people would be motivated to rise to the challenge.

“To quote British comedian Tommy Cooper:

“The recruitment consultant asked me ‘What do you think of voluntary work?’ I said ‘I wouldn’t do it if you paid me.’ ”

“This book offers insights into ‘The Club’ through the eyes of a young man whose mother fully embraced JW doctrine, and found the spiritual guidance that she was desperately seeking at that time of her life. Naturally, his mother expected her family to join her on the path to eternal life in a New World, and despite early resistance, she succeeded in converting her husband, and together they set the rules for their children.

“Young Dickie was an unwilling participant, quickly concluding that something seemed wrong with some of the rules and beliefs, which would sometimes change drastically depending on the Club president at the time. Mainly to please his mother, he remained with the Club for sixteen years, abiding by the strange rules for the most part, participating in the long and frequent Club meetings at the Kingdom Hall and performing his door-to-door duties. At the same time he found himself leading a double life, as he never fully embraced the teachings of the Club and wished to lead a more normal life.

“Despite having his parents’ religious beliefs forced upon him, he managed to make the best of it, becoming an accomplished public speaker and perfecting his interpersonal skills. He also formed his own opinions on ‘the truth’ as preached by Club members, and observed how some rules seemed not to apply to the upper levels of the hierarchy.

“From this book, the reader will have a better understanding of this controversial religious group, the administrative structure and its influence over its members. Well written, easy to read, humorous in places and shocking in others, anyone considering joining JW or any similar group should read this before making a final decision.”