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President Eisenhower and his Jehovah's Witness background.
by Joker10 13 years ago 14 Replies latest 4 years ago   jw experiences
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Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago


President Eisenhower's JW Background.
Introduction
The story of the religious upbringing of the Eisenhower boys is critically important in understanding both the Watchtower and the boys themselves. The most dominant religious influence in the Eisenhower home from the time the boys were young was Watchtower theology and beliefs. Both parents were deeply involved and highly committed to much of the Watchtower theology throughout most of their children's formative years. Ida probably took the lead religiously, and David Eisenhower later became disillusioned with many Watchtower teachings; nonetheless the religion also influenced him later in life.
As adults, none of the Eisenhower boys formally followed the Witness teachings and theology and even tried to hide their Jehovah's Witness upbringing. The eldest son, Arthur, once stated that he could not accept the religious dogmas of his parents although he had "his mother's religion" in his heart (Kornitzer, 1955:64).
Although none of Mrs. Eisenhower's boys were what she and other Witnesses called "in the truth," she was hopeful that they would someday again embrace the religion in which they were raised. They openly rejected much of the Watchtower theology and medical ideas, especially its eschatology and millennial teachings. Nonetheless their Witness upbringing clearly influenced them. Even in later life, Dwight preferred "the informal church service" with "vigorous singing and vigorous preaching" like he grew up with (Dodd, 1963:233). Ida was relatively supportive of them during most of their careers, often stating that she was proud of them and their accomplishments, even those achievements that violated her Watchtower faith.



 Born on October 14, 1890 at Denison, Texas, Dwight D. Eisenhower became the thirty-fourth President of the United States. He served for two terms, from 1953 to 1961. His parents, David and Ida Eisenhower, owned a modest two-story white framed house on South 4th Street in Abilene, Kansas. Ida, a frugal hard-working woman, planted a large garden on their three acre lot to raise much of the family's produce needs. Neal claimed that the Eisenhower's were able to feed their growing family only because of this small farm which included cows, chickens, a smokehouse, fruit trees and a large vegetable garden (Neal, 1984). Dwight and his five brothers (Arthur (b. 1886), Roy (b. 1892), Earl (b. 1898), and Milton (b. 1899) plus David) were raised in Abilene, Kansas.
The values of Dwight "Ike" Eisenhower's parents and their home environment reflected themselves in the enormous success of all of their children. Probably the most dominant influence in the Eisenhower home was religion, primarily the Jehovah's Witnesses (known as Bible Students until 1931) and to a much lesser extent the River Brethren (Dodd, 1994).
Both parents were active in the Watchtower during most of the Eisenhower children's formative years. Eisenhower's mother, Ida Eisenhower, stated she became involved with the Watchtower in 1895 when she was 34 and Dwight was only five years old (Cole, 1955:190). Ida was baptized in 1898, meaning she was then a Jehovah's Witnesses minister.
Furthermore, Ida did not flirt with her involvement in the Witnesses as claimed by some but "was a faithful member of Jehovah's Witnesses for 50 years" (Fleming 1955:1). In Dwight's words she had "an inflexible loyalty to her religious convictions." According to the current Watchtower president Milton G. Henshel, "Ida Eisenhower was one of the most energetic [Watchtower] preachers in Abilene" (Fleming, 1955:1). The Watchtower Society had a major religious influence on Dwight until 1914 when he went to West Point (Dodd, 1959; Eisenhower, 1969).



Ida grew up in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley and originally attended a Lutheran Church. Hutchinson concluded Ida showed a "deep interest in religion from her earliest years" (1954:364). As a school girl Ida studied the Bible extensively and quoted freely from it--she once memorized 1,365 Biblical verses in six months, a fact cited with pride by several of her sons (Neal, 1984:13). The Sunday school records in the Lutheran Church at Mount Sidney near Staunton, Virginia, still contain her Bible memorizing record.
Eisenhower's parents met when they were both students at a small United Brethren college in Lecompton, Kansas called Lane University. After they married at Lecompton on September 23, 1885, they both dropped out of college (Hatch, 1944). Although they each completed only one term, their desire for education persisted--and reflected itself in their strong support for their sons' educations (Kornitzer, 1955). Evidently it was Ida's husband who introduced Ida to the group popularly called River Brethren partly because many of his relatives were involved in this community.
Neither David or Ida ever became deeply involved in this sect, although, it is often incorrectly stated that "Ida and David Eisenhower were River Brethren" (Miller, 1987:77-78). David's father Jacob and his brothers Ira and Abraham were members, but Ike's cousin, the Reverend Ray L. Witter, son of A.L. Witter, claimed that, although Ida and David came to Brethren services for several years, neither was ever an actual member nor did they regularly attend for any length of time (Miller, 1987:77-78; Dodd, 1959:221).
Close family friend R.C. Tonkin even stated that he "never knew any of the family to attend the River Brethren Church" (Tonkin, 1952:48). Both church records and oral history indicate that Dwight attended around 1906 for less than a year (Sider, 1994). Note: The term River Brethren is commonly used in the literature which discusses President Eisenhower, but the officially registered name during the Civil War and after is The Brethren in Christ Church. The term River Brethren is used here because virtually all references to Eisenhower's religion use this term. This term caught on because the first churches were located near rivers.
Evidence that Dwight may have occasionally attended Sunday school at Abilene's River Brethren Church includes the claim by John Dayhoff (listed in the 1906 church records as a member of Dwight's class) that he went to Sunday school with him. When Dwight did attend according to the regular teacher, Ida Hoffman, he evidently "never seemed to pay any attention or take any interest in the lesson" (Davis, 1952:49). Three of the Eisenhower children including Dwight are listed in the 1906 Souvenir Report of the Brethren Sunday School of Abilene, Kansas as involved in the church, but no mention is made of their parents. The listing of the three boys was likely partly due to the influence of Jacob, Dwight's grandfather, an active River Brethren Church minister until his death in May of 1906.
When David's Uncle Abraham, a self-taught veterinarian, decided to became an itinerant preacher he rented his house to David on the condition that Jacob could live there (Lyon, 1974; Dodd, 1963). David Eisenhower's family then moved into Abraham's house at 201 Southeast Fourth Street. David was also connected with the River Brethren through his employment at the church-owned Bella Springs Creamery. He worked at the Creamery from the time he moved to Abilene until he retired (Ambrose, 1983:19-20).
The many other relatives and friends who were River Brethren also likely had some influence on Dwight's religious development. He was physically and emotionally surrounded by aunts, uncles, grandfathers and a great-grandfather, most of whom were lay members or preachers in one of the Brethren or Holiness sects (Dodd, 1994). Gladys Dodd concluded the Brethren, whom Dwight joined on occasion for worship, "were a clannish lot, glued together by common ties of unique appearance and modes of baptism, abhorrence of war, and the like" (Dodd, 1994:1).




A major catalyst that precipitated Dwight's parents leaving the River Brethren and joining the Watchtower involved Ike's eight-month old brother, Paul, who died of diphtheria in 1895. This tragedy devastated the Eisenhower's, and the theological explanation that Paul is in heaven provided by the River Brethren did not satisfy them. At this time, three neighborhood women were able to comfort the Eisenhower's with the hope that they would soon see their son. This comfort was the Russellite teaching that death was merely sleep, and that all those in the grave will be resurrected shortly. In 1895 it was taught that this resurrection would occur in the new world which was expected to arrive before 1914, a mere nine years away then (Gruss, 1976). The three women - Mrs. Clara Witt, Mrs. Mary Thayer, and Mrs. Emma Holland - also sold Ida a set of volumes which were then titled Millennial Dawn (later renamed Studies in the Scriptures) and a subscription to Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence, now named The Watchtower. Ida soon became involved and influenced her husband to join a short time later.
David and Ida's interest in Armageddon (the war the Watchtower teaches God will destroy all of the wicked, i.e. all non Witnesses) and the imminent return of Christ was highly influenced by the Watchtower preoccupation with end times events, especially the date of Armageddon. Likely, too, other acquaintances aside from Watchtower followers shared an interest in end-times date predicting including by their uncles Abraham and Ira, both of whom were evidently influenced by the end-times date speculation of the Tabor, Iowa evangelistic sect called the Hephzibah Faith Missionary Association (Dodd, 1994:2).
Dodd concluded from her extensive study of the Eisenhower family religious involvement that Ida soon became a "faithful and dedicated Witness and actively engaged as [a] colporteur [missionary] for the Watch Tower Society until her death" (Dodd, 1959:245). Soon the force that dominated the lives of everyone who lived in the Eisenhower frame house in Abilene was religion (Kornitzer, 1955:134). Dwight Eisenhower's faith was "rooted in his parents' Biblical heritage," and the Eisenhower boys' upbringing was "steeped" in religion (Fox 1969:907; Lyon, 1974:38).
The Eisenhower's held weekly Watchtower meetings in their parlor where the boys took turns reading from and discussing Watchtower publications and Scripture. Dwight Eisenhower was also involved in these studies--he claimed that he had read the Bible completely through twice before he was eighteen (Jameson, 1969:9). Ambrose concluded that the degree of religious involvement of the Eisenhower boys was so extensive that
David read from the Bible before meals, then asked a blessing. After dinner, he brought out the Bible again. When the boys grew old enough, they took turns reading. Ida organized meetings of the ... Watchtower Society, which met on Sundays in her parlor. She played her piano and led the singing. Neither David nor Ida ever smoked or drank, or played cards, or swore, or gambled (Ambrose 1983:19-20).
This upbringing no doubt had a major influence on all of the Eisenhower boys. R.G. Tonkin estimated that when the Eisenhower boys were young the size of the class was "about fifteen people" (1952:48).
The Watchtower followers met in Eisenhower's home until 1915 when the growth of the local congregation forced them to rent a local hall for their services. Later a large Watchtower meeting house (now called a Kingdom Hall) was built in Abilene (Dodd, 1959:244). The composition of early Russellite group in Abilene is described by Dodd as follows:
Mary Thayer first introduced the Watch Tower to the Eisenhower's. This company together with L.D. Toliver and the R.O. Southworths constituted the nucleus of the Abilene congregation of Russellites. From 1896 until 1915, the Bible Students ... met on Sunday afternoons at the Eisenhower home for their meetings. During most of this twenty year period, David Eisenhower (and occasionally L.D. Toliver) served the class as the Bible-study conductor, or "elder" as the group called its leader (1959:236).
Ida remained active in the Watchtower her whole life. In a letter to a fellow Witness Ida stated she has "been in the truth since ninety six [1896 and I] ... am still in ... it has been a comfort to me ... Naomi Engle stay [sic] with me and she is a witness too so my hope [sic] are good" (Fleming, 1955:3; Cole, 1955:192).



Dwight was also influenced by the religious ideas of his father, David Eisenhower. Although his early upbringing was in the River Brethren and he briefly attended the Lutheran, then later the Methodist church before and during his college days, he converted to the Watchtower a few years after his wife did. David Eisenhower actively served the Watchtower for many years as an elder and Bible study conductor, a role which he occasionally alternated with L.D. Toliver (Dodd, 1959:225). Neal even claimed that David Eisenhower was led by the Watchtower into "mysticism" because of David's use of "an enormous wall chart" of the Egyptian pyramids to predict the future. David taught his boys Watchtower last-days theology from this chart when they were growing up. The ten feet high and six feet wide chart "according to David . . . contained prophecies for the future as well as confirmation of biblical events. Captivated by the bizarre drawing . . . [Dwight] spent hours studying David's creation" (Neal, 1984:13).
This pyramid chart was of the Pyramid of Giza in Egypt and in fact was a central teaching of the Bible Students (Dodd, 1959:242). The chart was first published by the Watchtower in Millennial Dawn, Vol. 1 in 1898 and a large wall size version was available later. The chart played a prominent role in Watchtower theology for more than 35 years and was of such importance to David that his
. . . religious beliefs materialized in the form of an impressive (five or six feet high, ten feet long) wall chart of the Egyptian pyramids, by means of which he proved to his own satisfaction that the lines of the pyramids--outer dimensions, inner passageways, angles of chambers, and so on--prophesied later Biblical events and other events still in the future. As might be expected, this demonstration fascinated his children; the chart came to be one of the family's most prized possessions (Lyon, 1974:38).
Russell obtained from the Pyramid many of his prophesies, especially the year 1914 when the end of the world was expected to occur (Franz, 1993:20). The pyramid was also used to confirm Watchtower dispensational theology. Earl Eisenhower claimed that his father used the chart when he was in the Watchtower to prove "to his own satisfaction that the Bible was right in its prophecies" (Kornitzer, 1955:136).
The pyramid was of such major importance to early Watchtower theology that a huge ten foot concrete pyramid was selected as a fitting memorial to C. T. Russell when he died. It still stands close to Russell's grave near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Russell specifically condemned mysticism as demonism and taught that the pyramid had nothing to do with mysticism but was a second revelation, a "Bible in stone" which both added to and confirmed the Holy Scripture record (Russell, 1904:313-376).
A few years later, the second president of the Watchtower, Joseph F. Rutherford, condemned the pyramid teaching in no uncertain terms, one of many of his doctrinal changes that initiated several Watchtower schisms (Rutherford, 1928; Dodd, 1959:243). Dodd noted that the chart was still in the family home as late as 1944, but in 1957 she could no longer locate it in either the family home or the Eisenhower museum nearby and learned that the chart and other Watchtower effects were disposed of (Dodd, 1959:242-243). Dodd concluded the Watchtower items were probably destroyed by the family to reduce their embarrassment over their parents' involvement in the Jehovah's Witnesses. David's commitment to the Watchtower eventually changed and later he openly became an opposer.
Dodd concludes that "by 1919 David Eisenhower's interest in Russell had definitely waned and before his death in 1942 he is said to have renounced the doctrine of Russell" (1959:224). In a letter to Edward Ford, David stated that one factor causing his disillusionment with the Watchtower was the failure of their end of the world prophecies including 1914 and 1915 (Ford, 1995). After he left the Watchtower fellowship, his son Arthur claimed that David remained a student of the Scriptures, and his religious "reading habits were confined to the Bible, or anything related to the Bible" but not Watchtower literature. Although, the Bible was central to David Eisenhower's thinking, Milton added that his father also "read history, serious magazines, newspapers, and religion literature" (Kornitzer, 1955:261).
Edgar Eisenhower stated that his father left the Watchtower partly because he "couldn't go along with the sheer dogma that was so much a part of their thinking." His sons later adamantly claimed that David accompanied his wife on Watchtower activities primarily in an effort to appease her. Watchtower accounts usually referred only to Ida as a Witness, supporting the conclusion that David had left the Watchtower after 1915.
David Eisenhower died in March of 1942 at the age of 78. At this time Ida's nurse, Naomi Engle, was, "a strong-willed Witness who arranged a Jehovah's Witness funeral for David even though he had made it clear before his death that he was no longer a [Watchtower] believer" (Miller, 1987:80). The service was conducted by Witness James L. Thayer assisted by another Witness, Fred K. Southworth.




The Eisenhower's Watchtower involvement created many family conflicts. The Russellites taught that the Brethren and all other churches were not pleasing to God. Their second president, lawyer Joseph F. Rutherford (1916-1942), viciously attacked all religion with slogans such as all "religion is a snare and a racket" (Dodd, 1959). The Watchtower under Rutherford even taught all priests and ministers are of Satan leading their flocks to eternal damnation (Bergman, 1999). As a result of this and other teachings, Dodd observed that the River Brethren and other denominations at the turn of the century:
... were rabidly opposed to Russellism. As late as 1913 ... the Evangelical Visitor advertised a pamphlet entitled "The Blasphemous Religion which teaches the Annihilation of Jesus Christ" as the "best yet publication against Russellism" and the editor thought every River Brethren minister should read it. In 1928, one of the Brethren ministers, Abraham Eisenhower (David's brother), wrote to the Evangelical Visitor concerning Russellism: "Oh, fool-hearted nonsense. It is the devil's asbestos blanket to cover up the realities of a hell fire judgment. The word of God will tear off this infamous lie and expose the realities of an existence of life after death." This strong statement would reflect the general attitude of most of the Eisenhower's (Dodd, 1959:246).
The River Brethren have much in common with the Mennonites, and both were once called "the plain people" because of their simple lifestyle and dress. Although the sect has generally modernized and even in the early 1900s they no longer placed as much emphasis on details of clothing as formerly, they were still comparatively strict in the 1800s. Marriage could be dissolved only by death, hard physical work was a prime virtue, and after the turn of the century members could not use or even grow tobacco.
The early Watchtower teachings were also similar in some ways to the River Brethren, both of which have in major ways changed since the Eisenhower's became involved in 1895 (Dodd, 1959). Furthermore, "a number of the River Brethren had become followers of Russell" (Dodd, 1959:234). Although major differences existed especially in doctrine, the many similarities include both groups were pietistic Protestant conservative sects opposed to war, although on somewhat different grounds. Both sects also stressed the importance of Biblical study, both condemned many worldly habits and both were then very concerned about the last days prophesy and eschatology.




Dwights religious background is discussed by many writers, but most contain much misinformation. The misinformation about the religion of Dwight's parents is compounded by the fact that many Eisenhower biographies and even writings by the Eisenhower sons often declined to fully and honestly acknowledge their parents' actual religious affiliation (Fleming, 1955:1; Eisenhower, 1969). In a collection of personal recollections Edgar Eisenhower admitted only
Our parents' religious interests switched to a sect known as the Bible Students. The meetings were held at our house, and everyone made his own interpretation of the Scripture lessons. Mother played the piano, and they sang hymns before and after each meeting. It was a real old time prayer meeting. They talked to God, read Scriptures, and everyone got a chance to state his relationship with Him. Their ideas of religion were straightforward and simple. I have never forgotten those Scripture lessons, nor the influence they have had on my life. Simple people taking a simple approach to God. We couldn't have forgotten because mother impressed those creeds deep in our memories. Even after I had grown up, every letter I received from her, until the day she died, ended with a passage from the Bible (McCullun, 1960:21).
Even President Eisenhower's spiritual mentor and close friend, Billy Graham, was led to believe that Eisenhower's parents "had been River Brethren, a small but devoutly pious group in the Mennonite tradition." Many authors referred to the Watchtower faith only as "fundamentalists" or "Bible students," the latter term the Jehovah's Witnesses used only up until 1931 (Beschloss, 1990; Knorr, 1955). Lyon even stated
The specific nature of the religion is uncertain. The parents appear to have left the River Brethren for a more primitive and austere sect, something referred to as the Bible Students, and they would later gravitate to the evangelical sect known as Jehovah's Witnesses (Lyon, 1974:38).
Bela Kornitzer mentions only that the Eisenhower's were "Bible Students," had "fundamentalist religious beliefs" and studied "the writings of 'Pastor Russell'" but does not mention that Russell was the Watchtower founder (1955:14, 22, 32). (When Russell died in 1916 his writings were almost immediately replaced those of the new president, "Judge" J.F. Rutherford, resulting in several major schisms in the movement and their transformation into Jehovah's Witnesses).
Even works that include extensive discussions of Eisenhower's religious upbringing, such as the aforementioned Bela Kornitzer's book, discuss primarily his River Brethren religious background which had influenced Dwight primarily during his preschool years, if at all.
A Drew Pearson column stated that President Eisenhower's mother "once sold Bible tracts for the Jehovah's Witnesses," implying that she only flirted with the Witnesses and was never deeply involved (1956:6). Edmund Fuller and David Green, after claiming that Eisenhower's parents were River Brethren, noted that the President's grandfather was the Reverend Jacob Eisenhower, a Brethren minister, and that "the Eisenhower boys' religious training was strict, fundamentalist, and somewhat Puritanical. They were well schooled in Scripture" (1968:213).
Even more common is to totally omit the name of the predominant religion that Dwight was raised in and its importance in the Eisenhower boy's formative years (For example see Larson, 1968). In one of the most detailed histories of Eisenhower's early life, Davis said only that Ida later "sought out an even more 'primitive' and rigid Christianity" than River Brethren, leaving the reader up in the air as to what this group might be (1952:111). An extensive search by the author of the major depositories of President Eisenhower's letters and papers revealed he wrote virtually nothing about his feelings about the Watchtower or even religion in general except that reviewed here.
The Eisenhower boys' Watchtower background is not widely known or acknowledged likely also in part due to the antagonism many people had then, and still have today, against the Watchtower (Sellers, 1990). This antagonism is illustrated in the wording of a quote claiming that "late in life" Ida became, "of all things, a member of the sect known as Jehovah's Witnesses..." (Gunther, 1951:52).
Accounts of the Eisenhower family history commonly repeat the claim that Dwight's parents were River Brethren or were not directly involved with the Watchtower (Miller, 1944). Typical is a Time article that stated only that Ike's "parents were members of the River Brethren, a Mennonite sect," adding that "along with their piety, the Eisenhower's gave their sons a creed of self-starting individualism" (Time, Apr. 4, 1969:20). Another account claims that Eisenhower's parents were members of a Protestant sect called the River Brethren and brought up their children in an old-fashioned atmosphere of puritanical morals. Prayer and Bible reading were a daily part of their lives. Violence was forbidden, though in a family of six boys the edict was a bit hard to enforce (Whitney, 1967:311).




According to Pearson, when confronted with his religious ancestry, David Eisenhower looked for a
delicate way to clear the family name of this affiliation. He is sensitive about the fact that the Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe in saluting the flag or serving under arms. At the same time, he doesn't want to appear prejudiced against any religious sect. Both Ike and his brother, Milton, have discussed the problem with spiritual advisors. But they haven't quite figured out how to disclaim Ida Eisenhower's relations with the Jehovah's Witnesses without offending the sect and perhaps stirring up charges of religious prejudice (Pearson, 1956:6).
Pearson also adds the often repeated claim that "Ida was influenced in her old age by a nurse who belonged to the sect. Being Bible-minded, old Mrs. Eisenhower cheerfully agreed to help the Jehovah's Witnesses peddle Bible tracts. Actually, both of Dwight's parents were staunch members of a small sect called River Brethren" (Pearson, 1956:6). Ironically in a Drew Pearson column published only three months earlier, Jack Anderson said, "Ike is strangely sensitive about his parents' religion. They were Jehovah's Witnesses, though the authorized biographies call them 'River Brethren....'
Both Dwight and his brother Milton checked the manuscript of Bela Kornitzer's book, 'Story of the Five Eisenhower Brothers.' Afterward Milton privately asked Kornitzer to delete a reference to their parents' membership in the Witnesses sect" (Anderson, 1956:16b). In one of the last interviews given by the family, Milton said only that "we were raised as a fundamentalist family. Mother and father knew the Bible from one end to the other" (Quoted in Freeze, 1975:25). The Watchtower's response to this common omission was as follows:
Though Time magazine claimed Ida Stover Eisenhower was a member of the River Brethren, a Mennonite sect, Time was merely continuing its consistent policy of slander in all that pertains to Jehovah's witnesses. She was never a River Brethren. She was one of Jehovah's witnesses. The first study in the Watchtower magazine in Abilene, Kans., started in her home in 1895. Her home was the meeting-place till 1915, when a hall was obtained. She continued a regular publisher with Jehovah's witnesses till 1942, when failing health rendered her inactive; but she remained a staunch believer (Knorr, 1946:7).
Kornitzer specifically endeavored to determine the source of Dwight Eisenhower's "greatness," concluding that it came from his family and their values. In Dwight's words, his mother was "deeply religious," and he once stated that his mother
had gravitated toward a local group known as The Bible Class. In this group, which had no church minister, she was happy. Sunday meetings were always held in the homes of members, including ours. The unusual program of worship included hymns, for which mother played the piano, and prayers, with the rest of the time devoted to group discussion of a selected chapter of the Bible (1967:305)..
Although the group preferred the label Bible Students before 1931, when they met they usually did not study the Bible but primarily Watchtower publications.
In the early 1900s the study focus was a set of books called Studies in the Scriptures written by C.T. Russell and his wife, and also the current issues of The Watchtower magazine. Although the Eisenhower boys usually skirted around the issue of their religious upbringing, Dwight Eisenhower once openly acknowledged that the group his parents were involved with was the Jehovah's Witnesses:
there was, eventually, a kind of loose association with similar groups throughout the country ... chiefly through a subscription to a religious periodical, The Watchtower. After I left home for the Army, these groups were drawn closer together and finally adopted the name of Jehovah's Witnesses (1967:305).
Eisenhower then adds, "They were true conscientious objectors to war. Though none of her sons could accept her conviction in this matter, she refused to try to push her beliefs on us just as she refused to modify her own" (1967:305). Conversely Dwight's mother was not happy about her sons violation of Watchtower beliefs especially their attitudes toward war.
Many reporters termed Dwight's mother "a religious pacifist" (for example see Life Magazine, 1969) as Dwight did. The Watchtower has established in the courts that they are not pacifists but conscientious objectors, opposed only to wars initiated and carried out by humans. The Watchtower teaches that involvement in war, except those that God wants us to fight, is not only a violation of God's law that "thou shalt not kill" and "thou shall love thy neighbor" but is also wrong because Watchtower doctrine considers it an improper use of time in these last days before Armageddon. They taught their followers to be dedicated to converting others before the end, which since the late 1800s has been taught by the Watchtower to be "just around the corner." They are in their words "conditional pacifists" although the Watchtower often argues against all war on pacifist grounds. In Dwight's words, his mother "was opposed to militarism because of her religious beliefs" (Kornitzer, 1955:87).
Jehovah's Witnesses then also eschewed all political involvement because they felt--and still teach today--that the soon-to-be-established kingdom of God on earth--the millennium--was the only solution to all worldly problems (Kornitzer, 1955:276). In Milton Eisenhower's words, his parents were as good Jehovah's Witnesses "more concerned with the millennium which, unfortunately, hadn't come in their day, than they were with contemporary social institutions" (Kornitzer, 1955:278). All of the Eisenhower boys disagreed with the Watchtower view in this area. Milton also stated his parents were aloof from politics but ". . . as I became older, I used to hold many conversations with them in a futile attempt to show them that they were wrong" (Kornitzer, 1955:277). Of course, as Watchtower followers, Ida and, until he left, David were not allowed to be involved in politics--even voting became a disfellowshipping offense in the 1940's.
Often Ida's alleged pacifism is given as the reason for her opposition to Ike's military career when the actual reason was Watchtower theology. An example was her reaction to his leaving for West Point in the summer of 1911, as reported by Pickett. At this time Dwight's
. . . mother and twelve-year-old brother Milton were the only family members there to see him off. His mother was unable to say a thing, Milton remembered, "I went out on the west porch with mother as Ike started uptown, carrying his suitcase, to take the train. Mother stood there like a stone statue and I stood right by her until Ike was out of sight. Then she came in and went to her room and bawled" (Pickett, 1995:8).
Alden Hatch, after recounting the consternation Ida had over Dwight attending West Point--to the extent she hoped he would fail the entrance exam so he would not go, claims that the reason was her "abhorrence to war" (Hatch, 1944:21). Ida's opposition was actually for several reasons, and consequently she hid from her sons her "weakened faith" and "grief" that resulted from Ike's pursuing a military career. The Eisenhower sons' embarrassment about their parents' involvement in the Watchtower is vividly revealed in the following account:
Both Ida and David, but especially Ida, were avid readers of The Watchtower, and at the time of Ida's death there was a fifty-year collection in the house on South East Fourth Street. The publication had arrived by mail from 1896 to 1946. It was Milton who bundled up the fifty-year collection of the presumably embarrassing magazines and got them out of the Eisenhower house and away from the eyes of reporters. He gave them to a neighbor and Witness (Miller, 1987:79).
The neighbor was Mrs. James L. Thayer, one of the women that originally converted Mrs. Eisenhower. The disposal of Dwight's parent's Watchtower literature, charts and other Watchtower items was only one indication of the many conflicts the Eisenhower boys likely experienced over their parent's esoteric religion. These conflicts may be one reason why none of them ever became involved in the Watchtower or even a fundamentalist church.
Another account illustrates the press' tendency to avoid revealing the Eisenhower parents' Watchtower involvement. When Ike graduated from West Point Military Academy in 1915, his mother presented to him a copy of the American Standard version of the Bible used by the Watchtower because it consistently used the term "Jehovah" for God. When Ike was sworn in as president for his second term, this Bible was used (see photograph London Daily News Feb 2, 1957:1). The press reports of this account, though, usually did not quote the words the President actually read which were "Blessed is the nation whose God is Jehovah" but instead substituting the word "Lord" for "Jehovah." The Watchtower concluded that this misquote was an attempt to distance President Eisenhower from his parents' faith by not using a term that was at this time intimately connected with the Jehovah's Witnesses sect (Knorr, 1957:323-324).
Why were the Eisenhower's (and the press) so reticent about honestly revealing the religion of their parents? One reason is revealed in an article published in the official Watchtower magazine called Awake!
On September 11, 1946, Mrs. Ida Stover Eisenhower died in Abilene, Kans. Private services were conducted at the home, and public services were handled by an army chaplain from Ft. Riley. Was that in respect for Mrs. Eisenhower? Pallbearers were three American Legionnaires and three Veterans of Foreign Wars. Was that appropriate? ... In 1942 her husband, also one of Jehovah's witnesses, died. One of Jehovah's witnesses preached the funeral service. Mrs. I.S. Eisenhower, like all Jehovah's witnesses, believed religion a racket and the clergy in general, including army chaplains, to be hypocrites. She harbored no special pride for "General Ike;" she was opposed to his West Point appointment. It was gross disrespect to the deceased for an army chaplain to officiate at the funeral.
As for the pallbearers. The American Legion particularly, and also the Veterans of Foreign Wars, are repeatedly ringleaders in mob violence against Jehovah's witnesses. Hundreds of instances could be cited, but illustrative is the one occurring the Sunday before Mrs. Eisenhower's death, in near-by Iowa. There war veterans broke up a public Bible meeting of Jehovah's witnesses, doing much physical violence. Hardly appropriate, then, was it, for such to act as pallbearers? Only death could keep the body of Mrs. Eisenhower from walking away from a funeral so disrespectful of all that she stood for (Knorr, 1946:7).
Unfortunately, this article did not discuss how the Watchtower's teachings and policy on military service, education and involvement in "false religion" contributed to the conflicts noted in the above quote. Dwight's religious orientation as an adult was described as "moderate and tolerant, simple and firm," quite in contrast to the confrontative, pugnacious Watchtower sect of the first half of this century (Fox, 1969:907).
Other reasons for the press' and the Eisenhower boys' lack of honesty about their Watchtower background include embarrassment over the Watchtower's opposition to the flag salute and all patriotic activities, vaccinations and medicine in general, the germ theory and their advocating many ineffectual medical "cures" including phrenology, radio solar pads, radiesthesia, radionics, iridiagnosis, the grape cure, and their staunch opposition to the use of aluminum cooking utensils and Fluoridation of drinking water. Dwight Eisenhower had good reasons to hide his Watchtower background when he ran for president. Roy noted that Eisenhower's religious background was used by some to argue that he was not fit to become president:
Both Eisenhower and Stevenson were vigorously challenged by some Protestant[s]...for their religious ties. The association of Eisenhower's mother with the Jehovah's Witnesses was exploited to make the GOP candidate appear as an "anti-Christian cultist" and a "foe of patriotism" (Roy, 1953).
The thesis that the Eisenhower boys were embarrassed by their parents' Watchtower involvement is supported by the problem which developed when the Watchtower tried to exploit Mrs. Eisenhower's name for their advantage. One reason for the Eisenhower boys' concern was because Jehovah's Witnesses were generally scorned by most churches and society in general, especially at the turn of the century. Virtually no college-educated people were members, and the education level even today is still extremely low, among the lowest of all religious denominations (Cosmin and Lachman, 1993). A problem that the Eisenhower boys faced in the 1940s, according to Edgar Eisenhower, was that "the deep, sincere and even evangelical religious fervor" of their mother was used by the Watchtower "to exploit her in her old age" (Kornitzer, 1955:139).
This concern prompted Edgar to write a letter in 1944 to the Jehovah's Witness who was caring for his mother when she was 82. As was the practice then for all members, young and old--and as Jehovah's Witnesses today are well known for-- Witnesses go from door-to-door and "witness" on the street corners, primarily by selling their literature. Edgar evidently felt that the Eisenhower name was being exploited in this work and objected to his mother "being taken out of the home and used for the purpose of distributing [Watchtower] religious literature" (Kornitzer, 1955:139). Edgar added that he was "willing to fight" for his mother's "right to continue to believe as she saw fit, but ... she could be easily and mistakenly influenced in performing any service which would be represented to her as helpful to the advancement of religious beliefs" of the Watchtower (Kornitzer, 1955:139). His concern was that his mother should no longer
be taken from place to place and exhibited as the mother of General Eisenhower--solely for the purpose of attempting to influence anyone [to accept the Watchtower beliefs] ... I want mother shielded and protected and not exposed or exhibited ... mother's home should be maintained solely for her intimate friends and relatives and ... no stranger should be permitted to live in the house regardless of who he may be ... (Kornitzer, 1955:139).
This problem was eventually solved by removing the Jehovah's Witness who was then caring for Ida Eisenhower, Naomi Engle, a lifelong friend and certainly no stranger to Ida, from Ida's home and replacing her with a Mrs. Robinson, a non-Witness. Would Edgar have objected if Ida was allowed to use the Eisenhower name for a cause such as education, health or even a church such as the Lutherans or Methodists? Part of what he likely objected to was what he felt was the Watchtower exploiting her to spread a set of beliefs that he and his brothers firmly and openly disagreed with, i.e., the Watchtower Millennial theology.




When researching Eisenhower's religion "Since so little original documentation exists, most historians have relied on interviews with persons who knew David and Ida" (Branigar 1994:1). Of the large amount of information available, one has to determine which conclusions were historically accurate--sometimes no easy task. One of the most reliable sources is Gladys Dodd's thesis because she used scores of personal interviews with the family, many of whom she was personally acquainted with, to study the religious background of the Eisenhower family in the late 1950s. Unfortunately, some Watchtower sources are questionable.
Dr. Holt, the director of the Dwight D. Eisenhower library in Abilene, Kansas indicates that the Watchtower may be involved in passing documents off as real which are evidently forgeries (1999). Specifically, interviews with family members has led J. Earl Endacott, a former Eisenhower library curator, to conclude that it was a 1944 incident which led to the dismissal of Ida's nurse, Mrs. Engle, who was then an active Jehovah's Witness.
The source of this information was Mrs. Robinson, who became Ida's nurse after Engle's dismissal. She claimed that Engle and another Witness conned Ida to write her name several times on a blank sheet of paper under the pretense of giving her "practice." According to Mrs. Robinson, the most legible signature was then physically cut from the sheet and pasted on the bottom of the letter to Mr. Boeckel which was not written by Mrs. Eisenhower but by Engle. Endacott concluded Engle had "more loyalty to the Witnesses" than to the Eisenhower's to whom she was distantly related. Later "in one of her lucid moments Ida told Mrs. Robinson what had happened and gave the sheet with the cut out name to her. When the Eisenhower foundation took over the home, Mrs. Robinson told me the story and gave me the sheet which I still have" (Endacott, N.D.).
This letter she allegedly wrote was to a Richard Boeckel, a young man who had become a Jehovah's Witness while still in the army (Boeckel, 1980). In August of 1944 Boeckel attended a Watchtower assembly in Denver where he met Lotta Thayer, Ida's neighbor from Abilene. In his conversations with her, Boeckel explained the difficulty of being a Witness in a military environment. Thayer then reportedly told him that her neighbor was General Eisenhower's mother, and added that "she's one of Jehovah's Witnesses" and asked Boeckel if he would like her to write to him (Knorr, 1980:24-29). Boeckel wrote Ida, and part of the letter Ida allegedly wrote back to him stated,
A friend returning from the United Announcers Convention of Jehovah's Witnesses, informs me of meeting you there. I rejoice with you in your privilege of attending such convention. It has been my good fortune in the years gone by to attend these meetings of those faithfully proclaiming the name of Jehovah and his glorious kingdom which shortly now will pour out its rich blessings all over the earth. My friend informs me of your desire to have a word from General Eisenhower's mother whom you have been told is one of the witnesses of Jehovah. I am indeed such and what a glorious privilege it has been in associating with [other Witnesses]. . . . Generally I have refused such requests because of my desire to avoid all publicity. However, because you are a person of good will towards Jehovah God and His glorious Theocracy I am very happy to write you. . . . It was always my desire and my effort to raise my boys in the knowledge of and to reverence their Creator. My prayer is that they all may anchor their hope in the New World, the central feature of which is the Kingdom for which all good people have been praying the past two thousand years. I feel that Dwight my third son will always strive to do his duty with integrity as he sees such duty. I mention him in particular because of your expressed interest in him. And so as the mother of General Eisenhower and as a Witness of and for the Great Jehovah of Hosts (I have been such for the past 49 years) I am pleased to write you and to urge you to faithfulness, as a companion of and servant with those who "keep the commands of God and have the testimony of Jesus" (Quoted in Cole, 1955:194-195).
To encourage Boeckel to accept Watchtower doctrines, the letter mentioned several current events which the Watchtower then taught was evidence that Armageddon would occur very soon, concluding that "Surely this portends that very soon the glorious Theocracy, the long promised kingdom of Jehovah...will rule the entire earth and pour out manifold blessings upon all peoples who are of good will towards Him. All others will be removed [killed at Armageddon]. Again, may I urge your ever faithfulness to these 'Higher Powers' and to the New World now so very near." The letter dated August 20, 1944, evidently had the taped signature "Ida Eisenhower" affixed to it and closed with "Respectfully yours in hope of and as a fighter for the New World" (Cole, 1955:191).
This Ida Eisenhower letter, Endacott concluded, was "not in the words of Ida, who at the time could hardly write her own name" and evidentially she was not always mentally alert although her physical health was good. Her memory started to fail soon after her husband died and was at times so poor that she could not even remember her own son's names (Eisenhower, 1974:188). Furthermore, this letter is very well written quite in contrast to the letter she wrote in her own hand dated 1943 (see Cole 1955). When the Eisenhower sons found out about this event (evidentially a reporter published the letter putatively written by Ida Eisenhower to Mr. Boeckel) and other similar incidences, they wrote to Engle exploiting Ida (Kornitzer 1955). The letter was evidentially ignored by Engle and then Milton was given the task of dismissing her. At this time, Milton hired non-Witness Mrs. Robinson to help take care of Ida.
It would appear that Richard Boeckel would immediately be suspicious when he received the letter with Mrs. Eisenhower's signature obviously taped on it. He should have confirmed that the letter was genuine before he made claims about receiving a letter from Ida Eisenhower. His story and a photo reproduction of the letter was published in Marley Cole's book Jehovah's Witnesses and other sources, and Boeckel repeated the claims about the letter in his life story published in the October 15, 1980 Watchtower. At the minimum, the Watchtower Society, Mr. Boeckel, and Marley Cole have unethically presented a letter as genuine evidentially without verification. If Mrs. Eisenhower's letter is verified to be valid, the allegations that her letter is a forgery should be squashed. So far the Watchtower has not answered several inquiries about this matter. The Eisenhower museum has agreed to pay for a handwriting expert to examine the letter, but all attempts to obtain the cooperation of the Watchtower have so-far failed.
Merle Miller related an experience involving Boeckel and this letter which reveals the irony of Eisenhower's mother's faith:
. . . one time when Boeckel refused, as a good Witness must, to salute his superior officers at Fort Warren, he said that he was a Witness and that his refusal to salute was "based on my understanding of the Bible." One officer reportedly said, "General Eisenhower ought to line you Jehovah's Witnesses up and shoot you all!" Boeckel then, again according to The Watchtower, said, "'Do you think he would shoot his own mother, sir?' "'What do you mean by that?' "Reaching in my pocket and taking out Sister Eisenhower's letter, I handed it to him. . . . He read the letter ... [and] handed it back to me. 'Get back to ranks,' he said, 'I don't want to get mixed up with the General's mother'"(Miller, 1987:79).
Suspicion that the letter was a forgery is also supported by a Watchtower teaching called The Theocratic Warfare Doctrine. The Theocratic Warfare doctrine essentially teaches that it is appropriate to withhold the truth from "people who are not entitled to it" to further the Watchtower's interests (Reed, 1992; Franz, 1971:1060-1061). Reed defines Theocratic War Strategy as the approval to lie "to outsiders when deemed necessary" and also to deceive outsiders to advance the Watchtower's interests (Reed, 1995:40). In the words of Kotwall the Watchtower teaches that "to lie and deceive in the interest of their religion is Scripturally approved" (Kotwall, 1997:1). Jehovah's Witnesses do not always lie outright, but they often lie according to the court's definition--not telling "the whole truth and nothing but the truth," which means the court requires the whole story, not half-truths or deception (Bergman 1998). In the words of Raines, theocratic warfare in practice means "deceiving" to protect and advance the interests of "God's people" especially God's "organization the Watchtower" (Raines, 1996:20).
Nonetheless I found no evidence that either parent was not a devoted Watchtower adherent when the Eisenhower boys were raised. If Mrs. Eisenhower's allegiance to the Watchtower waned as she got older, this would not affect the fact that her boys were raised as Witnesses, but would help us to better understand Ida Eisenhower.
In conclusion, Ida probably did not resign from the Witnesses and still saw herself as one. The reasons for concluding Ida Eisenhower mailed other letters at about the same time that she allegedly mentioned her Witness commitment to Boeckel include a handwritten letter to fellow Witness Mrs. H. I. Lawson of Long Island, N.Y., in 1943 (Cole, 1955). Although this letter could be a forgery as well, no one has voiced this concern yet.
In addition, a front page Wichita Beacon (April 1943) article about Ida's Watchtower assembly attendance gave no indication that she was then disenchanted with Jehovah's Witnesses. The article stated that "the 82 year old mother of Americas famous military leader. . . was the center of attraction at the meeting Sunday, and her name was heard in just about every conversation, speech and discussion. The program's subject was 'how to become a good Jehovah's Witness." No evidence exists that only a year later she rejected Watchtower teachings or had resigned. These facts do not prove the letter is not a forgery, nor do they demonstrate the commonly alleged view that she became a Witness only in her later years when she was becoming senile, as often implied by many authors.
Conversely, some hints exists that Mrs. Eisenhower's loyalty to the Watchtower, in contrast to the common perception, waned as she grew older. All of her sons left the Watchtower, as did her husband, all whom became opposed to many of their teachings. Furthermore, when J. F. Rutherford became the Watchtower president in 1916, their teachings changed drastically. Rutherford introduced many - if not most - of their more objectionable teachings such as their opposition to medicine, flag salute, vaccines, blood transfusions, and all other religions, all of which Rutherford regarded as "a snare and a racket" and of Satan. If Rutherford had retained the teachings of the first president, C.T. Russell, I believe the Eisenhower family concerns about the Watchtower would not have been nearly as great.
On the other hand, very good reasons existed for the Eisenhower family to attempt to distance themselves from the Watchtower--reasons which were made clear by some of Eisenhower's opponents, some evidently who planned to use this information to hurt Eisenhower's political career. As noted above, Roy noted that Eisenhower's religious background was used by some to argue that he was not fit to become president.




 
Panda
Panda 13 years ago


Holy Mackral ! Did you write this article. It's very interesting. I always wondered what the real scoop was about Pres.Eisenhower, now I know. Do you have the Bibliography of this article? I'd like to look into those sources, especially Ike's brothers work. Very very interesting. Thanks for posting!

"Our day will come old friend, just not today."
 
cat1759
cat1759 13 years ago


This was an excellent read!
I thought the double standards were so cute.
Cathy
 
Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago


Panda, these are the sources:

References
Ambrose, Stephen E. The Supreme Commander: The War Years of General Dwight D. Eisenhower . Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, 1970.
_________. Eisenhower: 1893-1952 . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1983.
Anderson, Jack. "Is His Vote Record Related To Payroll?" Merry-Go-Round in the Detroit Free Press (Sept. 23, 1956),16b.
Bergman, Jerry. "The Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses Branch of Protestantism" in America's Alternative Religions , Ed. by Timothy White Albany, NY: State University of New Press, 1995, p. 33-46.
_________. The Theocratic Warfare Doctrine: Why Jehovah's Witnesses Lie in Court . Clayton, CA: Witness Inc 1998.
Beschloss, Michael R. Eisenhower, A Centennial Life . New York: Harper Collins 1990.
Boeckel, Richard A. "A Soldier who Became a Preacher" The Watchtower ( Oct. 15, 1980), 24-29.
Bonnell, John Sutherland. Presidential Profiles; Religion in the Life of American Presidents . (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1971).
Branigar, Thomas. Letter to the author, August 9, 1994
Cole, Marley. Jehovah's Witnesses, The New World Society  New York: Vantage Press 1955.
Cosmin, Barry A. and Seymour P. Lachman. One Nation Under God . New York: Harmony Books, 1993.
Davis, Kenneth , Soldier of Democracy; A Biography of Dwight Eisenhower  Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1952 originally published in 1945
Dodd, Gladys. The Religious Background of the Eisenhower Family . Bachelor of Divinity Thesis, Nazarene Theology Seminary, Merriam, Kans. 1959.
_________. "The Early Career of Abraham L. Eisenhower, Pioneer Preacher," Kansas Historical Quarterly  29 (Autumn 1963).
_________. Letter from author dated Oct. 8, 1994.
Endacott, J. Earl. Records, Documentary Historical Series , Box 4, Eisenhower Library
Eisenhower, Dwight D. At Ease, Stories I tell to Friends  Garden City, NJ: Doubleday, 1967.
_________. The Eisenhower Diaries (Robert H. Fervell, Ed.). New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1981.
Eisenhower, Milton S. The President is Calling  GardenCity, New York: Doubleday, 1974.
Fleming, Helen. "Ike's Mom Jehovah Witness 50 yrs., Say group leaders; preacher from door to door in Abilene, Director reports."  Chicago Daily News , June 25, 1955, pp. 1,3.
Ford, Edward , Jr. correspondence to author dated Sept. 1995.
Fox, Frederick. "Pro Ike." Christian Century . July 2,1969 Vol. 86.
Franz, Frederick (Ed.). Aid to Bible Understanding. New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1971.
________. J ehovah's Witnesses; Proclaimers of God's Kingdom . Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania 1993).
Freese, Arthur. "Man of the 20th century" (Interview with Milton Eisenhower) Modern Maturity. Dec-Jan., 1975 17(6):25-28).
Fuller, Edmund and David E. Green. God in the White House; The Faiths of American Presidents . New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1968.
Gammon, Roland (Ed.). Eisenhower speech reprinted in (Roland Gammon Ed.) Al l Believers Are Brothers . New York: Doubleday, Garden City, 1969), 3-4.
Graham, Billy. Just As I Am; The Autobiography of Billy Graham. (San Francisco: Harper 1997), chapter 12 "The General who Became President" 188 - 206.
Gruss, Edmond. T he Jehovah's Witnesses and Prophetic Speculation . Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1976.
Gunther, John. Eisenhower, The Man and the Symbol . Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1951.
Gustafson, Merlin. "Religion of a President." Christian Century . (April 30, 1969), 610-613.
Hatch, Alden. General Ike; A Biography of Dwight D. Eisenhower . Chicago, IL: Consolidated Book Publishers, 1944.
Hendon, David and James Kennedy. "Civil Religion" Journal of Church and State. 391 39 (2) 1997, 390-391.
Hutchinson, Paul. "The President's religious faith," Christian Century . March 24, 1954 Vol 71, 364; reprinted in Life March 22, 1954 Vol. 36: 150+
Henshel, Milton G. Chicago Daily News . June 25,1955, 1, 3
Jameson, Henery B. "Ike buried in Abilene; Massive crowd for Eisenhower funeral" Abilene Reflector--Chronicle , Memorial Ed. 1969.
Knorr, N.H. "Religion Void of Principle." Awake!  Oct 22,1946, 27(20): 323-324.
_________. "Eisenhower book stirs a controversy: conceals fact that parents were Jehovah's Witnesses." Awake!  ( Sept. 22, 1955. 36(18), 3-4.
_________. "Appreciated Parents" Awake! Ap. 22, 1975, 56(8):30.
_________. "Conspiracy against Jehovah's name" Watchtower 78(11): 323-324. June 1, 1957
Kornitzer, Bela. The Great American Heritage; The Story of the Five Eisenhower Brothers . New York: Farrar Straus, and Cudahy, 1955.
Kotwall, B. J. "The Watchtower Society Encourages Lying." The Investigator Magazine Australia 1997.
Larson, Arthur. E isenhower; The President Nobody Knew . New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1968.
Lyon, Peter. Eisenhower; Portrait of the Hero . Boston: Little, Brown and Co 1974.
McCullun, John Six Roads From Abilene, Some Personal Recollections of Edgar Eisenhower . Seattle, Wash.: Wood and Reber, Inc., 1960.
Miller, Francis Trevelyn. Eisenhower, Man and Soldier . (Philadelphia: John C. Winston Company, 1944)
Miller, Merle. Ike the Soldier; As They Knew Him. New York: Putnam's Sons, 1987.
Neal, Steve. The Eisenhower's . Lawrence, Kans: University Press of Kansas 1984.
Nevin, David. "Home to Abilene." Life  (April 11,1969 Vol 66 No 14 ), 24.
Pearson, Drew. "Eisenhower's seek to clear mother of affiliation with religious sect." Merry-Go-Roun d in the Defiance Crescent News . (Dec. 19, 1956): 6.
Pickett, William. Dwight David Eisenhower and American Power . Wheeling, Ill.:Harland Davidson, Inc., 1995.
Raines, Ken. "Deception by JWs in Court, OK with Judge?" JW Research Journal . 3(2) Spring 1996, p. 20.
Reed, David. "Court Rules; Watchtower Booklet Recommends 'Untrue' Testimony Under Oath." C omments from the Friends , Spring, 1992.
_______. Dictionary of J.W. eez: The Loaded Language Jehovah's Witnesses Speak . (Assonet, MA.: Comments from the Friends, 1995): 40.
Ralph Lord, Roy. Apostles of Discord; A Study of Organized Bigotry and Disruption on the Fringes of Protestantism . Boston: Beach Press, 1953.
Russell, Charles Taze. Studies in the Scriptures; Series III, Thy Kingdom Come Chapter 10, "The Testimony of God's Stone Witness and Prophet, The Great Pyramid in Egypt," Allegheny, PA: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, 1904.
________. Studies in the Scriptures; Series I, The Plan of the Ages . New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1914 Front page.
Rutherford, Joseph. "The Alter in Egypt." Pt. 1 The Watch Tower . 49(22):339-345, Nov. 15, 1928; Pt. II. Dec. 1, 1928, 49(23):355-362).
Sellers, Ron. How Americans View Various Religious Groups . Report by Barna Research Group, 1990
Sider, Morris E. . Archivist for the Brethren in Christ Church, Messiah College, Grantham, PA. Interviews of various dates, and correspondence to the author dated October 24, 1994.
Taylor, Allan (Ed.). What Eisenhower Thinks . New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company.
Tonkin, R.G. "I grew up with Eisenhower." Saturday Evening Post ,May 3,1952.
Time Eisenhower: Soldier of peace." April 4, 1969:19-25.
Time "I Chose My Way." Sept 23, 1946: 27.
Whitney, David C. The American Presidents . Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, 1967.
Watchtower Publication Awake! "Should Christians be Pacifists" (May 8, 1997, 78(9): 22-23); "Why Jehovah's Witnesses are not Pacifists" and "Pacifism and Conscientious Objection - is there a difference?" 73 - 81 The Watchtower (Feb 1, 1951 72(3): 67- 73; Christendom or Christianity, which is the light of the World?  (New York, NY:Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1955), 24-26 subtitled "Is a Christian a Pacifist?"
 
Panda
Panda 13 years ago

Joker10, Thank you I am going to keep this bibliography and someday get through a fraction of this list. Again, Thanks.
 
Nathan Natas
Nathan Natas 13 years ago


Joeker10 has neglected to mention that the article he posted can be found at: http://www.premier1.net/~raines/eisenhower.html
In an article titled, "Why President Eisenhower Hid His Jehovah's Witness Upbringing"
written by Jerry Bergman, Ph.D, Northwest State College, Ohio.
I'm sure Joker10's failure to mention this when specifically asked by Panda if he was the author of the article was simply an oversight.
 
Loris
Loris 13 years ago


I like to go to the local library when they have a used book sale. People donate books and the sale benefits the library. I found "The True Believer" at one of those sales. I had never heard of it before but the title caught my eye.
The one that I have was published by Time Magazine. In the Editors' Preface it starts out by saying, "Dwight Eisenhower is not a man who goes about insistently recommending books on political philosophy. When, during his Presidency, he pressed Eric Hoffer's book, The True Believer, on his associates, some expected to find it a handy expression of Eisenhower's own beliefs. The book is certainly not that, and many other readers before and after Eisenhower have delighted in The True Believer while disagreeing with much of it."
To me I found that tidbit facinating. I am sure that the editor missed the point of Eisenhower's interest in the subject matter. Was it the threat of Communism or was it the JW experience from his childhood? Did he see the similarity of the JW experience with what Eric Hoffer wrote about?
Thank you Jocker10 for posting the article. It was a facinating read.
Loris
 
Double Edge
Double Edge 13 years ago


Thanks Joker....
As a student of history I found this article very interesting. A lot of background information on what makes a person 'tick'. Dwight Eisernhower's life certainly made an impact on this earth and it is facinating to read about how his 'religious' background evolved.
D.E.
 
Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago

i thought it was a pretty interesting story to post. I'm quite surprised there has been few replies.
 
Double Edge
Double Edge 13 years ago


i
thought it was a pretty interesting story to post. I'm quite surprised there has been few replies.
Don't worry about it.... it's human nature to not take as much time with or completely ignore LONG posts.... their misfortune... it was a great read.
 
blondie
blondie 13 years ago


I researched this some time ago for a history project. My mother was a JW during the Eisenhower years. They talked about it like we do today about Michael Jackson and the Williams sisters.
During the JW generation of DDE, home family studies weren't stressed. My goodness, a structured study with householders didn't start until 1937 with the Model Study booklet. In many families around here the grandparents were JWs, skip the next generation, then the grandchildren are JWs. I guess the WTS thought the end was so close that it wasn't necessary to study with the kiddies.
Blondie
 
RR
RR 13 years ago

Actually, Ike's Father was a Bible Student eler, NEVER became a JW, lived and died a Bible Student.
 
blondie
blondie 13 years ago


That's good to know, RR. Then I take it his mother was a JW or was she a Bible Student too? That letter seems to indicate she was a JW. That must have made things interesting in the Eisenhower household.
Blondie
 
sf
sf 12 years ago

Here are some search hits on this topic:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=Eisenhower+mother+jehovah%27s+witness +
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=Ida+Stover&btnG=Search
Some google graphics:
http://images.google.com/images?q=Ida%20Stover&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi
Honorable MentionIda (Stover) Eisenhower,
Ike's Mother

Ida Eisenhower, 1902
Although arbitrarily excluded from the top five,
Ida Eisenhower may deserve to be
Ike's No. 1. Most Admired Contemporary.
Eisenhower stated more than once that his mother was
the greatest person he knew.
I posted this in another thread, yet just found this one. Therefore, I'll post it here as well:
http://www.aetv.com/tv/shows/ike/
A and E tv original event...May 31, 2004 8pm--7pm central
"IKE: Countdown to D-Day"
________________________
sKally
 
Bangalore
Bangalore 4 years ago

Bumping this.

Bangalore
 

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President Eisenhower and his Jehovah's Witness background.
by Joker10 13 years ago 14 Replies latest 4 years ago   jw experiences
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Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago


President Eisenhower's JW Background.
Introduction
The story of the religious upbringing of the Eisenhower boys is critically important in understanding both the Watchtower and the boys themselves. The most dominant religious influence in the Eisenhower home from the time the boys were young was Watchtower theology and beliefs. Both parents were deeply involved and highly committed to much of the Watchtower theology throughout most of their children's formative years. Ida probably took the lead religiously, and David Eisenhower later became disillusioned with many Watchtower teachings; nonetheless the religion also influenced him later in life.
As adults, none of the Eisenhower boys formally followed the Witness teachings and theology and even tried to hide their Jehovah's Witness upbringing. The eldest son, Arthur, once stated that he could not accept the religious dogmas of his parents although he had "his mother's religion" in his heart (Kornitzer, 1955:64).
Although none of Mrs. Eisenhower's boys were what she and other Witnesses called "in the truth," she was hopeful that they would someday again embrace the religion in which they were raised. They openly rejected much of the Watchtower theology and medical ideas, especially its eschatology and millennial teachings. Nonetheless their Witness upbringing clearly influenced them. Even in later life, Dwight preferred "the informal church service" with "vigorous singing and vigorous preaching" like he grew up with (Dodd, 1963:233). Ida was relatively supportive of them during most of their careers, often stating that she was proud of them and their accomplishments, even those achievements that violated her Watchtower faith.



 Born on October 14, 1890 at Denison, Texas, Dwight D. Eisenhower became the thirty-fourth President of the United States. He served for two terms, from 1953 to 1961. His parents, David and Ida Eisenhower, owned a modest two-story white framed house on South 4th Street in Abilene, Kansas. Ida, a frugal hard-working woman, planted a large garden on their three acre lot to raise much of the family's produce needs. Neal claimed that the Eisenhower's were able to feed their growing family only because of this small farm which included cows, chickens, a smokehouse, fruit trees and a large vegetable garden (Neal, 1984). Dwight and his five brothers (Arthur (b. 1886), Roy (b. 1892), Earl (b. 1898), and Milton (b. 1899) plus David) were raised in Abilene, Kansas.
The values of Dwight "Ike" Eisenhower's parents and their home environment reflected themselves in the enormous success of all of their children. Probably the most dominant influence in the Eisenhower home was religion, primarily the Jehovah's Witnesses (known as Bible Students until 1931) and to a much lesser extent the River Brethren (Dodd, 1994).
Both parents were active in the Watchtower during most of the Eisenhower children's formative years. Eisenhower's mother, Ida Eisenhower, stated she became involved with the Watchtower in 1895 when she was 34 and Dwight was only five years old (Cole, 1955:190). Ida was baptized in 1898, meaning she was then a Jehovah's Witnesses minister.
Furthermore, Ida did not flirt with her involvement in the Witnesses as claimed by some but "was a faithful member of Jehovah's Witnesses for 50 years" (Fleming 1955:1). In Dwight's words she had "an inflexible loyalty to her religious convictions." According to the current Watchtower president Milton G. Henshel, "Ida Eisenhower was one of the most energetic [Watchtower] preachers in Abilene" (Fleming, 1955:1). The Watchtower Society had a major religious influence on Dwight until 1914 when he went to West Point (Dodd, 1959; Eisenhower, 1969).



Ida grew up in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley and originally attended a Lutheran Church. Hutchinson concluded Ida showed a "deep interest in religion from her earliest years" (1954:364). As a school girl Ida studied the Bible extensively and quoted freely from it--she once memorized 1,365 Biblical verses in six months, a fact cited with pride by several of her sons (Neal, 1984:13). The Sunday school records in the Lutheran Church at Mount Sidney near Staunton, Virginia, still contain her Bible memorizing record.
Eisenhower's parents met when they were both students at a small United Brethren college in Lecompton, Kansas called Lane University. After they married at Lecompton on September 23, 1885, they both dropped out of college (Hatch, 1944). Although they each completed only one term, their desire for education persisted--and reflected itself in their strong support for their sons' educations (Kornitzer, 1955). Evidently it was Ida's husband who introduced Ida to the group popularly called River Brethren partly because many of his relatives were involved in this community.
Neither David or Ida ever became deeply involved in this sect, although, it is often incorrectly stated that "Ida and David Eisenhower were River Brethren" (Miller, 1987:77-78). David's father Jacob and his brothers Ira and Abraham were members, but Ike's cousin, the Reverend Ray L. Witter, son of A.L. Witter, claimed that, although Ida and David came to Brethren services for several years, neither was ever an actual member nor did they regularly attend for any length of time (Miller, 1987:77-78; Dodd, 1959:221).
Close family friend R.C. Tonkin even stated that he "never knew any of the family to attend the River Brethren Church" (Tonkin, 1952:48). Both church records and oral history indicate that Dwight attended around 1906 for less than a year (Sider, 1994). Note: The term River Brethren is commonly used in the literature which discusses President Eisenhower, but the officially registered name during the Civil War and after is The Brethren in Christ Church. The term River Brethren is used here because virtually all references to Eisenhower's religion use this term. This term caught on because the first churches were located near rivers.
Evidence that Dwight may have occasionally attended Sunday school at Abilene's River Brethren Church includes the claim by John Dayhoff (listed in the 1906 church records as a member of Dwight's class) that he went to Sunday school with him. When Dwight did attend according to the regular teacher, Ida Hoffman, he evidently "never seemed to pay any attention or take any interest in the lesson" (Davis, 1952:49). Three of the Eisenhower children including Dwight are listed in the 1906 Souvenir Report of the Brethren Sunday School of Abilene, Kansas as involved in the church, but no mention is made of their parents. The listing of the three boys was likely partly due to the influence of Jacob, Dwight's grandfather, an active River Brethren Church minister until his death in May of 1906.
When David's Uncle Abraham, a self-taught veterinarian, decided to became an itinerant preacher he rented his house to David on the condition that Jacob could live there (Lyon, 1974; Dodd, 1963). David Eisenhower's family then moved into Abraham's house at 201 Southeast Fourth Street. David was also connected with the River Brethren through his employment at the church-owned Bella Springs Creamery. He worked at the Creamery from the time he moved to Abilene until he retired (Ambrose, 1983:19-20).
The many other relatives and friends who were River Brethren also likely had some influence on Dwight's religious development. He was physically and emotionally surrounded by aunts, uncles, grandfathers and a great-grandfather, most of whom were lay members or preachers in one of the Brethren or Holiness sects (Dodd, 1994). Gladys Dodd concluded the Brethren, whom Dwight joined on occasion for worship, "were a clannish lot, glued together by common ties of unique appearance and modes of baptism, abhorrence of war, and the like" (Dodd, 1994:1).




A major catalyst that precipitated Dwight's parents leaving the River Brethren and joining the Watchtower involved Ike's eight-month old brother, Paul, who died of diphtheria in 1895. This tragedy devastated the Eisenhower's, and the theological explanation that Paul is in heaven provided by the River Brethren did not satisfy them. At this time, three neighborhood women were able to comfort the Eisenhower's with the hope that they would soon see their son. This comfort was the Russellite teaching that death was merely sleep, and that all those in the grave will be resurrected shortly. In 1895 it was taught that this resurrection would occur in the new world which was expected to arrive before 1914, a mere nine years away then (Gruss, 1976). The three women - Mrs. Clara Witt, Mrs. Mary Thayer, and Mrs. Emma Holland - also sold Ida a set of volumes which were then titled Millennial Dawn (later renamed Studies in the Scriptures) and a subscription to Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence, now named The Watchtower. Ida soon became involved and influenced her husband to join a short time later.
David and Ida's interest in Armageddon (the war the Watchtower teaches God will destroy all of the wicked, i.e. all non Witnesses) and the imminent return of Christ was highly influenced by the Watchtower preoccupation with end times events, especially the date of Armageddon. Likely, too, other acquaintances aside from Watchtower followers shared an interest in end-times date predicting including by their uncles Abraham and Ira, both of whom were evidently influenced by the end-times date speculation of the Tabor, Iowa evangelistic sect called the Hephzibah Faith Missionary Association (Dodd, 1994:2).
Dodd concluded from her extensive study of the Eisenhower family religious involvement that Ida soon became a "faithful and dedicated Witness and actively engaged as [a] colporteur [missionary] for the Watch Tower Society until her death" (Dodd, 1959:245). Soon the force that dominated the lives of everyone who lived in the Eisenhower frame house in Abilene was religion (Kornitzer, 1955:134). Dwight Eisenhower's faith was "rooted in his parents' Biblical heritage," and the Eisenhower boys' upbringing was "steeped" in religion (Fox 1969:907; Lyon, 1974:38).
The Eisenhower's held weekly Watchtower meetings in their parlor where the boys took turns reading from and discussing Watchtower publications and Scripture. Dwight Eisenhower was also involved in these studies--he claimed that he had read the Bible completely through twice before he was eighteen (Jameson, 1969:9). Ambrose concluded that the degree of religious involvement of the Eisenhower boys was so extensive that
David read from the Bible before meals, then asked a blessing. After dinner, he brought out the Bible again. When the boys grew old enough, they took turns reading. Ida organized meetings of the ... Watchtower Society, which met on Sundays in her parlor. She played her piano and led the singing. Neither David nor Ida ever smoked or drank, or played cards, or swore, or gambled (Ambrose 1983:19-20).
This upbringing no doubt had a major influence on all of the Eisenhower boys. R.G. Tonkin estimated that when the Eisenhower boys were young the size of the class was "about fifteen people" (1952:48).
The Watchtower followers met in Eisenhower's home until 1915 when the growth of the local congregation forced them to rent a local hall for their services. Later a large Watchtower meeting house (now called a Kingdom Hall) was built in Abilene (Dodd, 1959:244). The composition of early Russellite group in Abilene is described by Dodd as follows:
Mary Thayer first introduced the Watch Tower to the Eisenhower's. This company together with L.D. Toliver and the R.O. Southworths constituted the nucleus of the Abilene congregation of Russellites. From 1896 until 1915, the Bible Students ... met on Sunday afternoons at the Eisenhower home for their meetings. During most of this twenty year period, David Eisenhower (and occasionally L.D. Toliver) served the class as the Bible-study conductor, or "elder" as the group called its leader (1959:236).
Ida remained active in the Watchtower her whole life. In a letter to a fellow Witness Ida stated she has "been in the truth since ninety six [1896 and I] ... am still in ... it has been a comfort to me ... Naomi Engle stay [sic] with me and she is a witness too so my hope [sic] are good" (Fleming, 1955:3; Cole, 1955:192).



Dwight was also influenced by the religious ideas of his father, David Eisenhower. Although his early upbringing was in the River Brethren and he briefly attended the Lutheran, then later the Methodist church before and during his college days, he converted to the Watchtower a few years after his wife did. David Eisenhower actively served the Watchtower for many years as an elder and Bible study conductor, a role which he occasionally alternated with L.D. Toliver (Dodd, 1959:225). Neal even claimed that David Eisenhower was led by the Watchtower into "mysticism" because of David's use of "an enormous wall chart" of the Egyptian pyramids to predict the future. David taught his boys Watchtower last-days theology from this chart when they were growing up. The ten feet high and six feet wide chart "according to David . . . contained prophecies for the future as well as confirmation of biblical events. Captivated by the bizarre drawing . . . [Dwight] spent hours studying David's creation" (Neal, 1984:13).
This pyramid chart was of the Pyramid of Giza in Egypt and in fact was a central teaching of the Bible Students (Dodd, 1959:242). The chart was first published by the Watchtower in Millennial Dawn, Vol. 1 in 1898 and a large wall size version was available later. The chart played a prominent role in Watchtower theology for more than 35 years and was of such importance to David that his
. . . religious beliefs materialized in the form of an impressive (five or six feet high, ten feet long) wall chart of the Egyptian pyramids, by means of which he proved to his own satisfaction that the lines of the pyramids--outer dimensions, inner passageways, angles of chambers, and so on--prophesied later Biblical events and other events still in the future. As might be expected, this demonstration fascinated his children; the chart came to be one of the family's most prized possessions (Lyon, 1974:38).
Russell obtained from the Pyramid many of his prophesies, especially the year 1914 when the end of the world was expected to occur (Franz, 1993:20). The pyramid was also used to confirm Watchtower dispensational theology. Earl Eisenhower claimed that his father used the chart when he was in the Watchtower to prove "to his own satisfaction that the Bible was right in its prophecies" (Kornitzer, 1955:136).
The pyramid was of such major importance to early Watchtower theology that a huge ten foot concrete pyramid was selected as a fitting memorial to C. T. Russell when he died. It still stands close to Russell's grave near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Russell specifically condemned mysticism as demonism and taught that the pyramid had nothing to do with mysticism but was a second revelation, a "Bible in stone" which both added to and confirmed the Holy Scripture record (Russell, 1904:313-376).
A few years later, the second president of the Watchtower, Joseph F. Rutherford, condemned the pyramid teaching in no uncertain terms, one of many of his doctrinal changes that initiated several Watchtower schisms (Rutherford, 1928; Dodd, 1959:243). Dodd noted that the chart was still in the family home as late as 1944, but in 1957 she could no longer locate it in either the family home or the Eisenhower museum nearby and learned that the chart and other Watchtower effects were disposed of (Dodd, 1959:242-243). Dodd concluded the Watchtower items were probably destroyed by the family to reduce their embarrassment over their parents' involvement in the Jehovah's Witnesses. David's commitment to the Watchtower eventually changed and later he openly became an opposer.
Dodd concludes that "by 1919 David Eisenhower's interest in Russell had definitely waned and before his death in 1942 he is said to have renounced the doctrine of Russell" (1959:224). In a letter to Edward Ford, David stated that one factor causing his disillusionment with the Watchtower was the failure of their end of the world prophecies including 1914 and 1915 (Ford, 1995). After he left the Watchtower fellowship, his son Arthur claimed that David remained a student of the Scriptures, and his religious "reading habits were confined to the Bible, or anything related to the Bible" but not Watchtower literature. Although, the Bible was central to David Eisenhower's thinking, Milton added that his father also "read history, serious magazines, newspapers, and religion literature" (Kornitzer, 1955:261).
Edgar Eisenhower stated that his father left the Watchtower partly because he "couldn't go along with the sheer dogma that was so much a part of their thinking." His sons later adamantly claimed that David accompanied his wife on Watchtower activities primarily in an effort to appease her. Watchtower accounts usually referred only to Ida as a Witness, supporting the conclusion that David had left the Watchtower after 1915.
David Eisenhower died in March of 1942 at the age of 78. At this time Ida's nurse, Naomi Engle, was, "a strong-willed Witness who arranged a Jehovah's Witness funeral for David even though he had made it clear before his death that he was no longer a [Watchtower] believer" (Miller, 1987:80). The service was conducted by Witness James L. Thayer assisted by another Witness, Fred K. Southworth.




The Eisenhower's Watchtower involvement created many family conflicts. The Russellites taught that the Brethren and all other churches were not pleasing to God. Their second president, lawyer Joseph F. Rutherford (1916-1942), viciously attacked all religion with slogans such as all "religion is a snare and a racket" (Dodd, 1959). The Watchtower under Rutherford even taught all priests and ministers are of Satan leading their flocks to eternal damnation (Bergman, 1999). As a result of this and other teachings, Dodd observed that the River Brethren and other denominations at the turn of the century:
... were rabidly opposed to Russellism. As late as 1913 ... the Evangelical Visitor advertised a pamphlet entitled "The Blasphemous Religion which teaches the Annihilation of Jesus Christ" as the "best yet publication against Russellism" and the editor thought every River Brethren minister should read it. In 1928, one of the Brethren ministers, Abraham Eisenhower (David's brother), wrote to the Evangelical Visitor concerning Russellism: "Oh, fool-hearted nonsense. It is the devil's asbestos blanket to cover up the realities of a hell fire judgment. The word of God will tear off this infamous lie and expose the realities of an existence of life after death." This strong statement would reflect the general attitude of most of the Eisenhower's (Dodd, 1959:246).
The River Brethren have much in common with the Mennonites, and both were once called "the plain people" because of their simple lifestyle and dress. Although the sect has generally modernized and even in the early 1900s they no longer placed as much emphasis on details of clothing as formerly, they were still comparatively strict in the 1800s. Marriage could be dissolved only by death, hard physical work was a prime virtue, and after the turn of the century members could not use or even grow tobacco.
The early Watchtower teachings were also similar in some ways to the River Brethren, both of which have in major ways changed since the Eisenhower's became involved in 1895 (Dodd, 1959). Furthermore, "a number of the River Brethren had become followers of Russell" (Dodd, 1959:234). Although major differences existed especially in doctrine, the many similarities include both groups were pietistic Protestant conservative sects opposed to war, although on somewhat different grounds. Both sects also stressed the importance of Biblical study, both condemned many worldly habits and both were then very concerned about the last days prophesy and eschatology.




Dwights religious background is discussed by many writers, but most contain much misinformation. The misinformation about the religion of Dwight's parents is compounded by the fact that many Eisenhower biographies and even writings by the Eisenhower sons often declined to fully and honestly acknowledge their parents' actual religious affiliation (Fleming, 1955:1; Eisenhower, 1969). In a collection of personal recollections Edgar Eisenhower admitted only
Our parents' religious interests switched to a sect known as the Bible Students. The meetings were held at our house, and everyone made his own interpretation of the Scripture lessons. Mother played the piano, and they sang hymns before and after each meeting. It was a real old time prayer meeting. They talked to God, read Scriptures, and everyone got a chance to state his relationship with Him. Their ideas of religion were straightforward and simple. I have never forgotten those Scripture lessons, nor the influence they have had on my life. Simple people taking a simple approach to God. We couldn't have forgotten because mother impressed those creeds deep in our memories. Even after I had grown up, every letter I received from her, until the day she died, ended with a passage from the Bible (McCullun, 1960:21).
Even President Eisenhower's spiritual mentor and close friend, Billy Graham, was led to believe that Eisenhower's parents "had been River Brethren, a small but devoutly pious group in the Mennonite tradition." Many authors referred to the Watchtower faith only as "fundamentalists" or "Bible students," the latter term the Jehovah's Witnesses used only up until 1931 (Beschloss, 1990; Knorr, 1955). Lyon even stated
The specific nature of the religion is uncertain. The parents appear to have left the River Brethren for a more primitive and austere sect, something referred to as the Bible Students, and they would later gravitate to the evangelical sect known as Jehovah's Witnesses (Lyon, 1974:38).
Bela Kornitzer mentions only that the Eisenhower's were "Bible Students," had "fundamentalist religious beliefs" and studied "the writings of 'Pastor Russell'" but does not mention that Russell was the Watchtower founder (1955:14, 22, 32). (When Russell died in 1916 his writings were almost immediately replaced those of the new president, "Judge" J.F. Rutherford, resulting in several major schisms in the movement and their transformation into Jehovah's Witnesses).
Even works that include extensive discussions of Eisenhower's religious upbringing, such as the aforementioned Bela Kornitzer's book, discuss primarily his River Brethren religious background which had influenced Dwight primarily during his preschool years, if at all.
A Drew Pearson column stated that President Eisenhower's mother "once sold Bible tracts for the Jehovah's Witnesses," implying that she only flirted with the Witnesses and was never deeply involved (1956:6). Edmund Fuller and David Green, after claiming that Eisenhower's parents were River Brethren, noted that the President's grandfather was the Reverend Jacob Eisenhower, a Brethren minister, and that "the Eisenhower boys' religious training was strict, fundamentalist, and somewhat Puritanical. They were well schooled in Scripture" (1968:213).
Even more common is to totally omit the name of the predominant religion that Dwight was raised in and its importance in the Eisenhower boy's formative years (For example see Larson, 1968). In one of the most detailed histories of Eisenhower's early life, Davis said only that Ida later "sought out an even more 'primitive' and rigid Christianity" than River Brethren, leaving the reader up in the air as to what this group might be (1952:111). An extensive search by the author of the major depositories of President Eisenhower's letters and papers revealed he wrote virtually nothing about his feelings about the Watchtower or even religion in general except that reviewed here.
The Eisenhower boys' Watchtower background is not widely known or acknowledged likely also in part due to the antagonism many people had then, and still have today, against the Watchtower (Sellers, 1990). This antagonism is illustrated in the wording of a quote claiming that "late in life" Ida became, "of all things, a member of the sect known as Jehovah's Witnesses..." (Gunther, 1951:52).
Accounts of the Eisenhower family history commonly repeat the claim that Dwight's parents were River Brethren or were not directly involved with the Watchtower (Miller, 1944). Typical is a Time article that stated only that Ike's "parents were members of the River Brethren, a Mennonite sect," adding that "along with their piety, the Eisenhower's gave their sons a creed of self-starting individualism" (Time, Apr. 4, 1969:20). Another account claims that Eisenhower's parents were members of a Protestant sect called the River Brethren and brought up their children in an old-fashioned atmosphere of puritanical morals. Prayer and Bible reading were a daily part of their lives. Violence was forbidden, though in a family of six boys the edict was a bit hard to enforce (Whitney, 1967:311).




According to Pearson, when confronted with his religious ancestry, David Eisenhower looked for a
delicate way to clear the family name of this affiliation. He is sensitive about the fact that the Jehovah's Witnesses do not believe in saluting the flag or serving under arms. At the same time, he doesn't want to appear prejudiced against any religious sect. Both Ike and his brother, Milton, have discussed the problem with spiritual advisors. But they haven't quite figured out how to disclaim Ida Eisenhower's relations with the Jehovah's Witnesses without offending the sect and perhaps stirring up charges of religious prejudice (Pearson, 1956:6).
Pearson also adds the often repeated claim that "Ida was influenced in her old age by a nurse who belonged to the sect. Being Bible-minded, old Mrs. Eisenhower cheerfully agreed to help the Jehovah's Witnesses peddle Bible tracts. Actually, both of Dwight's parents were staunch members of a small sect called River Brethren" (Pearson, 1956:6). Ironically in a Drew Pearson column published only three months earlier, Jack Anderson said, "Ike is strangely sensitive about his parents' religion. They were Jehovah's Witnesses, though the authorized biographies call them 'River Brethren....'
Both Dwight and his brother Milton checked the manuscript of Bela Kornitzer's book, 'Story of the Five Eisenhower Brothers.' Afterward Milton privately asked Kornitzer to delete a reference to their parents' membership in the Witnesses sect" (Anderson, 1956:16b). In one of the last interviews given by the family, Milton said only that "we were raised as a fundamentalist family. Mother and father knew the Bible from one end to the other" (Quoted in Freeze, 1975:25). The Watchtower's response to this common omission was as follows:
Though Time magazine claimed Ida Stover Eisenhower was a member of the River Brethren, a Mennonite sect, Time was merely continuing its consistent policy of slander in all that pertains to Jehovah's witnesses. She was never a River Brethren. She was one of Jehovah's witnesses. The first study in the Watchtower magazine in Abilene, Kans., started in her home in 1895. Her home was the meeting-place till 1915, when a hall was obtained. She continued a regular publisher with Jehovah's witnesses till 1942, when failing health rendered her inactive; but she remained a staunch believer (Knorr, 1946:7).
Kornitzer specifically endeavored to determine the source of Dwight Eisenhower's "greatness," concluding that it came from his family and their values. In Dwight's words, his mother was "deeply religious," and he once stated that his mother
had gravitated toward a local group known as The Bible Class. In this group, which had no church minister, she was happy. Sunday meetings were always held in the homes of members, including ours. The unusual program of worship included hymns, for which mother played the piano, and prayers, with the rest of the time devoted to group discussion of a selected chapter of the Bible (1967:305)..
Although the group preferred the label Bible Students before 1931, when they met they usually did not study the Bible but primarily Watchtower publications.
In the early 1900s the study focus was a set of books called Studies in the Scriptures written by C.T. Russell and his wife, and also the current issues of The Watchtower magazine. Although the Eisenhower boys usually skirted around the issue of their religious upbringing, Dwight Eisenhower once openly acknowledged that the group his parents were involved with was the Jehovah's Witnesses:
there was, eventually, a kind of loose association with similar groups throughout the country ... chiefly through a subscription to a religious periodical, The Watchtower. After I left home for the Army, these groups were drawn closer together and finally adopted the name of Jehovah's Witnesses (1967:305).
Eisenhower then adds, "They were true conscientious objectors to war. Though none of her sons could accept her conviction in this matter, she refused to try to push her beliefs on us just as she refused to modify her own" (1967:305). Conversely Dwight's mother was not happy about her sons violation of Watchtower beliefs especially their attitudes toward war.
Many reporters termed Dwight's mother "a religious pacifist" (for example see Life Magazine, 1969) as Dwight did. The Watchtower has established in the courts that they are not pacifists but conscientious objectors, opposed only to wars initiated and carried out by humans. The Watchtower teaches that involvement in war, except those that God wants us to fight, is not only a violation of God's law that "thou shalt not kill" and "thou shall love thy neighbor" but is also wrong because Watchtower doctrine considers it an improper use of time in these last days before Armageddon. They taught their followers to be dedicated to converting others before the end, which since the late 1800s has been taught by the Watchtower to be "just around the corner." They are in their words "conditional pacifists" although the Watchtower often argues against all war on pacifist grounds. In Dwight's words, his mother "was opposed to militarism because of her religious beliefs" (Kornitzer, 1955:87).
Jehovah's Witnesses then also eschewed all political involvement because they felt--and still teach today--that the soon-to-be-established kingdom of God on earth--the millennium--was the only solution to all worldly problems (Kornitzer, 1955:276). In Milton Eisenhower's words, his parents were as good Jehovah's Witnesses "more concerned with the millennium which, unfortunately, hadn't come in their day, than they were with contemporary social institutions" (Kornitzer, 1955:278). All of the Eisenhower boys disagreed with the Watchtower view in this area. Milton also stated his parents were aloof from politics but ". . . as I became older, I used to hold many conversations with them in a futile attempt to show them that they were wrong" (Kornitzer, 1955:277). Of course, as Watchtower followers, Ida and, until he left, David were not allowed to be involved in politics--even voting became a disfellowshipping offense in the 1940's.
Often Ida's alleged pacifism is given as the reason for her opposition to Ike's military career when the actual reason was Watchtower theology. An example was her reaction to his leaving for West Point in the summer of 1911, as reported by Pickett. At this time Dwight's
. . . mother and twelve-year-old brother Milton were the only family members there to see him off. His mother was unable to say a thing, Milton remembered, "I went out on the west porch with mother as Ike started uptown, carrying his suitcase, to take the train. Mother stood there like a stone statue and I stood right by her until Ike was out of sight. Then she came in and went to her room and bawled" (Pickett, 1995:8).
Alden Hatch, after recounting the consternation Ida had over Dwight attending West Point--to the extent she hoped he would fail the entrance exam so he would not go, claims that the reason was her "abhorrence to war" (Hatch, 1944:21). Ida's opposition was actually for several reasons, and consequently she hid from her sons her "weakened faith" and "grief" that resulted from Ike's pursuing a military career. The Eisenhower sons' embarrassment about their parents' involvement in the Watchtower is vividly revealed in the following account:
Both Ida and David, but especially Ida, were avid readers of The Watchtower, and at the time of Ida's death there was a fifty-year collection in the house on South East Fourth Street. The publication had arrived by mail from 1896 to 1946. It was Milton who bundled up the fifty-year collection of the presumably embarrassing magazines and got them out of the Eisenhower house and away from the eyes of reporters. He gave them to a neighbor and Witness (Miller, 1987:79).
The neighbor was Mrs. James L. Thayer, one of the women that originally converted Mrs. Eisenhower. The disposal of Dwight's parent's Watchtower literature, charts and other Watchtower items was only one indication of the many conflicts the Eisenhower boys likely experienced over their parent's esoteric religion. These conflicts may be one reason why none of them ever became involved in the Watchtower or even a fundamentalist church.
Another account illustrates the press' tendency to avoid revealing the Eisenhower parents' Watchtower involvement. When Ike graduated from West Point Military Academy in 1915, his mother presented to him a copy of the American Standard version of the Bible used by the Watchtower because it consistently used the term "Jehovah" for God. When Ike was sworn in as president for his second term, this Bible was used (see photograph London Daily News Feb 2, 1957:1). The press reports of this account, though, usually did not quote the words the President actually read which were "Blessed is the nation whose God is Jehovah" but instead substituting the word "Lord" for "Jehovah." The Watchtower concluded that this misquote was an attempt to distance President Eisenhower from his parents' faith by not using a term that was at this time intimately connected with the Jehovah's Witnesses sect (Knorr, 1957:323-324).
Why were the Eisenhower's (and the press) so reticent about honestly revealing the religion of their parents? One reason is revealed in an article published in the official Watchtower magazine called Awake!
On September 11, 1946, Mrs. Ida Stover Eisenhower died in Abilene, Kans. Private services were conducted at the home, and public services were handled by an army chaplain from Ft. Riley. Was that in respect for Mrs. Eisenhower? Pallbearers were three American Legionnaires and three Veterans of Foreign Wars. Was that appropriate? ... In 1942 her husband, also one of Jehovah's witnesses, died. One of Jehovah's witnesses preached the funeral service. Mrs. I.S. Eisenhower, like all Jehovah's witnesses, believed religion a racket and the clergy in general, including army chaplains, to be hypocrites. She harbored no special pride for "General Ike;" she was opposed to his West Point appointment. It was gross disrespect to the deceased for an army chaplain to officiate at the funeral.
As for the pallbearers. The American Legion particularly, and also the Veterans of Foreign Wars, are repeatedly ringleaders in mob violence against Jehovah's witnesses. Hundreds of instances could be cited, but illustrative is the one occurring the Sunday before Mrs. Eisenhower's death, in near-by Iowa. There war veterans broke up a public Bible meeting of Jehovah's witnesses, doing much physical violence. Hardly appropriate, then, was it, for such to act as pallbearers? Only death could keep the body of Mrs. Eisenhower from walking away from a funeral so disrespectful of all that she stood for (Knorr, 1946:7).
Unfortunately, this article did not discuss how the Watchtower's teachings and policy on military service, education and involvement in "false religion" contributed to the conflicts noted in the above quote. Dwight's religious orientation as an adult was described as "moderate and tolerant, simple and firm," quite in contrast to the confrontative, pugnacious Watchtower sect of the first half of this century (Fox, 1969:907).
Other reasons for the press' and the Eisenhower boys' lack of honesty about their Watchtower background include embarrassment over the Watchtower's opposition to the flag salute and all patriotic activities, vaccinations and medicine in general, the germ theory and their advocating many ineffectual medical "cures" including phrenology, radio solar pads, radiesthesia, radionics, iridiagnosis, the grape cure, and their staunch opposition to the use of aluminum cooking utensils and Fluoridation of drinking water. Dwight Eisenhower had good reasons to hide his Watchtower background when he ran for president. Roy noted that Eisenhower's religious background was used by some to argue that he was not fit to become president:
Both Eisenhower and Stevenson were vigorously challenged by some Protestant[s]...for their religious ties. The association of Eisenhower's mother with the Jehovah's Witnesses was exploited to make the GOP candidate appear as an "anti-Christian cultist" and a "foe of patriotism" (Roy, 1953).
The thesis that the Eisenhower boys were embarrassed by their parents' Watchtower involvement is supported by the problem which developed when the Watchtower tried to exploit Mrs. Eisenhower's name for their advantage. One reason for the Eisenhower boys' concern was because Jehovah's Witnesses were generally scorned by most churches and society in general, especially at the turn of the century. Virtually no college-educated people were members, and the education level even today is still extremely low, among the lowest of all religious denominations (Cosmin and Lachman, 1993). A problem that the Eisenhower boys faced in the 1940s, according to Edgar Eisenhower, was that "the deep, sincere and even evangelical religious fervor" of their mother was used by the Watchtower "to exploit her in her old age" (Kornitzer, 1955:139).
This concern prompted Edgar to write a letter in 1944 to the Jehovah's Witness who was caring for his mother when she was 82. As was the practice then for all members, young and old--and as Jehovah's Witnesses today are well known for-- Witnesses go from door-to-door and "witness" on the street corners, primarily by selling their literature. Edgar evidently felt that the Eisenhower name was being exploited in this work and objected to his mother "being taken out of the home and used for the purpose of distributing [Watchtower] religious literature" (Kornitzer, 1955:139). Edgar added that he was "willing to fight" for his mother's "right to continue to believe as she saw fit, but ... she could be easily and mistakenly influenced in performing any service which would be represented to her as helpful to the advancement of religious beliefs" of the Watchtower (Kornitzer, 1955:139). His concern was that his mother should no longer
be taken from place to place and exhibited as the mother of General Eisenhower--solely for the purpose of attempting to influence anyone [to accept the Watchtower beliefs] ... I want mother shielded and protected and not exposed or exhibited ... mother's home should be maintained solely for her intimate friends and relatives and ... no stranger should be permitted to live in the house regardless of who he may be ... (Kornitzer, 1955:139).
This problem was eventually solved by removing the Jehovah's Witness who was then caring for Ida Eisenhower, Naomi Engle, a lifelong friend and certainly no stranger to Ida, from Ida's home and replacing her with a Mrs. Robinson, a non-Witness. Would Edgar have objected if Ida was allowed to use the Eisenhower name for a cause such as education, health or even a church such as the Lutherans or Methodists? Part of what he likely objected to was what he felt was the Watchtower exploiting her to spread a set of beliefs that he and his brothers firmly and openly disagreed with, i.e., the Watchtower Millennial theology.




When researching Eisenhower's religion "Since so little original documentation exists, most historians have relied on interviews with persons who knew David and Ida" (Branigar 1994:1). Of the large amount of information available, one has to determine which conclusions were historically accurate--sometimes no easy task. One of the most reliable sources is Gladys Dodd's thesis because she used scores of personal interviews with the family, many of whom she was personally acquainted with, to study the religious background of the Eisenhower family in the late 1950s. Unfortunately, some Watchtower sources are questionable.
Dr. Holt, the director of the Dwight D. Eisenhower library in Abilene, Kansas indicates that the Watchtower may be involved in passing documents off as real which are evidently forgeries (1999). Specifically, interviews with family members has led J. Earl Endacott, a former Eisenhower library curator, to conclude that it was a 1944 incident which led to the dismissal of Ida's nurse, Mrs. Engle, who was then an active Jehovah's Witness.
The source of this information was Mrs. Robinson, who became Ida's nurse after Engle's dismissal. She claimed that Engle and another Witness conned Ida to write her name several times on a blank sheet of paper under the pretense of giving her "practice." According to Mrs. Robinson, the most legible signature was then physically cut from the sheet and pasted on the bottom of the letter to Mr. Boeckel which was not written by Mrs. Eisenhower but by Engle. Endacott concluded Engle had "more loyalty to the Witnesses" than to the Eisenhower's to whom she was distantly related. Later "in one of her lucid moments Ida told Mrs. Robinson what had happened and gave the sheet with the cut out name to her. When the Eisenhower foundation took over the home, Mrs. Robinson told me the story and gave me the sheet which I still have" (Endacott, N.D.).
This letter she allegedly wrote was to a Richard Boeckel, a young man who had become a Jehovah's Witness while still in the army (Boeckel, 1980). In August of 1944 Boeckel attended a Watchtower assembly in Denver where he met Lotta Thayer, Ida's neighbor from Abilene. In his conversations with her, Boeckel explained the difficulty of being a Witness in a military environment. Thayer then reportedly told him that her neighbor was General Eisenhower's mother, and added that "she's one of Jehovah's Witnesses" and asked Boeckel if he would like her to write to him (Knorr, 1980:24-29). Boeckel wrote Ida, and part of the letter Ida allegedly wrote back to him stated,
A friend returning from the United Announcers Convention of Jehovah's Witnesses, informs me of meeting you there. I rejoice with you in your privilege of attending such convention. It has been my good fortune in the years gone by to attend these meetings of those faithfully proclaiming the name of Jehovah and his glorious kingdom which shortly now will pour out its rich blessings all over the earth. My friend informs me of your desire to have a word from General Eisenhower's mother whom you have been told is one of the witnesses of Jehovah. I am indeed such and what a glorious privilege it has been in associating with [other Witnesses]. . . . Generally I have refused such requests because of my desire to avoid all publicity. However, because you are a person of good will towards Jehovah God and His glorious Theocracy I am very happy to write you. . . . It was always my desire and my effort to raise my boys in the knowledge of and to reverence their Creator. My prayer is that they all may anchor their hope in the New World, the central feature of which is the Kingdom for which all good people have been praying the past two thousand years. I feel that Dwight my third son will always strive to do his duty with integrity as he sees such duty. I mention him in particular because of your expressed interest in him. And so as the mother of General Eisenhower and as a Witness of and for the Great Jehovah of Hosts (I have been such for the past 49 years) I am pleased to write you and to urge you to faithfulness, as a companion of and servant with those who "keep the commands of God and have the testimony of Jesus" (Quoted in Cole, 1955:194-195).
To encourage Boeckel to accept Watchtower doctrines, the letter mentioned several current events which the Watchtower then taught was evidence that Armageddon would occur very soon, concluding that "Surely this portends that very soon the glorious Theocracy, the long promised kingdom of Jehovah...will rule the entire earth and pour out manifold blessings upon all peoples who are of good will towards Him. All others will be removed [killed at Armageddon]. Again, may I urge your ever faithfulness to these 'Higher Powers' and to the New World now so very near." The letter dated August 20, 1944, evidently had the taped signature "Ida Eisenhower" affixed to it and closed with "Respectfully yours in hope of and as a fighter for the New World" (Cole, 1955:191).
This Ida Eisenhower letter, Endacott concluded, was "not in the words of Ida, who at the time could hardly write her own name" and evidentially she was not always mentally alert although her physical health was good. Her memory started to fail soon after her husband died and was at times so poor that she could not even remember her own son's names (Eisenhower, 1974:188). Furthermore, this letter is very well written quite in contrast to the letter she wrote in her own hand dated 1943 (see Cole 1955). When the Eisenhower sons found out about this event (evidentially a reporter published the letter putatively written by Ida Eisenhower to Mr. Boeckel) and other similar incidences, they wrote to Engle exploiting Ida (Kornitzer 1955). The letter was evidentially ignored by Engle and then Milton was given the task of dismissing her. At this time, Milton hired non-Witness Mrs. Robinson to help take care of Ida.
It would appear that Richard Boeckel would immediately be suspicious when he received the letter with Mrs. Eisenhower's signature obviously taped on it. He should have confirmed that the letter was genuine before he made claims about receiving a letter from Ida Eisenhower. His story and a photo reproduction of the letter was published in Marley Cole's book Jehovah's Witnesses and other sources, and Boeckel repeated the claims about the letter in his life story published in the October 15, 1980 Watchtower. At the minimum, the Watchtower Society, Mr. Boeckel, and Marley Cole have unethically presented a letter as genuine evidentially without verification. If Mrs. Eisenhower's letter is verified to be valid, the allegations that her letter is a forgery should be squashed. So far the Watchtower has not answered several inquiries about this matter. The Eisenhower museum has agreed to pay for a handwriting expert to examine the letter, but all attempts to obtain the cooperation of the Watchtower have so-far failed.
Merle Miller related an experience involving Boeckel and this letter which reveals the irony of Eisenhower's mother's faith:
. . . one time when Boeckel refused, as a good Witness must, to salute his superior officers at Fort Warren, he said that he was a Witness and that his refusal to salute was "based on my understanding of the Bible." One officer reportedly said, "General Eisenhower ought to line you Jehovah's Witnesses up and shoot you all!" Boeckel then, again according to The Watchtower, said, "'Do you think he would shoot his own mother, sir?' "'What do you mean by that?' "Reaching in my pocket and taking out Sister Eisenhower's letter, I handed it to him. . . . He read the letter ... [and] handed it back to me. 'Get back to ranks,' he said, 'I don't want to get mixed up with the General's mother'"(Miller, 1987:79).
Suspicion that the letter was a forgery is also supported by a Watchtower teaching called The Theocratic Warfare Doctrine. The Theocratic Warfare doctrine essentially teaches that it is appropriate to withhold the truth from "people who are not entitled to it" to further the Watchtower's interests (Reed, 1992; Franz, 1971:1060-1061). Reed defines Theocratic War Strategy as the approval to lie "to outsiders when deemed necessary" and also to deceive outsiders to advance the Watchtower's interests (Reed, 1995:40). In the words of Kotwall the Watchtower teaches that "to lie and deceive in the interest of their religion is Scripturally approved" (Kotwall, 1997:1). Jehovah's Witnesses do not always lie outright, but they often lie according to the court's definition--not telling "the whole truth and nothing but the truth," which means the court requires the whole story, not half-truths or deception (Bergman 1998). In the words of Raines, theocratic warfare in practice means "deceiving" to protect and advance the interests of "God's people" especially God's "organization the Watchtower" (Raines, 1996:20).
Nonetheless I found no evidence that either parent was not a devoted Watchtower adherent when the Eisenhower boys were raised. If Mrs. Eisenhower's allegiance to the Watchtower waned as she got older, this would not affect the fact that her boys were raised as Witnesses, but would help us to better understand Ida Eisenhower.
In conclusion, Ida probably did not resign from the Witnesses and still saw herself as one. The reasons for concluding Ida Eisenhower mailed other letters at about the same time that she allegedly mentioned her Witness commitment to Boeckel include a handwritten letter to fellow Witness Mrs. H. I. Lawson of Long Island, N.Y., in 1943 (Cole, 1955). Although this letter could be a forgery as well, no one has voiced this concern yet.
In addition, a front page Wichita Beacon (April 1943) article about Ida's Watchtower assembly attendance gave no indication that she was then disenchanted with Jehovah's Witnesses. The article stated that "the 82 year old mother of Americas famous military leader. . . was the center of attraction at the meeting Sunday, and her name was heard in just about every conversation, speech and discussion. The program's subject was 'how to become a good Jehovah's Witness." No evidence exists that only a year later she rejected Watchtower teachings or had resigned. These facts do not prove the letter is not a forgery, nor do they demonstrate the commonly alleged view that she became a Witness only in her later years when she was becoming senile, as often implied by many authors.
Conversely, some hints exists that Mrs. Eisenhower's loyalty to the Watchtower, in contrast to the common perception, waned as she grew older. All of her sons left the Watchtower, as did her husband, all whom became opposed to many of their teachings. Furthermore, when J. F. Rutherford became the Watchtower president in 1916, their teachings changed drastically. Rutherford introduced many - if not most - of their more objectionable teachings such as their opposition to medicine, flag salute, vaccines, blood transfusions, and all other religions, all of which Rutherford regarded as "a snare and a racket" and of Satan. If Rutherford had retained the teachings of the first president, C.T. Russell, I believe the Eisenhower family concerns about the Watchtower would not have been nearly as great.
On the other hand, very good reasons existed for the Eisenhower family to attempt to distance themselves from the Watchtower--reasons which were made clear by some of Eisenhower's opponents, some evidently who planned to use this information to hurt Eisenhower's political career. As noted above, Roy noted that Eisenhower's religious background was used by some to argue that he was not fit to become president.




 
Panda
Panda 13 years ago


Holy Mackral ! Did you write this article. It's very interesting. I always wondered what the real scoop was about Pres.Eisenhower, now I know. Do you have the Bibliography of this article? I'd like to look into those sources, especially Ike's brothers work. Very very interesting. Thanks for posting!

"Our day will come old friend, just not today."
 
cat1759
cat1759 13 years ago


This was an excellent read!
I thought the double standards were so cute.
Cathy
 
Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago


Panda, these are the sources:

References
Ambrose, Stephen E. The Supreme Commander: The War Years of General Dwight D. Eisenhower . Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, 1970.
_________. Eisenhower: 1893-1952 . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1983.
Anderson, Jack. "Is His Vote Record Related To Payroll?" Merry-Go-Round in the Detroit Free Press (Sept. 23, 1956),16b.
Bergman, Jerry. "The Adventists and Jehovah's Witnesses Branch of Protestantism" in America's Alternative Religions , Ed. by Timothy White Albany, NY: State University of New Press, 1995, p. 33-46.
_________. The Theocratic Warfare Doctrine: Why Jehovah's Witnesses Lie in Court . Clayton, CA: Witness Inc 1998.
Beschloss, Michael R. Eisenhower, A Centennial Life . New York: Harper Collins 1990.
Boeckel, Richard A. "A Soldier who Became a Preacher" The Watchtower ( Oct. 15, 1980), 24-29.
Bonnell, John Sutherland. Presidential Profiles; Religion in the Life of American Presidents . (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1971).
Branigar, Thomas. Letter to the author, August 9, 1994
Cole, Marley. Jehovah's Witnesses, The New World Society  New York: Vantage Press 1955.
Cosmin, Barry A. and Seymour P. Lachman. One Nation Under God . New York: Harmony Books, 1993.
Davis, Kenneth , Soldier of Democracy; A Biography of Dwight Eisenhower  Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1952 originally published in 1945
Dodd, Gladys. The Religious Background of the Eisenhower Family . Bachelor of Divinity Thesis, Nazarene Theology Seminary, Merriam, Kans. 1959.
_________. "The Early Career of Abraham L. Eisenhower, Pioneer Preacher," Kansas Historical Quarterly  29 (Autumn 1963).
_________. Letter from author dated Oct. 8, 1994.
Endacott, J. Earl. Records, Documentary Historical Series , Box 4, Eisenhower Library
Eisenhower, Dwight D. At Ease, Stories I tell to Friends  Garden City, NJ: Doubleday, 1967.
_________. The Eisenhower Diaries (Robert H. Fervell, Ed.). New York: W.W. Norton Co., 1981.
Eisenhower, Milton S. The President is Calling  GardenCity, New York: Doubleday, 1974.
Fleming, Helen. "Ike's Mom Jehovah Witness 50 yrs., Say group leaders; preacher from door to door in Abilene, Director reports."  Chicago Daily News , June 25, 1955, pp. 1,3.
Ford, Edward , Jr. correspondence to author dated Sept. 1995.
Fox, Frederick. "Pro Ike." Christian Century . July 2,1969 Vol. 86.
Franz, Frederick (Ed.). Aid to Bible Understanding. New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1971.
________. J ehovah's Witnesses; Proclaimers of God's Kingdom . Brooklyn, New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania 1993).
Freese, Arthur. "Man of the 20th century" (Interview with Milton Eisenhower) Modern Maturity. Dec-Jan., 1975 17(6):25-28).
Fuller, Edmund and David E. Green. God in the White House; The Faiths of American Presidents . New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1968.
Gammon, Roland (Ed.). Eisenhower speech reprinted in (Roland Gammon Ed.) Al l Believers Are Brothers . New York: Doubleday, Garden City, 1969), 3-4.
Graham, Billy. Just As I Am; The Autobiography of Billy Graham. (San Francisco: Harper 1997), chapter 12 "The General who Became President" 188 - 206.
Gruss, Edmond. T he Jehovah's Witnesses and Prophetic Speculation . Nutley, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1976.
Gunther, John. Eisenhower, The Man and the Symbol . Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1951.
Gustafson, Merlin. "Religion of a President." Christian Century . (April 30, 1969), 610-613.
Hatch, Alden. General Ike; A Biography of Dwight D. Eisenhower . Chicago, IL: Consolidated Book Publishers, 1944.
Hendon, David and James Kennedy. "Civil Religion" Journal of Church and State. 391 39 (2) 1997, 390-391.
Hutchinson, Paul. "The President's religious faith," Christian Century . March 24, 1954 Vol 71, 364; reprinted in Life March 22, 1954 Vol. 36: 150+
Henshel, Milton G. Chicago Daily News . June 25,1955, 1, 3
Jameson, Henery B. "Ike buried in Abilene; Massive crowd for Eisenhower funeral" Abilene Reflector--Chronicle , Memorial Ed. 1969.
Knorr, N.H. "Religion Void of Principle." Awake!  Oct 22,1946, 27(20): 323-324.
_________. "Eisenhower book stirs a controversy: conceals fact that parents were Jehovah's Witnesses." Awake!  ( Sept. 22, 1955. 36(18), 3-4.
_________. "Appreciated Parents" Awake! Ap. 22, 1975, 56(8):30.
_________. "Conspiracy against Jehovah's name" Watchtower 78(11): 323-324. June 1, 1957
Kornitzer, Bela. The Great American Heritage; The Story of the Five Eisenhower Brothers . New York: Farrar Straus, and Cudahy, 1955.
Kotwall, B. J. "The Watchtower Society Encourages Lying." The Investigator Magazine Australia 1997.
Larson, Arthur. E isenhower; The President Nobody Knew . New York: Charles Scribners Sons, 1968.
Lyon, Peter. Eisenhower; Portrait of the Hero . Boston: Little, Brown and Co 1974.
McCullun, John Six Roads From Abilene, Some Personal Recollections of Edgar Eisenhower . Seattle, Wash.: Wood and Reber, Inc., 1960.
Miller, Francis Trevelyn. Eisenhower, Man and Soldier . (Philadelphia: John C. Winston Company, 1944)
Miller, Merle. Ike the Soldier; As They Knew Him. New York: Putnam's Sons, 1987.
Neal, Steve. The Eisenhower's . Lawrence, Kans: University Press of Kansas 1984.
Nevin, David. "Home to Abilene." Life  (April 11,1969 Vol 66 No 14 ), 24.
Pearson, Drew. "Eisenhower's seek to clear mother of affiliation with religious sect." Merry-Go-Roun d in the Defiance Crescent News . (Dec. 19, 1956): 6.
Pickett, William. Dwight David Eisenhower and American Power . Wheeling, Ill.:Harland Davidson, Inc., 1995.
Raines, Ken. "Deception by JWs in Court, OK with Judge?" JW Research Journal . 3(2) Spring 1996, p. 20.
Reed, David. "Court Rules; Watchtower Booklet Recommends 'Untrue' Testimony Under Oath." C omments from the Friends , Spring, 1992.
_______. Dictionary of J.W. eez: The Loaded Language Jehovah's Witnesses Speak . (Assonet, MA.: Comments from the Friends, 1995): 40.
Ralph Lord, Roy. Apostles of Discord; A Study of Organized Bigotry and Disruption on the Fringes of Protestantism . Boston: Beach Press, 1953.
Russell, Charles Taze. Studies in the Scriptures; Series III, Thy Kingdom Come Chapter 10, "The Testimony of God's Stone Witness and Prophet, The Great Pyramid in Egypt," Allegheny, PA: Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society, 1904.
________. Studies in the Scriptures; Series I, The Plan of the Ages . New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1914 Front page.
Rutherford, Joseph. "The Alter in Egypt." Pt. 1 The Watch Tower . 49(22):339-345, Nov. 15, 1928; Pt. II. Dec. 1, 1928, 49(23):355-362).
Sellers, Ron. How Americans View Various Religious Groups . Report by Barna Research Group, 1990
Sider, Morris E. . Archivist for the Brethren in Christ Church, Messiah College, Grantham, PA. Interviews of various dates, and correspondence to the author dated October 24, 1994.
Taylor, Allan (Ed.). What Eisenhower Thinks . New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company.
Tonkin, R.G. "I grew up with Eisenhower." Saturday Evening Post ,May 3,1952.
Time Eisenhower: Soldier of peace." April 4, 1969:19-25.
Time "I Chose My Way." Sept 23, 1946: 27.
Whitney, David C. The American Presidents . Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Company, 1967.
Watchtower Publication Awake! "Should Christians be Pacifists" (May 8, 1997, 78(9): 22-23); "Why Jehovah's Witnesses are not Pacifists" and "Pacifism and Conscientious Objection - is there a difference?" 73 - 81 The Watchtower (Feb 1, 1951 72(3): 67- 73; Christendom or Christianity, which is the light of the World?  (New York, NY:Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, 1955), 24-26 subtitled "Is a Christian a Pacifist?"
 
Panda
Panda 13 years ago

Joker10, Thank you I am going to keep this bibliography and someday get through a fraction of this list. Again, Thanks.
 
Nathan Natas
Nathan Natas 13 years ago


Joeker10 has neglected to mention that the article he posted can be found at: http://www.premier1.net/~raines/eisenhower.html
In an article titled, "Why President Eisenhower Hid His Jehovah's Witness Upbringing"
written by Jerry Bergman, Ph.D, Northwest State College, Ohio.
I'm sure Joker10's failure to mention this when specifically asked by Panda if he was the author of the article was simply an oversight.
 
Loris
Loris 13 years ago


I like to go to the local library when they have a used book sale. People donate books and the sale benefits the library. I found "The True Believer" at one of those sales. I had never heard of it before but the title caught my eye.
The one that I have was published by Time Magazine. In the Editors' Preface it starts out by saying, "Dwight Eisenhower is not a man who goes about insistently recommending books on political philosophy. When, during his Presidency, he pressed Eric Hoffer's book, The True Believer, on his associates, some expected to find it a handy expression of Eisenhower's own beliefs. The book is certainly not that, and many other readers before and after Eisenhower have delighted in The True Believer while disagreeing with much of it."
To me I found that tidbit facinating. I am sure that the editor missed the point of Eisenhower's interest in the subject matter. Was it the threat of Communism or was it the JW experience from his childhood? Did he see the similarity of the JW experience with what Eric Hoffer wrote about?
Thank you Jocker10 for posting the article. It was a facinating read.
Loris
 
Double Edge
Double Edge 13 years ago


Thanks Joker....
As a student of history I found this article very interesting. A lot of background information on what makes a person 'tick'. Dwight Eisernhower's life certainly made an impact on this earth and it is facinating to read about how his 'religious' background evolved.
D.E.
 
Joker10
Joker10 13 years ago

i thought it was a pretty interesting story to post. I'm quite surprised there has been few replies.
 
Double Edge
Double Edge 13 years ago


i
thought it was a pretty interesting story to post. I'm quite surprised there has been few replies.
Don't worry about it.... it's human nature to not take as much time with or completely ignore LONG posts.... their misfortune... it was a great read.
 
blondie
blondie 13 years ago


I researched this some time ago for a history project. My mother was a JW during the Eisenhower years. They talked about it like we do today about Michael Jackson and the Williams sisters.
During the JW generation of DDE, home family studies weren't stressed. My goodness, a structured study with householders didn't start until 1937 with the Model Study booklet. In many families around here the grandparents were JWs, skip the next generation, then the grandchildren are JWs. I guess the WTS thought the end was so close that it wasn't necessary to study with the kiddies.
Blondie
 
RR
RR 13 years ago

Actually, Ike's Father was a Bible Student eler, NEVER became a JW, lived and died a Bible Student.
 
blondie
blondie 13 years ago


That's good to know, RR. Then I take it his mother was a JW or was she a Bible Student too? That letter seems to indicate she was a JW. That must have made things interesting in the Eisenhower household.
Blondie
 
sf
sf 12 years ago

Here are some search hits on this topic:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=Eisenhower+mother+jehovah%27s+witness +
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&q=Ida+Stover&btnG=Search
Some google graphics:
http://images.google.com/images?q=Ida%20Stover&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wi
Honorable MentionIda (Stover) Eisenhower,
Ike's Mother

Ida Eisenhower, 1902
Although arbitrarily excluded from the top five,
Ida Eisenhower may deserve to be
Ike's No. 1. Most Admired Contemporary.
Eisenhower stated more than once that his mother was
the greatest person he knew.
I posted this in another thread, yet just found this one. Therefore, I'll post it here as well:
http://www.aetv.com/tv/shows/ike/
A and E tv original event...May 31, 2004 8pm--7pm central
"IKE: Countdown to D-Day"
________________________
sKally
 
Bangalore
Bangalore 4 years ago

Bumping this.

Bangalore
 

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Dwight D. Eisenhower
by Wordly Andre 8 years ago 8 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

I found this on the web: Eisenhower's family originally belonged to the local River Brethren sect of the Mennonites. However, when Ike was five years old, his parents became followers of the WatchTower Society, whose members later took the name Jehovah's Witnesses. The Eisenhower home served as the local WatchTower meeting Hall from 1896 to 1915, when Eisenhower's father stopped regularly associating due to the WatchTower's failed prophesies that Armageddon would occur in October 1914 and 1915. Ike's father received a WatchTower funeral when he died in the 1940s. Ike's mother continued as an active Jehovah's Witness until her death. Ike and his brothers also stopped associating regularly after 1915. Ike enjoyed a close relationship with his mother throughout their lifetimes, and he even used a WatchTower printed Bible for his second Presidential Inauguration. In later years, Eisenhower was baptized, confirmed, and became a communicant in the Presbyterian church in a single ceremony on February 1, 1953, just weeks after his first inauguration as president. In his retirement years, he was a member of the Gettysburg Presbyterian Church in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
 
BFD
BFD 8 years ago

I forget where I read that but it sure is interesting. Eisenhower is also the President who inserted "Under God" in the pledge of allegence.
"From this day forward, the millions of our school children will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our Nation and our people to the Almighty." President Eisenhower (1954) after signing into law a bill to have "under God" added to the original pledge
BFD
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

Quotations: "In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America's heritage and future; in this way we shall constantly strengthen those spiritual weapons which forever will be our country's most powerful resource in peace and war." -- Flag Day speech, signing bill authorizing addition of the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance, 14 June 1954
 
greendawn
greendawn 8 years ago

They were too smart to remain with the JWs it's not for nothing that he was chosen as the leader of the allied forces in the West European war theatre. It is strange though that the mother of one of the US presidents was a JW. According to the dubs, political systems and their leaders are from the Devil!
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

not to mention he had nukes, he could have brought Armageddon!!
 
tula
tula 8 years ago

Forget college! This board has covered a lot of history for one day in this thread. Boy howdy! I sure didn't know all that Andre.
alt
 
garybuss
garybuss 8 years ago

So when the Witnesses brag about their standing up to Hitler just remind them that it was an ex-Witness who rode on a Sherman tank into Berlin and got them out of Nazi concentration camps. Not one active Witness helped them.



 
moshe
moshe 8 years ago

A very good point Gary and one I shall use! Preisdent Eisenhower's mother died in 1946, so he didn't have to worry about what she thought when he joined a church.
 
jaguarbass
jaguarbass 8 years ago

I cant immagine how the wactower society would have been in 1914. Everything about the world was different.
I'm not even sure it was the wactower society back then, it might have been called something else.
They used to celebrate birthdays and xmas.
 

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Dwight D. Eisenhower
by Wordly Andre 8 years ago 8 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

I found this on the web: Eisenhower's family originally belonged to the local River Brethren sect of the Mennonites. However, when Ike was five years old, his parents became followers of the WatchTower Society, whose members later took the name Jehovah's Witnesses. The Eisenhower home served as the local WatchTower meeting Hall from 1896 to 1915, when Eisenhower's father stopped regularly associating due to the WatchTower's failed prophesies that Armageddon would occur in October 1914 and 1915. Ike's father received a WatchTower funeral when he died in the 1940s. Ike's mother continued as an active Jehovah's Witness until her death. Ike and his brothers also stopped associating regularly after 1915. Ike enjoyed a close relationship with his mother throughout their lifetimes, and he even used a WatchTower printed Bible for his second Presidential Inauguration. In later years, Eisenhower was baptized, confirmed, and became a communicant in the Presbyterian church in a single ceremony on February 1, 1953, just weeks after his first inauguration as president. In his retirement years, he was a member of the Gettysburg Presbyterian Church in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
 
BFD
BFD 8 years ago

I forget where I read that but it sure is interesting. Eisenhower is also the President who inserted "Under God" in the pledge of allegence.
"From this day forward, the millions of our school children will daily proclaim in every city and town, every village and rural schoolhouse, the dedication of our Nation and our people to the Almighty." President Eisenhower (1954) after signing into law a bill to have "under God" added to the original pledge
BFD
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

Quotations: "In this way we are reaffirming the transcendence of religious faith in America's heritage and future; in this way we shall constantly strengthen those spiritual weapons which forever will be our country's most powerful resource in peace and war." -- Flag Day speech, signing bill authorizing addition of the words "under God" to the Pledge of Allegiance, 14 June 1954
 
greendawn
greendawn 8 years ago

They were too smart to remain with the JWs it's not for nothing that he was chosen as the leader of the allied forces in the West European war theatre. It is strange though that the mother of one of the US presidents was a JW. According to the dubs, political systems and their leaders are from the Devil!
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

not to mention he had nukes, he could have brought Armageddon!!
 
tula
tula 8 years ago

Forget college! This board has covered a lot of history for one day in this thread. Boy howdy! I sure didn't know all that Andre.
alt
 
garybuss
garybuss 8 years ago

So when the Witnesses brag about their standing up to Hitler just remind them that it was an ex-Witness who rode on a Sherman tank into Berlin and got them out of Nazi concentration camps. Not one active Witness helped them.



 
moshe
moshe 8 years ago

A very good point Gary and one I shall use! Preisdent Eisenhower's mother died in 1946, so he didn't have to worry about what she thought when he joined a church.
 
jaguarbass
jaguarbass 8 years ago

I cant immagine how the wactower society would have been in 1914. Everything about the world was different.
I'm not even sure it was the wactower society back then, it might have been called something else.
They used to celebrate birthdays and xmas.
 

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Sunday Washington Post: Gay Christians choosing celibacy emerge from the shadows.
by Balaamsass2 a year ago 9 Replies latest a year ago   social current
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Balaamsass2
Balaamsass2 a year ago

Local
Gay Christians choosing celibacy emerge from the shadows
Despite encountering criticism, the LGBT community is finding greater acceptance, even in religious circles
Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Google Plus Share via Email More Options Resize Text Print Article Comments 529
Josh Gonnerman and Eve Tushnet, both of Washington, are shown on Oct. 22 in the District. Gonnerman and Tushnet are gay and choosing the path of celibacy. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post) By Michelle Boorstein December 13 at 9:20 PM
When Eve Tushnet converted to Catholicism in 1998, she thought she might be the world’s first celibate Catholic lesbian.
Having grown up in a liberal, upper Northwest Washington home before moving on to Yale University, the then-19-year-old knew no other gay Catholics who embraced the church’s ban on sex outside heterosexual marriage. Her decision to abstain made her an outlier.
“Everyone I knew totally rejected it,” she said of the church’s teaching on gay sexuality.
Today, Tushnet is a leader in a small but growing movement of celibate gay Christians who find it easier than before to be out of the closet in their traditional churches because they’re celibate. She is busy speaking at conservative Christian conferences with other celibate Catholics and Protestants and is the most well-known of 20 bloggers who post onspiritualfriendship.org, a site for celibate gay and lesbian Christians that draws thousands of visitors each month.
Celibacy “allows you to give yourself more freely to God,” said Tushnet (rhymes with RUSH-net), a 36-year-old writer and resident of Petworth in the District. The focus of celibacy, she says, should be not on the absence of sex but on deepening friendships and other relationships, a lesson valuable even for people in heterosexual marriages.

When he came out in the mid-2000s, Josh Gonnerman says church leaders were not speaking about celibacy because they had “sort of thrown their lot in with the Republican Party.” (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post)
Celibate Christian LGBT people are stepping out into the open for the same reason LGBT people in general are: Society has become so much more accepting, including in religious circles. But among conservative Christians, efforts toward more acceptance have collided with the basic teaching that sex belongs only among married men and women. The celibacy movement helps reconcile those concerns.
However, they are also met with criticism from many quarters, including from other gays and lesbians who say celibacy is both untenable and a denial of equality.
“We’ve been told for so long that there’s something wrong with us,” said Arthur Fitzmaurice, resource director of the Catholic Association for Lesbian and Gay Ministry. Acceptance in exchange for celibacy “is not sufficient,” he said. “There’s a perception that [LGBT] people who choose celibacy are not living authentic lives.”
The reaction among church leaders themselves has been mixed, with some praising the celibacy movement as a valid way to be both gay and Christian. But others have returned to the central question of how far Christianity can go in embracing homosexuality — even if people abstain from sex.

Al Mohler, president of the flagship Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and one of the country’s most respected conservative evangelical leaders, said in an interview that there is “growing and widespread admiration” for Tushnet and others, including Wesley Hill, an evangelical scholar who founded the spiritualfriendship blog.
Given that LGBT people are coming out and “being welcomed,” he said, “it is now safe and necessary to discuss these things aloud in evangelical churches — and that’s hugely important.”
But echoing the ambivalence of some conservative Christians, Mohler said he believes that sexual orientation can change “by the power of the Gospel.” He said he is not comfortable with the way in which some celibate gay Christians proudly label themselves as gay or queer.

Eve Tushnet grew up in a liberal, upper Northwest D.C. home before moving on to Yale University. “Everyone I knew totally rejected it,” she says of the church’s teaching on gay sexuality. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post)
“Even if someone is struggling with same-sex attraction, I’d be concerned about reducing them to the word ‘gay,’ ” Mohler said.
Josh Gonnerman, 29, a theology PhD student at Catholic University, writes for the spiritualfriendship site and speaks easily about embracing his gayness. When he came out in the mid-2000s, Gonnerman says, church leaders weren’t speaking about celibacy because they had “sort of thrown their lot in with the Republican Party” and wouldn’t talk inclusively in any way about LGBT people. The LGBT group he and Tushnet are part of at Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle, he said, has gone from more of a “support group” to something more upbeat that organizes social and spiritual activities for members — not all of whom accept church teaching on celibacy.
“There is this shift from the more negative to the more positive,” he said. “In the past, the Catholic approach was: ‘Oh, sucks for you’ [that you’re gay]. The emphasis was on the difficulty. Celibacy is being reimagined.”
Julie Rodgers was hired this fall to engage frankly with these topics. A lesbian, she is the first staffer charged with serving the gay and lesbian community in the chaplain’s office of Wheaton College, a highly prominent evangelical school in Illinois.
Raised in a conservative Southern Baptist home in Texas, Rodgers went through years of now-discredited “reparative therapy” — a practice purported to turn gay people straight that many conservative churches are abandoning. After deciding it was damaging, she embraced celibacy.
Rodgers avoids speaking too judgmentally but says she “can’t get behind” the idea that God would bless a same-sex relationship. She is focused, she said, on trying to heal injustices done to gay people by the church.
“Evangelicals are really trying to figure out what to do. There is a real panic about how to move forward. How do we think and talk about sexuality? We haven’t had a robust understanding around celibacy in the past,” she said. “We are trying to find a congruence between faith and spirituality that does not try to align with traditional marriage but does recognize that we can live without sex, but we can’t live without intimacy.”
But what does that intimacy look like, specifically?
The desire of these new celibacy advocates to emphasize the positive and to not have LGBT people defined by their sex lives has left what can look like a gaping hole: Virtual silence on the difficulty of not having sex. Or about sex in general. Many of the essays on the blog tend toward the academic, removed from physical human passions or desires.
Some say they are simply hesitant to speak or write publicly about topics, such as whether it’s okay to think about sex, or to masturbate, and whether they find celibacy difficult. Gay Christians considering or trying celibacy do sometimes discuss such things in private settings, Gonnerman says.
Tushnet, a writer, anticipates some of these questions in her memoir “Gay and Catholic,” which positions her as kind of a non-judgmental Dear Abby to the celibate LGBT set.
“How do I deal with crushes? In terms of physical affection, how far can you go?” she asks in a “Frequently Asked Questions” section in her book.
She urges people not to focus so much on the sex they can’t have and instead find other places to pursue intimacy, such as deeper friendships that could be seen as spouselike, co-living arrangements, public service and the arts as ways to express intimacy.
“I use the image of a kaleidoscope — the jewels inside are desires. If you turn it one way, it’s lesbianism. If you rearrange them, it can be community service or devotion to Mary,” she said during a recent interview.

But Tushnet knows her background makes it hard for her to identify with so many gay and lesbian people who experienced rejection and exclusion, having grown up in a nominally Jewish home in upper Northwest Washington, the daughter of two liberal law professors, and graduating from the liberal bastion of Yale. Before she became celibate, she had a positive experience in the mainstream gay community — something she thinks makes her a good envoy for celibacy.
“You can see love, solidarity and beauty in gay communities and still believe there is even more love and beauty in Christianity,” she says.
More typical is the experience of Charleigh Linde, 24, who said she was sick of “lying all the time” and came out last year to her community at the conservative evangelical megachurch McLean Bible, in Vienna, which she calls incredibly warm — “like family.” Her pastor told her she could remain as a leader of young adult ministry but only if she was celibate. Many at the church told her that they were praying for her to become straight, yet several of her McLean friends went with her last month to a conference called the Reformation Project, where hundreds of gay Christians trained at ways to promote what they see as full equality — not celibacy — at their conservative churches. These are people who aren’t comfortable with the liturgy or theology of liberal churches.
“Maybe it’s the service, or that they don’t put as much emphasis on the Bible. I wouldn’t want to go to a gay church because I don’t want that to be the focus. It’s about Jesus,” Linde said of affirming churches. The theology around celibacy doesn’t make sense to her either, and Linde now says she believes gay relationships are okay. She expects this will eventually force her to leave McLean. Yet she considers it progress that she remains — for now — in leadership as an openly gay person.
The Reformation Project was run by gay author Matthew Vines, whose recent popular book “God and the Gay Christian” was considered so dangerous by some conservative leaders that Mohler and others immediately penned a counter-argument book and made it available for free.

At the ground level are people like Lindsey and Sarah, a celibate lesbian couple who live in Northeast Washington. The women, who asked that their last names not be used for fear of harassment, write about their experience at aqueercalling.com. They hope to launch talks about intimacy and friendship — and not just the question of whether gay sex is a sin.
“It’s not that we don’t have moral convictions of our own, but we are tired of that conversation. We really wish people could look past the black and white thing,” Sarah said. “But since same-sex relationships are being talked about more openly, there’s more space to talk about celibacy — this is the ideal time to be having this conversation.”
 Michelle Boorstein is the Post’s religion reporter, where she reports on the busy marketplace of American religion
 
littlerockguy
littlerockguy a year ago


Square pegs forcing themselves into round holes.

LRG
 
breakfast of champions
breakfast of champions a year ago

Can't possibly be gay.
Pants too loose.
Although there are the socks. . . . .
 +1 / -0
little_Socrates
little_Socrates a year ago

Many straight people choose to live a celibate lifestyle are they also a square peg in a round hole?

Being Catholic I gotta say I think my Church is somewhat progressive on this issue. ANY sex outside of marriage is frowned apon. So the teaching is just as hard for a hetrosexual as it is for a homosexual. Pre Marital Sex, Adultery, Homosexual Sex is all considered the same essentially. Many straight people don't live this teaching but nobody condems them. There should be no more condemnation for a homosexual.

You are who you are. Nobody really knows what makes one homosexual or another hetrosexual. Being yourself is not a sin. Having desires for homosexual sex is not a sin. However things we do can be sin.
 
Apognophos
Apognophos a year ago

I'm trying to figure out how anyone can be a celibate homosexual while also living together with someone of the same sex. Do they just not find each other attractive? Otherwise it sounds like a recipe for disaster.
 
Balaamsass2
Balaamsass2 a year ago

Seemed common to me as kid. We had a lot of "confirmed Bachelors" in our 60s hall, Circuit and Bethel. Later they were called NPGs. At the time our family considered it almost like hair color.- A little "odd", but no big deal.
 
littlerockguy
littlerockguy a year ago

I'm trying to figure out how anyone can be a celibate homosexual while also living together with someone of the same sex. Do they just not find each other attractive? Otherwise it sounds like a recipe for disaster.

You assume gay people want to have sex with every other gay person of the same sex? It doesn't work that way. Do you think that someone like me who is gay wants to have sex with all my other gay friends? Again, it doesn't work that way. There are a lot of factors that determine attractiveness to another individual.

LRG
 +1 / -0
Apognophos
Apognophos a year ago

I did allow for the possibility in my post that they are not attracted to each other. It still seems dangerous to me. I wouldn't be roommates with a girl if I was trying to remain celibate unless she was really not my type. People can grow more attracted to each other over time, keep in mind.
Anyway, I just found it odd that two gay women would choose to live together and think this would be good for their celibate lifestyle. Why not pick a random straight woman to live with, if they want to avoid temptation? It takes two to tango....
 
kaik
kaik a year ago

Evangelical movement find another heros of the crusades against gay people, a gay & lesbian people who do not have a sex. Decades ago, they prized gay people who married and breed children with opposite sex to show that they are not gay. In medieval times, when celibacy was prized as the highest virtue together with poverty and starvation, people often disfugured themselves to ensure they are not attractive. Women cut their noses and burned their breasts so nobody would tempt them, while men castrated themselves. So in their twisted reasoning, you can be gay in your mind, but you cannot engage in same sex relationship. They beat themselves in the chest how they sacrificed their sexuality and get paraded like did medieval beggers with leprosis in front of the church.
 +1 / -0
Vidiot
Vidiot a year ago

All abstinence and no play makes Jack or Jill go squirrely.
 

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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Out of all religions, Catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.
 
John Doe
John Doe 8 years ago

You're assuming that everyone wants the same things from religion and that you've evaluated all possible aspects of Catholicism.
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

Out of all religions, Catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.
I used to feel the same way. I actually hated it. I still have some psychological barriers. I credit these to leftover JW programming. But intellectually it makes sense to me. BTS
 
Seeker4
Seeker4 8 years ago

It's interesting that Barbara Harrison Grazutti, Tom Cabeen and two of our serious JWD posters (names evade me at the moment, but they were on the ETWN (??) Catholic channel a few months ago) here left the JWs and eventually became Catholic. Barbara I think was intrigued by the beauty and ritual. She and I e-mailed a few times, having a few JW friends in common, just before she died.
As far as Catholics go, I do have to say that the writings of Thomas Merton, who became a Trappist monk, have been very important to me. I've been fascinated by the idea of monks, regardless of the religion. Sort of strange for a horndog like me!
S4
 
Scully
Scully 8 years ago

I can think of a few explanations:
1.To really pi$$ off any JW they ever knew (the old dog-returning-to-the-vomit thing) and ensure that JWs won't bother them, ever.
2.To experience the rituals involved in Catholicism, that they were never allowed to do as JWs.
3.To show their support of the Catholic Church's current stance regarding pedophile priests: official apologies from the pulpit and the Vatican, acknowledgement of the pain and suffering of the victims and their families and financial restitution for the victims - something you'll NEVER see happen with the JWs.
4.To go back to the family religion (if a Catholic converted to the JWs and then left).
5.Because they can.
The WTS did a stand-up job of slamming the Catholic Church at every opportunity - I think a lot of times this tactic backfires and makes people more curious and willing to investigate a belief system that spawns so much hatred from "the competition".
Having said all that, it's not for me to judge other peoples' choices in belief systems - people have as much right to become Catholics after they leave the JWs as I have to be atheist.
 
5go
5go 8 years ago

Strangely I do they read the bible which was written for catholics by catholics.
The thing that shocks me is why so many become protestant again.
 
rekless
rekless 8 years ago

Because Catholocism is 180 degrees opposite of the tower; it gives freedom to explore and expand the mind in search for the truth while not condeming you for seeking the truth.
 
Quirky1
Quirky1 8 years ago

Different Strokes for Different Folks
Quirky1
 
hillary_step
hillary_step 8 years ago

Minimus,
I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
I am not a believer now but have been both a Catholic and a WTS lemming.
I own the full run of the Catholic Encyclopedia, I also own a full run of Insight on the Scriptures.
Let us just put it this way, Catholic Theologians are rather more catholic than is the WTS and they are also far more advanced in their scientific and Biblical knowledge than Ted Jaracz and his lifeless flock of career compromised pseudo-scholars.
Perhaps this has something to do with it.
HS
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

I became a Catholic after growing up in the Tower prison, why because it's the first time I felt that god was really there, no matter how you reason it with what ever books or how the JW's twist the thinking, I know that the first time I attended mass it felt like I was with god and not a cult that has a monthly magazine.
 
nicolaou
nicolaou 8 years ago

That's cool Andre, but honestly I just don't get how a JW can awaken his thinking skills enough to get out of a cult and then progress no further.
I've left the cult of god for good.
 
lonelysheep
lonelysheep 8 years ago

Because the Catholics have it the most right! At least they did to me, for the short time I still believed in religion after quitting jw's and god. I wanted to go back to them (briefly) and be confirmed.
Having not grown up jw whatsoever, I was protestant my entire life. I attended Catholic school my elementary years and went to Mass every week from age 5 to 15, as I had often been attending with family friends.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

Mini, let the WT prejudice against the Roman Catholic Church influence you no further.
The Roman Catholic Church is not as controlling as the WTBTS. I was raised Anglican Catholic or Episcopalian. I have returned to my church for the beauty and the deeply spiritual connection it gives me. The Church is very progressive and does not consider the Bible without flaw or to be untampered with. They hold science to be very important as well as reason and tradition when reading scripture.
And the Roman Church? My therapist is a Sinsinawa Dominican Nun. She is highly educated and is a doctor of psychology. She tells me the Dominicans are very "progressive". And they are. She gives me Buddhist prayers and meditations and she also tells me that if I attend a mass at Marywood, I can take communion there, which is normally something you're not supposed to do. That is: take communion at the Catholic Church when you aren't Catholic.
I have a harder time understanding how JW's can go into very fundamentalist churches that border on cult like religions. But then it may be they need that kind of control in their lives.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

Hey, Minimus, the beautiful thing about leaving the org is that we don't have to have "the truth". We don't have to have all the answers either. And the Catholic Church will tell you there are many mysteries we don't understand. And they aren't going to ban you or shun you if you don't believe everything they teach in the conventional way.
 
drew sagan
drew sagan 8 years ago

As far as Catholics go, I do have to say that the writings of Thomas Merton, who became a Trappist monk, have been very important to me. I've been fascinated by the idea of monks, regardless of the religion. Sort of strange for a horndog like me!
I feel exactly the same way.
 The Watchtower and Catholic are two very different animals. You can point out doctrinal similarities in authority structure and problems with leadership but I think at the end of the day you are dealing with two very different things.
 I like to say that JWs are protestants on steroids. Deep down JWs hold a number of protestant ideas and so the transformation over to that belief system appears to be more natural. Many who leave the JWs move into protestantism because that form of theology suits them and their personal experience. I found myself leaning very protestant when I left the JWs and I know many here have felt that way as well. Over time though protestantism has its many flaws and some are not content with it (like me). Ex-JWs turning Catholic really isn't all that surprising to me and I can personally relate to their experience.
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

Also, My grandma has always been Catholic, She says she was born a Catholic and will die a Catholic and in between she is going to be a Catholic, dispite most of her children left the church to join some cult and push magazines door to door, she has always been very nice and accepting. Growing up in the JW environment, while most of my family either judged me or shunned me, my grandma has always been there for me, she told me one time, I don't know why our Witness family judges everyone, as a Catholic we are taught that only god can judge and we are to love everyone. That is something I never saw with my family thats in the "Truth". I can understand why some here find it hard to think of anyone leaving the JW's and going into the Catholic faith, and as for me it took about 10 years to get there, before I didn't want anything to do with church, god, or religion when ever someone started talking about it I either walked away or changed the subject. I am very happy now, and I never try to push my views on anyone else, I just know what I feel inside.
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

Personally...I don't see how anyone who would take an hour to research the history of the Catholic church could think seriously about joining them with the view to being part of the One True Church.
If you wanna join just to get a free sip of wine and a bite of cracker, well, sure knock yourself out. But if it's about the tradition and the grandeur and the architecture, you don't have to be Catholic to enjoy it. Anyone can pay their money and tour the Vatican and all the other Holy sites.
Touring the Vatican actually caused a Catholic friend of mine to question the motives of the church. He saw all the history, the hundreds of years of marble, granite and gold churches. He saw the millions of dollars in artifacts and art. He then wondered why the church couldn't have used all that power and money to actually help the poor and needy over the centuries instead of amassing one of the largest money coffers in the world.

As far as a former JW joining any other religion...about the only circumstance that wouldn't puzzle me was if a former JW joined a local, neighborhood church that isn't part of a larger organization or church body. If there is a God, I'm sure he would visit that kind of church before he went to see the Vatican, the Southern Baptist convention or any 'mega-church' organization. If Jesus was his son, that's the kind of people he would be drawn to...the simple people who worship for the sake of worship and not for the sake of money, power or fame.
I like what Johnny Cash said about churches...he said he felt closer to any supreme being by being outside in nature and seeing the handiwork of his creator. There was a spiritualism in being alone with nature to him. He didn't understand why people felt the need to go inside a closed up, man-made building to get close to God. Something to think about.
 
lonelysheep
lonelysheep 8 years ago

as a Catholic we are taught that only god can judge and we are to love everyone.
True.
That was also a teaching that was not just taught but lived by many, from my experiences.
 
sacolton
sacolton 8 years ago

I'm having a real difficult time with deciding any denomination to join. I think Raymond Franz said it best when he illustrates how the apostles didn't create separate branches of Christianity to cause followers to say, "I'm a Luke" or "I'm a Matthew" by going with their teachings. I view this the same as with every Christian church because it still follows "men" and glorifies that particular organized religion and separates Christians as brothers. We mold ourselves into labels again by being a "Catholic", "Baptist", "Methodist", etc ...
I wish things weren't so screwed up.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

If you wanna join just to get a free sip of wine and a bite of cracker, well, sure knock yourself out. But if it's about the tradition and the grandeur and the architecture, you don't have to be Catholic to enjoy it. Anyone can pay their money and tour the Vatican and all the other Holy sites.
So go to an Episcopal Church. Their Anglican Catholic services are higher and more beautiful than Catholic masses. You can take communion if you're baptized in any Christian faith. You don't have to join. You get same rituals, but they haven't been watered down by Vatican II to be plain and boring. And really, even if you aren't Christian and you aren't baptized, they aren't going to quesiton you if you take communion. And it's also very beautful to see small children and babies take part in communion.
 

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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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NewYork44M
NewYork44M 8 years ago

I personally am not aware of any turning Catholic. However, I understand especially for those who came from a Catholic background and want to re instate their family ties.
And, maybe they want to be the next pope.
 
NanaR
NanaR 8 years ago

Minimus:
I am Catholic because I found Jesus in the Catholic Church.
The Catholic Church lives in Jesus' life. They follow a liturgical calendar that begins with the month leading up to His birth and continues through his earthly life marking every milestone in that life.
The Catholic Church takes seriously Jesus' admonition that the "sheep" are to take care of the poor, and the sick, and the imprisoned. There are Holy Orders that tend to people with every sort of problem, from leprosy to blindness to the poverty of countries wracked by war. Individual members of the Church visit the old in nursing homes, the sick in hospitals, and encourage the depressed. Catholics are taught to be the face of Christ to those they meet. Many of them pay attention to that teaching.
The Catholic Mass IS Holy Scripture. At the first Mass I ever attended, I could recognize every part and knew what part of the Bible it came from.
While the Witnesses (and other groups) go to foreign lands (which are foreign because the Witnesses are primarily an American religion) and evangelize among those who are already Christian (usually Catholic), Catholic missionaries go to foreign lands and do the really hard and dangerous work of evangelizing Muslims, Chinese, and others (even secular Americans -- America is a mission field). Just this year, two Iraqi Archibishops were killed for practicing Christianity in a Muslem country.
As for the presence of sinners in the Church, well that is how it must be. We are all sinners, to a greater or lesser extent. The Church is a hospital for sinners, not a country club for saints.
If you want to know more about me, feel free to pm me or check out my blog:
http://nanaruthann.blogspot.com
The Catholic Parish I belong to has enfolded me in its loving arms, and I have found mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers there. My own parents are dead, my sister has little to do with me (she is still a JW), my husband has not chosen to return to the Church as yet (he was Catholic before he was JW) although he has not opposed my pursuit of it.
I have found Jesus, I have found loving friends who do not sit in judgment of their neighbors, and I have found peace. What more can a person ask?
Pax,
Ruth
 
JK666
JK666 8 years ago

I personally do not understand why an ex-JW would become a part of any other religion. I hate religion so much it is indescribable!
JK
 
NanaR
NanaR 8 years ago

There is a good thread entitled "Why the RCC?" at this link. Part of my story is there:
http://catholicxjw.proboards55.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=89
 
IP_SEC
IP_SEC 8 years ago

Same reason Catholics (or anyone else) leaves and becomes JWs. Come on min, use some brainage.
could never be the truth.
I could use your same line of reason to wonder why you'd think any religion would have THE TRUTH? huh?
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago


I am Catholic because I found Jesus in the Catholic Church.
The Catholic Church lives in Jesus' life. They follow a liturgical calendar that begins with the month leading up to His birth and continues through his earthly life marking every milestone in that life.
You found Jesus in the Catholic Church? Was he hanging out with the alter boys? The Catholic Church lives in Jesus' life? So what is the Vatican? Jesus' vacation home?

The Catholic Church takes seriously Jesus' admonition that the "sheep" are to take care of the poor, and the sick, and the imprisoned. There are Holy Orders that tend to people with every sort of problem, from leprosy to blindness to the poverty of countries wracked by war. Individual members of the Church visit the old in nursing homes, the sick in hospitals, and encourage the depressed. Catholics are taught to be the face of Christ to those they meet. Many of them pay attention to that teaching.
The Catholic church takes money seriously...
For all the millions they're using in charitable work, they're also spending millions in settle child abuse cases. If the Catholic Church lives in Jesus, then Jesus is a pedophile because he allowed what lives within him to continue to commit these crimes, thus making him an accomplice.
And that is why I can't see how people can realize that the Watchtower organization is crooked and deceitful and then turn right around and buy the bullshit the Catholic church hands out.
Amazing...
 
Deputy Dog
Deputy Dog 8 years ago

Min
I agree! It seems like it would be trading one legal system for another.
I was raised Catholic for a couple of years, my mom still is.
 
startingover
startingover 8 years ago

JK666,
I'm with you. I really don't understand how anyone can watch grown men perform wierd ceremonies in the robes they wear and not think it's a joke.
 
jaguarbass
jaguarbass 8 years ago

I dont know why they leave and become catholics. There are all kinds of people with all kinds of stories.
The catholics that I know seem to keep things simpler. And after spending time trapped in the tower, people might be looking for a simple spiritual fix.
Go to church once a year, or once a week say a few prayers and your good to go.
Not to say that some catholics do not have a more complicated ritual. Some catholics are more dedicated than that. But I know several that keep it simple.
If your catholic you can sin 6 days a week and not loose your friends and family and still maintain a relationship with God.
And the bible says we are all sinners.
They say know Jesus know peace. No Jesus no peace.
I see the Wac tower has driven many to be atheist and agnostic.
Personally the way I am wired atheism and agnosticsm does give me any peace.
The reason I think the Wactower drives people to atheism and agnostism is in my life they have acted as prophets and prophecied falsely.
They have by their rules and regulations caused many to deeply examine the scriptures.
Reading the scriptures is the number one recruiting tool of the atheist.
They say if they could get everyone to read the bible many more would become atheist.
Faith is fuled by faith and prayer. Faith is not something that is nurtured by deeply examining stories, It is not fuled by deeply studying false phrophecies. To have faith you have to be as a Child. At least in that aspect of your life.
There comes a certain point when nothing I say makes sense, because that is the realm we are in.
But I would suggest people become catholics after escaping the tower so they can scratch an itch that the Wactower bible and tract society could not.
You can keep it simple enough as a catholic to know jesus.
To be a witness in good standing is not simple after a while.
I am not a catholic and barring some great personal revelation from God. I doubt I will be one in this life.
 
Rapunzel
Rapunzel 8 years ago

I'm a former witness. I was born into the Roman Catholic tradition. I left the church after I joined the witnesses. And now, some twenty years after leaving the Witnesses, I attend mass agai in a Catholic church. As can be seen from reading my other posts, I don't believe in God, at least I don't believe in God as traditionally posited. However, I ask, in all sincerity: "What does God have to with it?"
Many people are Catholics [or Jews, or Moslems, or Hindus, or Buddhists, or whatever] for reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with their conception of God [or lack thereof]. I have close friends who are atheists/agnostic, and yet consider themselves Jews. Many people join a religious community because of the sense of communion and fellowship that are offered. People also join a religious community out of a sense of fidelity. This fidelity need not have anything to do with the truth claims of any religion in particular. When I speak of fidelity, I intend a sense of fidelity to Judeo-Islamic-Christian ethics. To the extent that these three religions advance or propose any specific, exclusive truth claims, I reject any and all such claims. In other words, I don't think that Roman Catholicism [or Islam or Judaism] has any monopoply on truth. What I do appreciate are certain fundamental values that are common to all three religions.
There is some debate in regard to the etymology of the word religion. Most people feel that it is derived from the Latin religare - "to bind."' However, the famous Roman orator, Cicero, claimed that the root word is in fact relegare, meaning "to contemplate," or "to reread." In other words, the "heart" of religion lies in contemplating, rereading and reinterpreting foundational texts, narratives, and myths. All three religions - Judaism, Islam, and Christianity - have long traditions of commentary upon their respective scriptures. For example, Jews have their Talmud and Moslems have the hadith.
Lastly, I'm offended by the ignorance of few posters who make such claims as "Roman Catholics are not Christians," or "Islam is wrong," or whatever. These people are not stupid; it's just that they are ignorant. They are unaware of - they know nothing about - the ancient and venerable traditions behind Judaism, Islam, and Christianity [in all its variants - Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox]. All three religions offer a diachronic bond [a bond running through time], connecting living believers to ancient traditions. All three religions are archaic in the non-pejorative sense of the word: they are ancient (arkhaios) beginnings (arche) that command (arkhein). They command us to have regard for one another, to care for and respect one another. As one can recall, the two greatest commandments are not listed among the Big Ten, but these two are at the core of Judaism, Islam, and all variants of Christianity.
I think that the concept of reinterpretation is a crucial one. Not all aspects of tradition are spiritually healthy or desirable. There is always the danger of ossification of thought. There is always the danger of dogmatism and intolerance. The truth be told, all three religions possess the germ - the seed or potential - of this danger. Hence, the need for tolerance. Hence the need for the avoidance of dogmatism. People need to realize that the truth claims of all religions are relative and not absolute. As the French Renaissance philosopher, Montaigne, said: "It is putting a very high price on one's conjectures to have a man roasted alive because of them."
Were this an ideal world, Jews and Moslems and Christians would all study each other's scriptures and sacred texts, not with the aim of proving or disproving any specific truth claim [which, in any case, cannot be done], but rather with the goal of understanding each other. Jews, Moslems and Christians together constitute about 40% of the world's population. There is much at stake in regard to ecumenical tolerance and dialogue.
 
Honesty
Honesty 8 years ago

Catholics believe that Jesus is God and that He died for us as individuals.
That's exactly what the Bible teaches.
Salvation is through Jesus...
Nothing more
Nothing less

I have friends who are Catholic and they love Jesus with all their being.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Thank you for all your responses. They were interesting.
Personally, I do not believe any religion has the "Truth". I do feel that the mysticism of the RCC is VERY cultish and strange. The belief in transubstantiation is ghoulish. The attire of the clergy is absurd (to me). The view that the Pope is doctrinally infalliable is very wrong to me as it would be to believe the same about the FDS.
John Ankerberg has in the past, had tv programs suggesting they are a cult. I concur.
 
PrimateDave
PrimateDave 8 years ago

Nice post Rapunzel.
Dave
 
greendawn
greendawn 8 years ago

Catholics are OK nowadays though in the past they were a dreadfully oppressive and authoritarian religion. They do have some left overs from the days of paganism but to me this is not important since they keep the essence of christianity which the JWs certainly do not and they also let you find your own level in religion instead of constantly ramming things down your throat.
 
gaiagirl
gaiagirl 8 years ago

If it came down to choosing between practicing as a Catholic or returning to being a JW, I would choose the Catholic Church without hesitation for the following reasons:
 The Catholic Church encourages higher education, and may even offer some scholarships. JW's discourage higher education, so followers are essentially doomed to menial jobs.
 The Catholic Church is accepting toward evolution, admitting that the weight of evidence in favor of evolution is so overwhelming that it cannot be ignored. JW's are still stuck in the 19th century, never mind the 20th.
 Whether or not the human Mary was divine, it is important to honor the feminine aspects of divinity. JW's fail completely in this regard. The god they worship is a bloodthirsty, jealous, warmonger, completely unlike the kind and nuturing image of Mary adored by Catholics. In nature, the egg which begins life always comes from the female, not the male. And that egg CAN develop with no male involvement whatsoever. So if a divine being was responsible for this universe, and life in it, it makes better sense to view that being as a "goddess". If one chooses instead to view the universe itself as the source of life, then a feminine view of the universe still makes more sense.
 Finally, I'd pass on being a JW again for the simple reason that, I've "been there, done that", and didn't find it to my liking.
 
Sasha
Sasha 8 years ago

I find it hard to believe anyone who has left the JW's, could join any organized religion!!!!!
I studied Catholisim before a JW gave me the "truth" book, back in '67. I thought the Catholics went against Bible scripture. Especially with the worship of the statue of Mary. I was a Sunday school teacher from the age of 12. Methodist Doctrine. I was against that and left the church I was brought up in.
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

Whether or not the human Mary was divine, it is important to honor the feminine aspects of divinity.
When I was in Orlando, Florida in February, I visited the shrine "Mary Queen of the Universe".
It was a beautiful, spiritual place.
According to Catholic doctrine Mary is the greatest of all created human beings, the greatest of the saints. The most popular Catholic devotional is the prayer of the Rosary, which is a devotion to Mary, among other things.
In my hometown we have three Churches dedicated to female saints. And the new Catholic University is called Ave Maria.
alt
 
DanTheMan
DanTheMan 8 years ago

There's a weekly radio show that runs on NPR called "Speaking of Faith with Krista Tippett". They run it early on Sunday mornings on the station that serves the market I live in and I always find it very interesting to listen to - Krista is the best interviewer I've ever heard; she is so smart and friendly and inquisitive. Last week's program was "The Beauty and Challenge of Being Catholic: Hearing the Faithful". And by gum I was ready to get out of bed, put on a pair of slacks and a decent shirt and head off to Mass by the time it was done! One guy's description of the Latin Mass and its meaning to him was particularly moving.
I was raised by extremely naive and horrendously dysfunctional Catholic parents and I imagine that my conversion to JWism had a lot to do with the deep (and very adolescent) animosity I felt towards them and the rest of the world by extension. But if I ever were to get a hankering for weekly religious services again I would go back to it. I do miss it sometimes, in sort of a sentimental way I guess.
 
Rapunzel
Rapunzel 8 years ago

Roman Catholic churches, and the liturgical services held within the chuches, most definitely have aspects - or dare I say "trappings -" that provide spiritual/psychological comfort for a lot of people. There are the incense and beautiful stained-glassed windows [of course, the grand cathedrals are architectural wonders that exert great power even over avowed atheists. There is no denying the sheer marvel of the intrinsic aesthetic beauty of these structures. They are among the glories of "Western" civilization. This is not to disparage the equivalent beauty of mosques and synagogues. For me these edifices go way beyond mere art or architecture. I am sorry to use such silly language, but for me these buildings are to culture, what organs are to the human body. These structures are "vital" to the spiritual health and well-being of their respective cultures. They are the "hearts" and "lungs" through which flows the life-force of societies and cultures]. There are also the priests' garments whose changes in color "mark off" the stages of the liturgical year; different colors correspond to different seasons. There is also the use of rosary beads, which provide an aide to meditation and spirituality.
It surprises me how many people want to see a return to the Latin mass!!! I have read articles by many people who long to for a return to the Latinate Mass. In fact, I think there is even a "movement" calling for it.
I, along with many Catholics, do have complaints against the Roman Catholic church and its doctrines. I find the stance of the church vis-a-vis sexuality in general, and birth control/contraception in particular to be...well...frankly ludicrous. Moreover, I don't agree with the church's stance barring the ordination of women to the priesthood.
To clear up a common misconception, Catholics do not "worship" Mary; they "venerate" her. In regard to statues of Mary, these are viewed as aides to worship. The various icons are not meant to be a substitute for faith; they are a supplement to faith. Having said this, I find it a little ironic that the church should grant such an exalted stauts to Mary, and yet forbid the ordination of women. I also do not appreciate the "official" position of the church in regard to homosexuals.
Despite all these comlaints, the church does have one good thing in its favor; it puts great importance on individual conscience. Many, many Roman Catholics disagree with the church's stance on contraception [and even abortion - there are "pro-choice" Catholics]. The church is far, far from being a doctrinal or ideological "monolith." The church lost such power a long time ago. Educated Catholics the world over hold a great variety of opinions on many different issues.
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

It's da church, man! It decided what went into the bible. It built christianity. It propagated it worldwide for 2000 yrs (almost). All other christian religions are merely splinters off of it. In it's present form, it has something for practically everyone; wanna go deep into theological studies, wanna do philosophy, wanna be a mystic, wanna be a nominal christian, wanna be a missionary, wanna fight for human rights? It will accomadate you.
S
 

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Topic Summary
out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Big Tex
Big Tex 8 years ago

Out of all religions, Catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.
I've got to admit, when I was a Witness I kind of envied Catholics. What I envied most was the concept of confession. I like(d) the idea of confessing anything and everything you've done wrong and then receiving absolution. No judicial committees, no condemnation, no thundering pronouncements that Jehovah is furious with you, or considers you dead.
Of course you've also got to believe in it too. But I think it would be neat to believe in being forgiven, truly forgiven, for what you've said or done.
 
lancelink
lancelink 8 years ago

I am very happy now, and I never try to push my views on anyone else, I just know what I feel inside. wordly andre, thank you for saying this !!
 
dogisgod
dogisgod 8 years ago

Every belief is an obstacle to overcome.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago


I personally do not understand why an ex-JW would become a part of any other religion. I hate religion so much it is indescribable!
JK
Jk, how many religions have you personally had experience with? Since people are flawed and religions include people, religions are inevitably going to be flawed. But they do a lot of good, especially the non fundamentalist faiths. St. Mark's feeds over 130 homeless men and women breakfast each weekend. They knit hats, scarfs and mittens for the poor and homeless. They collect food and money for food pantries. They participate in the hunger walk each year. They do the landscaping for a women's and children's shelter here each spring. They have a breakfast and forum of the homeless women each Thursday. They have gotten the word out so that people are coming forward with jobs and homes for these ladies. The church helped me out in many, many ways with Mickey and Julian. I can't even begin to list all they did and still do for Julian. Catholic Churches do many good things in the communities they reside in. If you don't choose to participate in religion, that is fine. Many people make the same choice everyday. But please realize that your experience is very limited. One day you just might get a very pleasant surprise.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

Of course you've also got to believe in it too. But I think it would be neat to believe in being forgiven, truly forgiven, for what you've said or done.
We forgive our children: don't we?
I used to long for the church I grew up in where people could believe different things if they wanted and God was a kind, loving, very, very forgiving fatherly figure. I used to long for the kindness of the people in the church who never made me feel uncomfortable, save one Sunday school teach with a naturally sour disposition.
I went back to my church. Not the same one, but the Episcopal Church. I love it. It's not perfect, but it respects my conscience will lead me to do the right things eventually.The sermons last 15 minutes. They are always positive.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

The attire of the clergy is absurd (to me).
Minimus, do you know why they wear vestments? Because it is exactly the attire of Jesus' day. The Roman priests from the beginning wore that attire and didn't update it. The Anglicans and Lutherens also wear it. And the Orthodox Churches wear similar garb.
 
StAnn
StAnn 8 years ago

Minimus, just how extensive has your study of Catholicism been? I assume you formed your opinion of the RCC based upon your readings of her official writings, such as the Catechism of the Catholic Church? What in the Cathechism seems so wrong to you?
 
inrainbows
inrainbows 8 years ago

Well, I can't comment for those who leave and become Catholics who believe that Catholicism is THE Truth.
But I think that is where the error of thinking lies; JW's think religion is about finding THE truth. About literalism. Thus the idea of an x-JW becoming a RC is abusrd.
But for most people it is about belief and metaphor. In many countries Catholics are actually quite relaxed in their belief. Ignoring the vocal minorities in any creed which distort ones perception of a religion, Catholicism is not about totalitarian unswerving specifity of belief.
Many Catholics quite happily ignore many 'rules', contraception, marriage, etc., etc.. Many rarely go to church. But they still feel they are real Catholics.
They identify themselves with a TRADITION of belief that has changed and will change, as soon as the old guard die out. Another Pope could have been a cusp; this Pope (Pope Fester; check the photos and compare) is a traditionalist who has rewound some progress. But the RC as is cannot sustain itself.
Thus is we free ourselves from the ideological straitjacket we had imposed opon us and accept that this may not be the way other people (or x-JW's) view their religion, people becoming RC's (at least of a modern liberal bent) is not surprising.
 
justhuman
justhuman 8 years ago

The Papal Church holds a prominent possition in the Christian world. Plus it is much closer to the Christian Gospel from the rest of the Protestand religions and groups. It has history that goes back centuries and holds monuments of Christianity.
But what actually should a JW or anyone coming from the Protestand movement it is to examine the Christian history from the Early Church until now. Doing this there are many questions that coming up and need to be examine:
1.Is the Holy Bible the only basis for the Christian faith?
2. Were in the Bible indicates that only the Bible is our basis for our Christian Faith?
3. Who set the Biblical Canon?
4.What is the Protestand basis to accept the 66 books of the Bible instead of 77 that Orthodox and Catholic Church accepts?
5. Were in the Bible is telling us the Books that we should accept as the Biblical Canon are part of the Holy Scriptures?
6. Can you indicate a verse in the Bible that claims to be infalible?
7. Were in the Bible is telling us that the faith of the Church is being set according to the Bible and not the opposite?
8. In the Early Christian Church we had the Apostoles and the Prophets and they were appointed by the Holy Spirit Elders (Episkopoi in Greek)and this succesion is being carried for over 2000 years in the Apostolic Church, starting from James the first Bishop of Jerusalim.Do JW's or any Protestand has any Apostolic Succesion?
9. Has the Apostolic Church ever Apostasized?
10.Why do Protestands accept a Bible that was set by the Apostolic Church with Saint Athanasius(Greek Orthodox) at the 3th century who defined the Biblical canon?Is it correct on their behalf to accept a Bible that came out from the "apostate" Christians?
11. What do the writtings of the first 2 centuries of Christianity indicate to us regarding the Christian faith since we have letters from the immediate succesors of the Apostles like The letter to the Church of Magnisis from Saint Ignatios the Bishop of Antioch? It was written between 97 AD - 107AD.
12. Would Jesus allow Satan to turn the Church that He set with His Blood an "apostate"Church, and Satan would truimph over Jesus Church for hundreds of years?
I do understand why many JW's become Catholics. As a member now of the Holy Catholic Apostolic Orthodox Church I found answers to my questions to the Church that Jesus set 2000 years and still is going strong despite the many obstacles.
I know God is not a God of hate and that in the end we are ALL going to be saved by the Grace of Jesus. Because God is Love that is why Jesus blood set us free
 
WTWizard
WTWizard 8 years ago

Some born-in witlesses are more comfortable with that style of religion, and are choked off by the witlesses. Hence, the Catholic church is the religion that will give them the balance of structure and freedom. Still, I feel being totally independent of any religion is far better.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

The Catholic Church allows such freedoms, huh? But OFFICIALLY, if you do not accept the 10 Commandments and papal decrees, you could find yourself in "hell". The Mafia are big into the RCC. They kill and violate every part of the Bible and The Church, yet all they have to do is get a priest and recieve absolution on their deathbed.
The fact that you can be a church member in good standing and still have an abortion is hypocritical, no??
It's all pomp with the Popemobile, the Jesus attire (), the lovers of the Latin Mass who know zippo about what they're hearing and so forth!
For those who criticize the JWs, be honest! The RCC iswhatever you want it to be. No matter what is preached, the clergy and parishoners can do things that they feel is right for that moment. It's a lazy man's religion.
(And remember, I'm not for any religion....I just think the RCC REALLY is a hypocritical religion).
 
lonelysheep
lonelysheep 8 years ago

The Catholic Church allows such freedoms, huh? But OFFICIALLY, if you do not accept the 10 Commandments and papal decrees, you could find yourself in "hell".
Hell in death, yes....but no one alive is breathing down your back 24/7 or 3 nights a week questioning your faith in the religion and god. It does allow you to still "live" now.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

and heat up for eternity. with the devil.
 
lonelysheep
lonelysheep 8 years ago

LOL
Exactly....you'll get what's due to you somehow, at some point!
That's why I put all religions and karmatic philosophies in the same sunk boat.
 
NanaR
NanaR 8 years ago

Just A Human:
Great post!!


Ruth
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

The church apostasized from the beginning. Schisms occured regularly and Councils were needed to deal with heretical beliefs. To suggest that the RCC was the beginning of the Christian Congregation is ludicrous. I have a number of books that I bought at Christian bookstores a few years back that detail the corruption of the Church.
 
Wordly Andre
Wordly Andre 8 years ago

Minimus, that reminds me of something my priest said last year, when talking about the recent sexual abuse by priests, he said something to the effect that, "The Catholic church is not perfect, it is after all a church lead by sinners, as all men are sinners, and we haven't been perfect church since jesus died for our sins, but as long as our belief, our love and trust in the lord our faith will overcome." I don't remember word for word what he said but it was something like that.
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

that reminds me of something my priest said last year, when talking about the recent sexual abuse by priests, he said something to the effect that, "The Catholic church is not perfect, it is after all a church lead by sinners, as all men are sinners, and we haven't been perfect church since jesus died for our sins, but as long as our belief, our love and trust in the lord our faith will overcome."
What the fuck difference is that from what the Watchtower Society says: (paraphrased) The organization is not infallable and has made mistakes. The earthly organization is afterall made up of imperfect men and imperfect men will make mistakes. But we can still be assured that Jehovah's spirit is upon his organization as it is the only hope for mankind. So we should put our hope in this only hope for salvation.
 
Finally-Free
Finally-Free 8 years ago

I have a number of books that I bought at Christian bookstores a few years back that detail the corruption of the Church.
I've acquired some books like that, but I make it a point to read the Catholic rebuttals as well.
W
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

The church apostasized from the beginning.
Then Jesus was a liar:
Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter,and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. Matthew 16:17
and
And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age. Matthew 28:20
Schisms occured regularly and Councils were needed to deal with heretical beliefs.
Schismatics and heretics were operating even during the Apostolic time as evidenced by the NT text itself. The Jerusalem council in Acts 15 is an example of just such a council needed to make a ruling with respect to the faith.
To use your logic the church was apostate even while the Apostles lived.
BTS
 

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out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

Undercover
'What the fuck difference is that from what the Watchtower Society'
The difference is that the rc leadership doesn't expect as much from members, doesn't set such high standards for members, doesn't punish like the wt does. Catholic families aren't ripped apart by church rules, like the wt rips apart families.
S
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago



(And remember, I'm not for any religion....I just think the RCC REALLY is a hypocritical religion).

 
Church is a spiritual hospital where you go to heal. Can you think of a better place for hypocrites. No one claims going to the Catholic church will make you perfect and therefore not a hypocrite.
 
SPAZnik
SPAZnik 8 years ago

Picture this: Dense rainforest (or whatever landscape/terrain you prefer to envision). An indigenous tribe of people. Their people power hierarchy. The unseen forces and events they story-tell about, especially to their young. All the business of living, surviving, thriving, and dying, that springs from this. >>>---> It's okay, minimus, they don't understand us either.
 
stillajwexelder
stillajwexelder 8 years ago

I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
Nor do I minimus, nor do I
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

The difference is that the rc leadership doesn't expect as much from members, doesn't set such high standards for members, doesn't punish like the wt does. Catholic families aren't ripped apart by church rules, like the wt rips apart families.
Oh, okay...that makes it all good then. They're not as bad as the Watchtower when it comes to shunning and expecting perfection so it has to be the one true religion.

I'm still amazed...how anyone can free themselves of the slavery of the Watchtower Society and turn right aournd and give themselves up as a slave to another religion...a religion that is so obviously bogus if you take the time to research it...it just boggles the mind.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Some people just like "feeling" "spiritual". When their religion teaches certain mysteries, it should just be accepted in blind faith. Church makes them feel at one with God. You know, the music, the incense, the garb.
 
sacolton
sacolton 8 years ago

Honestly, I've always felt God's presence when I'm outside admiring His wonderous creations ... the trees, the rain, the sun, etc. I've never felt that inside a church. Is there a scripture that specifically says we must worship in a building?
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

so it has to be the one true religion.
Most Catholics do not believe they are the one true religion. It isn't important to them that there is a one true religion.
And, Minimus, it isn't required that Catholics accept those mysteries in blind faith. It's an acknowedgment from the church that they don't have all the answers. It's okay not to know all the answers and have the exact truth about everything. My therapist is a Dominican nun. She doesn't believe everything traditionally Catholic. A lot of the priests don't either and they don't get kicked out for telling people so.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

Is there a scripture that specifically says we must worship in a building?
No. And you know that Jesus said that whenever two or more are gathered in his name he is with them in spirit. I don't believe you have to be part of anything to connect spiritually to the Great Spirit or God, gods or goddesses.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

The cannot explain the "mystery of the Holy Trinity". it IS a mystery they accept blindly, as they cannot clearly understand it.
And the RCC believes it IS the "True Church".
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

The cannot explain the "mystery of the Holy Trinity". it IS a mystery they accept blindly, as they cannot clearly understand it.
Well, pretty much every Christian church believes that! The Orthodox, and all the mainline Protestant denominations. We can't fully grasp it, but we can't grasp eternity either.
And the RCC believes it IS the "True Church".
Sure, and as has already been stated on this thread, it does not mean that the RCC considers members of other denominations to not be Christian and to not have salvation.
BTS
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03744a.htm


The necessary means of salvation
In the preceding examination of the Scripturaldoctrine regarding the Church, it has been seen how clearly it is laid down that only by entering the Church can we participate in the redemption wrought for us by Christ. Incorporation with the Church can alone unite us to the family of the second Adam, and alone can engraft us into the trueVine. Moreover, it is to the Church that Christ has committed those means of grace through which the gifts He earned for men are communicated to them. The Church alone dispenses the sacraments. It alone makes known the light of revealedtruth. Outside the Church these gifts cannot be obtained. From all this there is but one conclusion: Union with the Church is not merely one out of various means by which salvation may be obtained: it is the only means.
This doctrine of the absolutenecessity of union with the Church was taught in explicit terms by Christ. Baptism, the act of incorporation among her members, He affirmed to be essential to salvation. "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved: he that believeth not shall be condemned" (Mark 16:16). Any disciple who shall throw off obedience to the Church is to be reckoned as one of the heathen: he has no part in the Kingdom of God (Matthew 18:17). St. Paul is equally explicit. "A man that is a heretic", he writes to Titus, "after the first and second admonition avoid, knowing that he that is such a one is . . . condemned by his own judgment" (Tit., iii, 10 sq.). The doctrine is summed up in the phrase, Extra Ecclesiamnullasalus. This saying has been the occasion of so many objections that some consideration of its meaning seems desirable. It certainly does not mean that none can be saved except those who are in visible communion with the Church. The CatholicChurch has ever taught that nothing else is needed to obtain justification than an act of perfectcharity and of contrition. Whoever, under the impulse of actualgrace, elicits these acts receives immediately the gift of sanctifying grace, and is numbered among the children of God. Should he die in these dispositions, he will assuredly attain heaven. It is true such acts could not possibly be elicited by one who was aware that God has commanded all to join the Church, and who nevertheless should willfully remain outside her fold. For love of God carries with it the practical desire to fulfill His commandments. But of those who die without visible communion with the Church, not all are guilty of willful disobedience to God's commands. Many are kept from the Church by Ignorance. Such may be the case of numbers among those who have been brought up in heresy. To others the external means of grace may be unattainable. Thus an excommunicatedperson may have no opportunity of seeking reconciliation at the last, and yet may repair his faults by inward acts of contrition and charity.
It should be observed that those who are thus saved are not entirely outside the pale of the Church. The will to fulfill all God's commandments is, and must be, present in all of them. Such a wish implicitly includes the desire for incorporation with the visible Church: for this, though they know it not, has been commanded by God. They thus belong to the Church by desire (voto). Moreover, there is a true sense in which they may be said to be saved through the Church. In the order of Divine Providence, salvation is given to man in the Church: membership in the Church Triumphant is given through membership in the Church Militant. Sanctifying grace, the title to salvation, is peculiarly the grace of those who are united to Christ in the Church: it is the birthright of the children of God. The primary purpose of those actualgraces which God bestows upon those outside the Church is to draw them within the fold. Thus, even in the case in which GodSavesmen apart from the Church, He does so through the Church's graces. They are joined to the Church in spiritualcommunion, though not in visible and external communion. In the expression of theologians, they belong to the soul of the Church, though not to its body. Yet the possibility of salvation apart from visible communion with the Church must not blind us to the loss suffered by those who are thus situated. They are cut off from the sacramentsGod has given as the support of the soul. In the ordinary channels of grace, which are ever open to the faithfulCatholic, they cannot participate. Countless means of sanctification which the Church offers are denied to them. It is often urged that this is a stern and narrow doctrine. The reply to this objection is that the doctrine is stern, but only in the sense in which sternness is inseparable from love. It is the same sternness which we find in Christ's words, when he said: "If you believe not that I am he, you shall die in your sin" (John 8:24). The Church is animated with the spirit of Christ; she is filled with the same love for souls, the same desire for their salvation. Since, then, she knows that the way of salvation is through union with her, that in her and in her alone are stored the benefits of the Passion, she must needs be uncompromising and even stern in the assertion of her claims. To fail here would be to fail in the duty entrusted to her by her Lord. Even where the message is unwelcome, she must deliver it.
It is instructive to observe that this doctrine has been proclaimed at every period of the Church's history. It is no accretion of a later age. The earliest successors of the Apostles speak as plainly as the medievaltheologians, and the medievaltheologians are not more emphatic than those of today. From the first century to the twentieth there is absoluteunanimity. St. Ignatius of Antioch writes: "Be not deceived, my brethren. If any man followeth one that maketh schism, he doth not inherit the kingdom of God. If any one walketh in strange doctrine, he hath no fellowship with the Passion" (ad Philad., n. 3). Origen says: "Let no mandeceive himself. Outside this house, i.e. outside the Church, none is saved" (Hom. in Jos., iii, n. 5 in P. G., XII, 841). St. Cyprian speaks to the same effect: "He cannot have God for his father, who has not the Church for his mother" (De Unit., c. vi). The words of the FourthEcumenicalCouncil of Lateran (1215) define the doctrine thus in its decree against the Albigenses: "Una estfideliumuniversalis Ecclesia, extraquamnullusomninosalvatur" (Denzinger, n. 357); and Pius IX employed almost identical language in his Encyclical to the bishops of Italy (10 August, 1863): "Notissimum est catholicum dogma neminem scilicet extra catholicam ecclesiam posse salvari" (Denzinger, n. 1529).


Infallibility
As the Divinely appointed teacher of revealedtruth, the Church is infallible. This gift of inerrancy is guaranteed to it by the words of Christ, in which He promised that His Spirit would abide with it forever to guide it unto all truth (John 14:16; 16:13). It is implied also in other passages of Scripture, and asserted by the unanimous testimony of the Fathers. The scope of this infallibility is to preserve the deposit of faithrevealed to man by Christ and His Apostles (see INFALLIBILITY.) The Church teaches expressly that it is the guardian only of the revelation, that it can teach nothing which it has not received. The Vatican Council declares: "The Holy Ghost was not promised to the successors of Peter, in order that through His revelation they might manifest new doctrine: but that through His assistance they might religiously guard, and faithfully expound the revelation handed down by the Apostles, or the deposit of the faith" (Conc. Vat., Sess. IV, cap. liv). The obligation of the naturalmorallaw constitutes part of this revelation. The authority of that law is again and again insisted on by Christ and His Apostles. The Church therefore is infallible in matters both of faith and morals. Moreover, theologians are agreed that the gift of infallibility in regard to the deposit must, by necessary consequence, carry with it infallibility as to certain matters intimately related to the Faith. There are questions bearing so nearly on the preservation of the Faith that, could the Church err in these, her infallibility would not suffice to guard the flock from false doctrine. Such, for instance, is the decision whether a given book does or does not contain teaching condemned as heretical. (See DOGMATIC FACTS.)
It is needless to point out that if the Christian Faith is indeed a revealeddoctrine, which men must believe under pain of eternal loss, the gift of infallibility was necessary to the Church. Could she err at all, she might err in any point. The flock would have no guarantee of the truth of any doctrine. The condition of those bodies which at the time of the Reformation forsook the Church affords us an object-lesson in point. Divided into various sections and parties, they are the scene of never-ending disputes; and by the nature of the case they are cut off from all hope of attaining to certainty. In regard also to the morallaw, the need of an infallible guide is hardly less imperative. Though on a few broad principles there may be some consensus of opinion as to what is right and what is wrong, yet, in the application of these principles to concrete facts, it is impossible to obtain agreement. On matters of such practical moment as are, for instance, the questions of private property, marriage, and liberty, the most divergent views are defended by thinkers of great ability. Amid all this questioning the unerring voice of the Church gives confidence to her children that they are following the right course, and have not been led astray by some specious fallacy. The various modes in which the Church exercises this gift, and the prerogatives of the Holy See in regard to infallibility, will be found discussed in the article dealing with that subject.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

I bet you're glad the Church no longer burns heretics at the stake. Their history shows that either you were for them or against them as The Church. Being against them meant certain death. But like the Witnesses, they recognized that it wasn't in their best interests to be soooooo harsh. So since 1963, they adopted a kinder, gentler approach, publicly. When a priest teaches that it's ok and natural to marry, they are eventually removed as priests. Yet for decades they paid hush money to keep their pedophile priests in their parishes! HYPOCRITES! And people make a huge deal about the other hypocrites---the Witnesses??
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

I bet you're glad the Church no longer burns heretics at the stake.
How many people do you think actually got executed by the Inquisition?
Take a stab at it.
1 million? 3 million? 500,000?
Over four centuries, only about 3000.
Yeah, it's bad that anyone got executed.
But it gets blown way out of proportion. It's partly known as the Black Legend.
BTS
 
Finally-Free
Finally-Free 8 years ago

And people make a huge deal about the other hypocrites---the Witnesses??
Does that mean we should stop picking on the poor little jws?
You'll find hypocrites everywhere, not only among jws and Catholics.
What's the big deal? If you don't like a religion, then don't go. Who cares?
W
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago


The cannot explain the "mystery of the Holy Trinity". it IS a mystery they accept blindly, as they cannot clearly understand it.
And the RCC believes it IS the "True Church".
Mini, not everyone believes in the trinity or in the same exact way. Father Mic, who was Roman Catholic but decided he wanted to marry and later became an Episcopal priest, he told me he believed that God spoke Jesus' name, whatever name it was and then Jesus came to be. And when they acknowedged each other the holy spirit or ghost came to be. So there you have three separate beings but they were united as one as this country of 50 states is one nation. Now that is his personal view. And he got that growing up in the Catholic Church. I don't believe Jesus is God and never have. Do the three operate together in unity? I believe that's a better way to explain it. Something to keep in mind is that governments often used the church to get what they wanted from people. People still use religion to exercise all kinds of control over each other. The Catholic Church is not perfect. I am not Roman Catholic. I do see much, much good done within the church and in outreach to non Catholics. They acknowledge that over the centuries the church has went through turmoil and storms and dark times. Most Catholics I know would never tell you that they are the only true religion or way to God. And only some of them believe the Pope is infallible.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Only 3000, huh? Well, that's not so bad, I guess. Just a measley 3000 killed horrifically.
I think we should continue to expose any religion that claims to be the way of salvation and isn't.
And when people believe whatever they want, that's ok, I guess. If they believe in the Pope or don't, they have that option.....which makes me wonder why anyone would want to be a Catholic. Is it great to be Catholic simply because you can now believe anything you want without being killed?
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

Only 3000, huh? Well, that's not so bad, I guess. Just a measley 3000 killed horrifically.
You have to realize that essentially the Church was society in those days. The Inquisition basically functioned as the secret police of the Crown. You are looking at the whole thing through 21st century eyes.
The modern day notion of a unified and horrible “Inquisition” is an assemblage of the “body of legends and myths which, between the sixteenth and the twentieth centuries, established the perceived character of inquisitorial tribunals and influenced all ensuing efforts to recover their historical reality” (Peters 1988: 122). It was the relatively limited persecution of Protestants, mostly by the inquisitions in Spain and Italy, that provoked the first image of “The Inquisition” as the most violent and suppressive vehicle of the Church against Protestantism. Later, philosophical critics of religious persecution and the Catholic Church only furthered this image during the Enlightenment
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historical_revision_of_the_Inquisition#The_Creation_of_.22The_Inquisition.22
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

Does that mean we should stop picking on the poor little jws?
I can't speak for minimus, but I'm surprised at how many people have jumped to the Catholic Church's defense. This site is all about JWism and the issues surrounding it. Minimus has led the charge on this site for some time in questioning the Watchtower and its policies. He has suffered personally for his willilng to leave the faith. But when he questions another faith, people have jumped to defend this bigger cult where on another thread they denounce the smaller one.
More people have died at the hands of the Catholic Church, either directly or indirectly than has died because of WT policies. It's a fair bet that more Catholic children have been abused than JW children.
Yes, the Catholic Church has a couple thousand year head start on the JWs (except to a JW) and there are millions more Catholics than JWs so the numbers can be decieving. But the fact that these atrocities happened under the roof of the "True Church" that is infallible speaks volumes as to it's not being infallible nor trustworthy as God's spokemen.
On this site, people blast the Society for its handling of the child abuse case and many have left the religion because of it. Yet, the Catholic Church suffers similar issues and can still be defended by people who want to believe that it is special.
Again, beating this dead horse...how people can wake up to one abusive cult but defend another is beyond any logic that I can comprehend.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Undercover, thank you. That was expressed perfectly!
 

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Topic Summary
out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



Related Topics
Wonderment
The truth shall set us free!
by Wonderment 4 months ago
blondie
Blondie's Comments You Will Not Hear at the 09-20-2015 WT Study (LOYALTY)
by blondie 6 months ago
Anders Andersen
Really beautiful Watchtower article about truth
by Anders Andersen 3 months ago
cappytan
Lurkers: A truth is either true, or it isn't. There is no in between.
by cappytan 2 months ago
lsw1961
JWs have more good points than bad
by lsw1961 4 months ago



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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Tom Cabeen
Tom Cabeen 8 years ago

Hi Min,
 Your statements raise some questions. Can you provide some clarification?
 First, if the church as a whole "apostasized from the very beginning", on what basis could schisms recognized as such? Is not some main body of disciples, who share orthodox ("right teaching") beliefs presupposed, from which body schismatics separate themselves? What do you think of the possibility, based on, for example, what we find in Paul's letters to the Corinthians or the letters to the Asian congregations which form the opening chapters of the Revelation, that a worldwide community of believers could preserve "orthodoxy" (true teachings and practices) even if a significant number of its members failed miserably to live by those teachings and practices?
 Second, if the meeting described in Acts 15 is counted as a "council," the second council identified historically was held in Nicea in 325, nearly three centuries after Pentecost. Do you see that council as having any legitimate authority to "deal with heretical beliefs"? I am using the word "heresy" to describe a "contrary opinion", a teaching that differs significantly from that held by the main body of Christians; for example, the idea that Jesus Christ was a created being with a beginning in time rather than a divine being begotten outside of time (Arianism).
 According to biblical Bruce Metzger (in The Canon of the New Testament, its Origin, Development and Significance), "the process by which certain Christian writings gradually came to occupy a unique status of sacredness and authority in the Church" (pg 251) was a long process that occurred during at least three to four centuries. The NT canon was finally confirmed late in the fourth century.
 As explained by Hillaire Belloc, (in Survivals and New Arrivals, pp 29-38), although the Jews accepted its authority, it was only on the authority of the Church (during approximately the same time three to four hundred year period) that the Old Testament came to take on the status of Sacred Scripture among the Gentiles nations, who had no other reason to consider the sacred writings of some small, insignificant people like the Jews (at least in the Roman view) as anything special.
 So here is my third question: Assuming these respected scholars to be correct about their respective areas of expertise, is it possible that it was a completely corrupt and apostate Church was the same one who identified and preserved the Scriptures which now enjoy virtually universal acceptance by all Christians?
 Thanks in advance for your thoughts on this.
 Tom Cabeen
 
Finally-Free
Finally-Free 8 years ago

I can't speak for minimus, but I'm surprised at how many people have jumped to the Catholic Church's defense.
First, I'll make it clear that I'm not affiliated with any church. Having been raised as a Catholic and converting to the jws at 26, I've seen what both religions have to offer firsthand. No catholic ever abused me or hounded me in any way as the jws did. As for child molestation, I don't have statistics but I would venture to guess the jws likely have a higher rate on a per capita basis. I have no doubt the JWs would have their own inquisition and commit atrocities if they were greater in number and thought they could get away with it. Instead, they leave the butchering of innocent men, women, and children to Jehovah at armageddon. They have the desire to see 6 billion people killed, they just don't have the means to carry it out.
how people can wake up to one abusive cult but defend another is beyond any logic that I can comprehend.
The catholic church a cult? Has the definition of the word "cult" been broadened?
W
 
S3RAPH1M
S3RAPH1M 8 years ago

(Revelation 2:2) ". . .‘I know your deeds, and your labor and endurance, and that you cannot bear bad men, and that you put those to the test who say they are apostles, but they are not, and you found them liars."
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

The catholic church a cult? Has the definition of the word "cult" been broadened?
From Merriam-Websters:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cult
Main Entry: cultPronunciation: \ ' k?lt\Function: nounUsage: often attributiveEtymology: French & Latin; French culte, from Latin cultus care, adoration, from colere to cultivate — more at wheelDate: 1617 1 : formal religious veneration : worship 2 : a system of religious beliefs and ritual ; also : its body of adherents 3 : a religion regarded as unorthodox or spurious ; also : its body of adherents 4 : a system for the cure of disease based on dogma set forth by its promulgator <health cults> 5 a : great devotion to a person, idea, object, movement, or work (as a film or book) ; especially : such devotion regarded as a literary or intellectual fad b : the object of such devotion c : a usually small group of people characterized by such devotion
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

It's a fair bet that more Catholic children have been abused than JW children.
Fewer Catholic priests, as a percentage of the total, have been abusers than the general population and the public education system.
BTS
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

By going with a broad definition, they are divesting the term of all pejorative meaning.
BTS
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

Fewer Catholic priests, as a percentage of the total, have been abusers than the general population and the public education system.
Wow...I guess they do have holy spirit poured upon them then
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

By going with a broad definition, they are divesting the term of all pejorative meaning.
On the contrary...I'm lumping the Catholic church in with all other groups that deserve the label...
If you don't flinch when the Watchtower is called a cult, why flinch when the Catholic church is called one? By definition it is one...
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

The meaning of the word cult has changed, during the last 400 yrs. Back then, it meant religion. In the french, it is still used that way. However, in english, it has come to mean a high control group.
S
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

Wow...I guess they do have holy spirit poured upon them then
As individuals, we are all sinners.
BTS
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

I'll try to answer from a biblical perspective.
Apostasies occured from the beginning of the Christian congregation. The Roman church continued to propogate beliefs that were not from the inspired scriptures. As I mentioned earlier, I believe the trinity belief is incorrect, hence an example of apostasy. Forbidding men to marry, scripturally, is a sign of a false teaching.
Since I do not recognize the universal church of Catholisism as having been part of true Christianity, I believe the council was not a part of a true Christian arrangement.
I think the corruption of the church was gradual but constant. It appears that the Church was the only vehicle around, whether it was being corrupted slowly or not.
When you look at the shameful history of the Popes, you cannot make me believe these vicars were representing God!
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

Min
A person could ask, from WHAT were they apostatizing? From jesus' simple teaching? From paul's string of churches? There were numerous christianities during the first two centuries. Remember as well, that jesus apostatized from judaism.
S
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

All God's chi'ren are apostates...
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

They were breaking away from Jesus' teachings. The 2 Babylons by Hislop document every way those that claim to carry on the truths of Christ did so.
I have to say I find it ironic that exjws defend the Catholic church. The belief that Mary worship is acceptable is counter to all Bible teaching. Infant sprinkling and baptism is unscriptural. Forbidding the clergy to marry or have children is a perversion of scripture and we can go on and on.
 
Finally-Free
Finally-Free 8 years ago

I have to say I find it ironic that exjws defend the Catholic church. The belief that Mary worship is acceptable is counter to all Bible teaching. Infant sprinkling and baptism is unscriptural. Forbidding the clergy to marry or have children is a perversion of scripture and we can go on and on.
Sorry to say it min, but you're sounding a bit dubbish today.  You're giving me flashbacks. The pioneers™ on my doorstep in the summer of 1975 said the same stuff...
Have a beer or two.
W
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

Jesus never started any church(s). He never set down any rules or organizational system for churches. The way he is depicted, he never forsaw a worldwide org. It was just a traveling/wandering group that hung about, living off of acolytes. They never even wrote anything down. It was paul, who never met jesus, who started the writing and started the rules. The romans went w paul, and enlarged it, somewhat. W jesus' nonexistent system, there would be no orgs.
I understand that hyslop has dropped in popularity because some of his stuff was debunked.
S
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

Infant baptism corresponds to the ot infant circumcision, an introductory to the communal covenant.
S
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

What was debunked??
I'm "dubbish" today because I refute the Catholic Church?? That's ok by me, then.
Infant circumcision??? That's a good one!
 
Muney
Muney 8 years ago

*sorry wrong topic, admin please delete*
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Yeah Muney, this is a test.
Welcome to the board!!
 

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out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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Jenlet
Jenlet 8 years ago

"The belief that Mary worship is acceptable is counter to all Bible teaching. Infant sprinkling and baptism is unscriptural. Forbidding the clergy to marry or have children is a perversion of scripture and we can go on and on."

Wow, you are certainly well trained by the WTS ... these are some of the most well-worn anti-Catholic chestnuts in existence.
May I make a book suggestion? "Catholicism and Fundamentalism" by Karl Keating is a good piece of Catholic apologetics, in my opinion. Keating responds to your concerns directly, and I think very well.
I am not Catholic but I found this book interesting.
 
hillary_step
hillary_step 8 years ago

I can't speak for minimus, but I'm surprised at how many people have jumped to the Catholic Church's defense.
Well, I am not sure that what is happening is actually a defence ofthe Catholic Church. I think people are merely trying to answer the question that Minimus raised, which I will remidn you was :
I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
Encapsulated within that question is a presupposition that finding one religion to be flawed theologically, then it would logically follow that another one is flawed also. That of course does not follow. Perhaps the question would have been better posed if it were worded: 'Why Do People Become Catholics', not why to XJW's become Catholic.
My own suggestion which I will quote again:
I own the full run of the Catholic Encyclopedia, I also own a full run of Insight on the Scriptures.  Let us just put it this way, Catholic Theologians are rather more catholic than is the WTS and they are also far more advanced in their scientific and Biblical knowledge than Ted Jaracz and his lifeless flock of career compromised pseudo-scholars. Perhaps this has something to do with it.
...is that a person who has been versed on WTS theology, basically founded on the brain of a handful of suspect scholars like Frederick Franz, are suddenly presented with an overwhelming body of well preserved and established theology from Augustine to Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, it can be a compelling discovery. The Catholic Church has, for example, had no issue with evolution since the 50's and has long adhered to the concept of ID, before it became the refuge of the defeated Creationist.
I have been both a Catholic and a JW, and as far as I am concerned 'a pox on both their houses', but it is no real mystery as to why the Chruch would appeal to the mainly shallow religionists who stumble from the cult.
HS
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Catholic.com library has that interesting comment about circumcision, I see.
Regarding my dissing of Mariolatry, infant baptism and priests not marrying and having kids, this is not just a JW point of view. Most Protestants would agree that these issues are valid.
It's funny, we can all diss JWs but we shouldn't expose the false beliefs and corruption of the Roman Catholic Church. Hmmmmm.

Hillary, just to remind you, my theme has no question in it (for a change).
 
hamilcarr
hamilcarr 8 years ago

The Eucharist offers a collective and spiritual experience which appeals to our deepest sociobiological urges.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Eating Christ's flesh and drinking his blood will do that I guess.

And this is supposed to be literal. Yum and dumb.
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

A book by ralph woodrow, called babylon connection? dubunks hislop. Here is a pasted rundown on it:
Woodrow carefully covers the "sun god" argument that Hislop mounted against the Eucharist. He exposes the poor reasoning that tries to link the Eucharist to the sun god based on its round shape, while ignoring that the manna that God rained down on the Israelites in the dessert was also round. (Exod. 16:14) He also shows how Hislop's arguments turn against themselves.
There is no evidence, so far as I have been able to find, that, in the Babylonian system, the thin round cake...was ever regarded in any other light than as a symbol... [nor did they believe it was] changed into the god whom it represented" (Hislop)
... the Catholics did not get the doctrine of transubstantiation from Babylon! On the other hand, it is the Protestants who regard the communion bread as a symbol!...In reality Babylon had nothing to do with it either way! (Woodrow examining Hislop pg. 65)
Woodrow also carefully exposes the fallacies behind the "pagan goddess" argument against Mary. Mary had nothing in common with the perverted pagan earth goddesses. (more on the attempts to link Mary to pagan goddesses here) He disassembles the argument that the Pope is "actually canonized Satan" citing historical twists used by Hislop to link the Pope to Babylon. He exposes the faulty association that Hislop attempts to make between the pagan god Dagon (the fish god) and the shape of the Pope's hat (mitre) saying that the hat looks like a fish. The hat was not formed until after 1100A.D. and had many shapes over the centuries. To say we worship a fish god because the Pope's hat is pointed, is about as bizarre as saying a guitar is shaped like a fish so any Evangelical who plays a guitar is worshipping the fish god. Woodrow shows Hislop's faulty claims that Peter (who Catholics believe is the first pope) holding the "keys to the kingdom" is really Janus the god of doors, meanwhile forgetting that this reasoning could lead one to thinking Jesus is also Janus because Christ is described as holding keys. (Rev 1:18, 3-7)
Woodrow shows how Hislop's creative numerology (which is no more than superstition) could be used to make almost any name add up to the mark of the beast, including the name "The Rev Alexander Hislop." Woodrow reclaims candles and lamps (which are used by Jews in the Old Testament), he defends the anointing with oil "...anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord." (James 5:14, 15 & Mat 6:13). Woodrow demonstrates the faulty logic that claims a Church steeple is a phallic symbol and the tower of Babel. According to Herodotus 425 B.C. Babel was a ziggurat shape and looked nothing like a steeple. (pg 28)
Woodrow's in-depth book examines Hislop's attempts to re-write Church history against the Catholicism. Woodrow concludes that these are unfair fringe arguments against Catholic doctrine that don't reflect sound reasoning or research.
Woodrow makes it plain that he himself is an Evangelical and holds Evangelical views. Although he doesn't agree with all Catholic doctrine, he says it is clear that the Eucharist and Mary have nothing to do with pagan practices. Catholics have Jesus in their hearts when they take the Eucharist and they are identifying with the woman of whom Scripture says "all generations will call me blessed" (Lk 1:48) when they think of Mary. The book is called "The Babylon Connection?" by Ralph Woodrow available on Amazon.com.
http://www.gov.ph/forum/thread.asp?rootID=96656&catID=24
------
S
 
hamilcarr
hamilcarr 8 years ago

Eating and drinking together. Can you think of anything more basic to humans?
Protestants are far too rational in their denying the transsubstantiation
 
Tom Cabeen
Tom Cabeen 8 years ago

Hi Min,
 You write: "Apostasies occurred from the beginning of the Christian congregation. The Roman church continued to propagate beliefs that were not from the inspired scriptures." Before the NT canon was finalized in the fourth century, by what standard would one decide that some teaching or practice was "scriptural"? The Old Testament?
 You write: "I believe the trinity belief is incorrect, hence an example of apostasy." To what would you attribute the phenomenon that only groups like Jehovah's Witnesses, Oneness Pentecostals and Unitarians have "seen through" this "apostate" teaching, whereas the vast majority of Christians historically have believed the teaching about the relationship of Father, Son and Holy Spirit that is currently taught by the Catholic church and most Protestant Christians. Do you think it is because none of them have ever read the Bible?
 You say: "Forbidding men to marry, scripturally, is a sign of a false teaching." I would agree. That is why groups like the Albigensians were condemned by the Catholic Church. Surely you do not consider that the Catholic church's decision to select priests from among men who had already chosen to follow Jesus' and Paul's teaching of the superiority of the single state from the perspective of pursuing a career in ministry to be the same as "forbidding men to marry", do you? I would hope not, especially in view of the fact that no religious community holds marriage and family in higher regard than do Catholics.
 Regarding popes, I agree that some of them have done shameful things, at least as shameful as Peter denying Christ three times, even after he had been warned about it in advance. Yet I still consider his letters to be inspired and free from error.
 Tom
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

We had a thread on hislop @ http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/65204/1.ashx
S
 
willyloman
willyloman 8 years ago

Some people (I'm not saying Cabeen is one of them) leave the dubs for one reason or another but can't seem to live without finding another straight jacket to wear. For them, you can take the man out of the JWs, but you can't take the JWs out of the man. And thus they fall into another tightly-knit religious community, memorize its creeds, and carry on the fierce debate over who's wrong, who's right, but from a brand new perspective.
All you've done is trade one set of preconceived notions for another. Both positions require you to judge others based on what they believe about a set of man-made religious doctrines.
When you choose any religion doctrine and insist it must be "The Truth," you become judgmental, intolerant, and divisive. But of course you do not call it that; you call it spirituality.
Religion divides. Spirituality unites. Go and learn that and make your Jesus proud.
 
Satanus
Satanus 8 years ago

I won't be becoming catholic in this lifetime. However, i think that the church is getting a bad rap. Let's try to see it w less preconceptions.
S
 
NanaR
NanaR 8 years ago

Both positions require you to judge others based on what they believe about a set of man-made religious doctrines.
Catholicism does not require me to ever judge others, at all. At every Mass, I am called upon to examine MY OWN conscience, and so is every other person in the room, including the Priest.
Pax,
Ruth
 
GoingGoingGone
GoingGoingGone 8 years ago

Isn't religion supposed to be about serving God? And so someone who wants to serve God will want to find the religion that tells him that WE, and we alone, have the one PERFECT path to God.
The RCC does acknowledge that other Christians are their 'brothers', but not so much so that their 'brothers' from other Christian churches can, for example, share the Eucharest with them. And if one is to live their life closely following Catholic law/rules/beliefs, then they could not marry a non-Catholic; never miss Sunday Mass intentionally; never have sex with anyone other than their Catholic mate, and then never use contreception; never ever divorce their Catholic mate, not even for adultry, and never be free to marry again until that mate dies; and the list goes on and on.
Of course, if you have joined (or been born into) the Catholic religion and believe that it is, in fact, the way that God wants to be worshipped, (religion is supposed to be about serving God, remember?), then you have no choice but to follow all of the Catholic rules to the letter. Will anyone condemn you if you don't? No - but if you're a true believer, then you'd condemn yourself because you believe the Catholic teaching that not obeying the Church will land you in hell.
I have more I could say but I have to go to the meeting. (JUST KIDDING!!!)
GGG
 
yesidid
yesidid 8 years ago

Regarding popes, I agree that some of them have done shameful things, at least as shameful as Peter denying Christ three times
Hi Tom,

I find it very interesting that you put sins of the popes, (the inquisition would have to be included) in the same sentence as Peter's impetuous outbursts of one evening.
And if the inquisition can be so easily brushed aside, it seems to me that most anything can be excused on the basis of Peter's example.

 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

There are some exceptions to the only Catholics sharing in the Catholic Eucharist rule. In the USA there times communion can be admininstered to Episcopalians and The Last Rite can be administered to Episcopalians. On the other hand, those two cannot be given to members of The Church of England.
Someone likened leaving the JW's and becoming Catholic to trading one straight jacket for another. This couldn't be farther from the truth. There are some fundamentalist churches and cults you can liken to a straight jacket, I give you that. But being Catholic is much easier unless of course you are priest who wishes to marry. Then is when many of them leave and become Anglican Catholic, or Episcopalian priests, here in the USA.
 
justhuman
justhuman 8 years ago

Very interesting points I have seen...But there is another examination that needs to be done regarding the history of the Church.
After Saint Constantine(Both early Churches Orthodox and Catholic accept that)set the New Rome in Constantinoupolis and gave freedom to the Christians the Early Church was free to practice their faith. The were free to build Churches and coming out from the catacombs that they were persecuted for more than 300 years. We have millions of Christian martyrs over those 300 years. So it would be rediculous for those early Christians to die for something that is apostatic, plus all the hate that was developed by the Roman Empire against the Christians. Faith was preserved all this centuries by the Apostles and their succesors.
When an heretic idea was insert then the Council of the Bishops- Synodos in Greek was held to face those heretic views and define the Christian faith. One of those was Aruis a Bishop that tried to fight Trinity. He knew he was wrong but he insisted. He had a tragic end at the toilet the same day when the Synodos was held. He told that although he knew he was wrong he will fight Athanasius.
The Church continued to be united, and we can see that from the Emblem of the Romanae Empire(Byzantine)the 2 headed Eagle, symbol of the East(Constantinoupole)and West(Rome). For 1000 years the East and West Church was united in worship and Holy Communion. The head of the West the Pope was equal among the rest of the Bishops of the Church, and in no way he was superior from the other Bishops. Unfortunately the POLICAL GAMES of the Franks leaded the Church to the 1080 A.D schisma. This was the unfortunate event that split the Church. Then the West part of the Church the Roman Catholic Church seperated from the East Part the Orthodox and in matters of Christian dogma.
One of the basic differences is the Filoque issue. In the Symbol of Faith that both accepted the Papal Church insert the idea that the Holy Spirit comes also from the Son and the Father, forgetting that the Synode defined that it comes only by the Father because He is the Source of the Godship and the causality of the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Then is the Pope's infalible. The Church for all those years all the members of the Synode they were equal and if the Presiding Bishop the Ecoumical Patriarch was out of line the rest of the Bishops can correct him.
The woship of Mother Mary. In the Orthodox Church she is Holy but in no way equal to the Father and the Son. She is honored for her privellage to carry Jesus. She was always treaded like that by the Church, and in Revelation we see that she is the Woman with the 12 stars having a prominent possition in heaven.
The political games of the Franks and their hunger for power and gold let them to attack Constantinoupolis with 2 Crusaders. Their excuse to free the Holy land siege Polis the Capitol of the Romanae Empire. As a result they did not show ANY RESPECT to the Christian Orthodox, and both times they capture the gold, Christian relics, they did not respect the Churches, and the City was full with dead bodies and raped women. Yes this is what the "Roman Catholics" did to their fellow Christians. As a result of this Constantinoupolis feld into the hands of the Othomans in 1453 A.D and there was not a helping hand from the Catholic Church...
I believe one the basic reasons for the problems that Christianity is facing is language. The Gospel was written, preached, and spread with the Greek language. The Hellenic language is one of the most wealthy language in the world and the most ACCURATE. That is why the Orthodox Church still holds at the Eucharist the ORIGINAL Bible texts, for thousands of years. That is one of the reasons why the Roman Catholic Church failed to keep the original Christian faith as it was delivered by the Early Church.
Unfortunately when Luther tried to reform fell into more serious mistakes. Instead of going back to the Early Church he developed his own Theology and as a result the Protestand movement occured with thousands of sects and dominations. All of them ingnoring the Early Church, the History of the Church having no Apostolic Succesion and claiming that they "found" the truth.
Having the chance to be in one of the most extreme protestand groups I realize after my Odysee that I had the jewel of Christian faith in front of my face and I didn't had a clue about it.
I found that the Church is a place of spiritual healing of my soul. A place to seek Jesus, and a place were I can ask forgiveness of my sins. I found that there is no Hell, but we are the ones who will create our hell when we are way from the Source of Love God.
I know in the end by the Grace of Jesus ALL will be saved for having faith in Him, and that in the end His Church will Truimph again.
I know the truth never changes, and it was there for 2000 years as it was delivered to us by Jesus the Apostles and their Succesors. I know that:
"I believe in one Father, Creator of heavens and earth, visible and invisible things, and in one Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God that was born from the Father but not created, and everything was created by Him. For our salvation He came from Heavens and took flesh by the Holy Spirit and he became human through Mary the Virgin
Crusified by Pontius Pilate, burried and resurrected at the third day according to the Scriptures, and accending to heavens sitting in the right side of the Father. And He will come with Glory to Judge the living and the dead, in His Kindom that will be no end
And in one Holy Spirit, the Life giving, that proceeds from the Father, having the same worship and glory with the Father and Son, that was spoken by the Prophets, In one Holy Catholic Apostolic Church, I confess one baptizim for forgiveness of sins, I'm waiting for the resurrection of the dead, and in eternal future life."
 
reniaa
reniaa 8 years ago

I'll just say if i was a catholic I would be glad I live in this century and not in the time of "The Inquisition" i'd have been burned as a witch lol but seriously I think the Catholic church is directly to blame for why there are so many fractured christian faiths and denominations, if the catholic church had stayed truer to the bible teachings rather than getting rapped up in the pomp and idolatory then we might still all be catholics,
As one of our oldest faiths it was entrusted with the spiritual well-being of the people instead it got too involved with acquiring wealth and politics (An interesting look-up is the history between kings/rulers and popes) it even stopped the normal person having access to the bible to read.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

You know, I was just remembering all the many times that the WT publications quote the Catholic Encyclopedia.
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

GGG made some excellent points!
Unfortunately, I have to be careful in how much I post due to my posting limits.
Tom, just because the majority believe a certain way, it doesn't mean it's correct. Jesus was in the minority and he was right and everyone else wasn't.
Paul never said you couldn't marry. The Church tells priests they cannot....Big difference.
Equating Peter's denials with the history of the popes makes you a bad boy, Tom. You know that's not even close! Tsk Tsk....But I still love ya, bro!
This thread is quite interesting, including our Hellenic poster's thoughts.
 
undercover
undercover 8 years ago

...it is no real mystery as to why the Chruch would appeal to the mainly shallow religionists who stumble from the cult.
Most people who 'stumble' from the Witnesses don't join other religions. They're still indoctrinated in the fear and guilt of the Society to think about going anywhere else. But those that gained enlightenment about the Soceity and realized that the religion was bogus, well, I would've thought they would be a little more careful before committing to another religion.
It may not be a mystery when considering it the way you put it (which was pretty ballsy) but it perplexes me anyway. People managed to wake up to the scam of the Watchtower, yet won't apply the same critical reasoning they used in researching the Society to the Catholic Church. And they end up joining. It's illogical. Did these people not learn anything while escaping one pompous religion only to trade allegiances to another?
 

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Topic Summary
out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



Related Topics
Wonderment
The truth shall set us free!
by Wonderment 4 months ago
blondie
Blondie's Comments You Will Not Hear at the 09-20-2015 WT Study (LOYALTY)
by blondie 6 months ago
Anders Andersen
Really beautiful Watchtower article about truth
by Anders Andersen 3 months ago
cappytan
Lurkers: A truth is either true, or it isn't. There is no in between.
by cappytan 2 months ago
lsw1961
JWs have more good points than bad
by lsw1961 4 months ago



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I Do Not Understand Why JWs Leave & Become Catholics!
by minimus 8 years ago 239 Replies latest 8 years ago   jw friends
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AK - Jeff
AK - Jeff 8 years ago

This thread is interesting to me from a non-biased perspective.
I am no longer one of Jehovah's Witnesses. I left due to falsehood, lies, duplicity, and hypocrisy, to name a few.
One of the things we did as Jw's was constant attack on other religions. I am happy to see so many xjws here willing to defend a religion other than Jw's against attack. The arguments/counters are less significant to me than is the fact that we have become more willing to reason on matters like this.
I will say this - I have become fairly well acquainted with a few Catholics who were formerly Jw's. I have had some contact with Mr Cabeen. I have had more extensive contact with several other practicing Catholics. I don't know of a single one of them whom I would not invite to my home. They seem to be good people. I like that about them. Good fruitage is good fruitage no matter the religion the person practices.
I have come to respect all the Catholics I know - both former Jw's and not. I doubt I will ever become one. But it has little to do with doctrine. I don't believe we can find a 'doctrinally pure' Christian group anywhere. I don't think such an animal exists. To debate the merits of a particular Christian community based on doctrine seems almost silly to me these days. There are flaws in all of them. Yet - I think individual Catholics are at least as devoted to being good Christians as any other individual in any denomination I have seen.
So if one wants to continue down the 'Christian path' after leaving Jw's, I have to make a different statement:
I Do Not Understand Why Jw's Leave & Don't Become Catholic if They Seek to Remain Christian! The Catholics Seem As Good As Any Other To Me!
Just my opinion
Jeff
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

http://www.westminster-abbey.org/ Do you realize that Westminster Abbey dates to before 1066 and was
the Roman church in London? The Abbey has been the coronation church since 1066 and is the final resting place of seventeen monarchs.
The present church, begun by Henry III in 1245, is one of the most important Gothic buildings in the country, with the medieval shrine of an Anglo-Saxon saint still at its heart.
 
Fisherman
Fisherman 8 years ago

I agree with you min. There is nothing in that religion for me. I have to admit however that there are many, many wonderful people that are catholics. I dare to say that some catholics are better and even more Christ-like than some jws. One also must credit some of their clergy for their humanitarianism, self sacrifice and the help and comfort and guidance that they have provided. JWS do not dare to open schools for JWS, yet the Catholics continue to take up this challenge and for what it is worth with all its pagan teachings they offer something better than the public schools in my opinion. Given the opportunity, I would rather send my child to the babylonian catholic school than to a public school.
Anyway, aside from their teachings and beliefs, again many catholics are wonderful people.
 
yesidid
yesidid 8 years ago


I have to agree with Fisherman:

 


Anyway, aside from their teachings and beliefs, again many catholics are wonderful people.

 
Nevertheless I must ask:
Is it this:



Tom Cabeen
Surely you do not consider that the Catholic church's decision to select priests from among men who had already chosen to follow Jesus' and Paul's teaching of the superiority of the single state from the perspective of pursuing a career in ministry to be the same as "forbidding men to marry", do you?
Or is it this:

FlyingHighNow
But being Catholic is much easier unless of course you are priest who wishes to marry. Then is when many of them leave and become Anglican Catholic, or Episcopalian priests, here in the USA.

.

 
ESTEE
ESTEE 8 years ago

After jw, any religion is a cake walk! Some people can't leave the "structure"...?
ESTEE
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

YesIDid, Andy's family are devout Catholics. I attended a mass one Saturday night and Father George gave a sermon about why priests do not marry. This is the jist of what he said. He said that the rule has nothing to do with scripture. He said that at the time the rule was instilled, the church owned lands belonged to the Bishops and Priests whose sons became Bishops and Priests so that the land could be passed on to the sons. There was corruption that developed so Rome decided that the priests would not marry any longer. And the celibacy rule came into play to stop priests from passing on the land to illegitimate sons. He said the rule was strictly for economical reasons and to prevent people with poor characters from becoming priests just to inherit the church lands.
Andy's mother has taught cathecism for years. She pointed out to me that she was taught that the church today continues to ban the marrying of priests because they church does not wish to support spouses and children.
 
Tom Cabeen
Tom Cabeen 8 years ago

YID,
 Catholics do not put things into black and white nearly as often as JWs, and not even as often as Evangelicals. Rather than things being "either this or that", much more often, their view is "both...and..." In this particular case, there is no rule that Catholic priests may not be married. In fact, any number of married Anglican/Episcopal or Orthodox priests who have become Catholics have subsequently been ordained as Catholic priests.
 For the Catholic Church as a whole, the norm is to get married and have offspring. Catholics are not forbidden to marry in general; in fact, marriage is a sacrament just as holy orders is. Catholics are encouraged to marry. But some Catholics want to be priests, or "religious" (monks or nuns). The desire to enter these "holy orders" is viewed as out of the norm, a special gift from God, which includes the desire to serve God in the single state, as taught by Jesus and Paul. It is never a decision into which anyone is rushed. The process of becoming a priest or monk or nun takes years, and genuine deep commitment. Only after a long period of trial and examination is one finally accepted for holy orders.
 Sometimes, however, in spite of the fact that someone has taken a vow of chastity and been ordained as a priest, a priest or monk later decides that he wants to marry. In that case, he must break his vow. He can no longer serve as a Catholic priest or monk. But it may be that the same person still wants to be a priest. He may decide to try to be ordained as an Episcopal or Anglican priest. In that case, if he meets the requirements for priests set up by the Episcopal bishops, he can become an Episcopal priests. Presumably, they might be accepted for the Orthodox priesthood as well, I do not know about that.
 Tom
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

Anglican/Episcopal or Orthodox priests who have become Catholics have subsequently been ordained as Catholic priests.
This is true. Adding to this though, the married priests have to vow that should there be a death of spouse or divorce, they will not marry again. They will at that become celibate.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

I should add that there would be many happy priests if the celibacy rule were ever to be lifted.
 
mouthy
mouthy 8 years ago

John Ankerberg has in the past, had tv programs suggesting they are a cult. I concur.
Mim you should read the Book he wrote on the Catholic Church( cant remembr the name) I gave it away but it was excellent in my opinion. I dont think the Catholic Church is a cult.Because I believe a cult stiffles how you want to behave & every Catholic I have ever met does all the things I feel is not in harmony with scripture.And they do as they like & MOST never get excommunicated for it. Now remembering I dont either do every thing I should if I follow scripture. .but I believe Jesus the ONLY WAY<TRUTH<LIFE forgave me when I asked & still does when I goof ....but I am not belonging to ANY religion that thinks they have the TRUTH>>
2cents that will quash the post ( as my post usually do
 
NanaR
NanaR 8 years ago

AK Jeff:
I wanted to stand up and cheer when I read this:
One of the things we did as Jw's was constant attack on other religions. I am happy to see so many xjws here willing to defend a religion other than Jw's against attack. The arguments/counters are less significant to me than is the fact that we have become more willing to reason on matters like this.
Any statement that begins “I do not understand” (as the OP) should indicate a beginning of a search for understanding. There is nothing to be afraid of in examining various religious perspectives.
Here are a few books that I have enjoyed and can recommend:
First, a LITTLE book written about a hundred years ago that presents a different perspective on the history of the Bible:
Where We Got the Bible... Our Debt to the Catholic Church (Paperback)
by Henry G. Graham (Author)
http://www.amazon.com/Where-Bible-Debt-Catholic-Church/dp/0895557967/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1210419156&sr=1-2
Next, a very interesting read regarding the Early Church Fathers:
Four Witnesses: The Early Church in Her Own Words (Paperback)
by Rod Bennett (Author)
http://www.amazon.com/Four-Witnesses-Early-Church-Words/dp/0898708478/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1210419236&sr=1-1
The best explanation I have ever read of the Orthodox (a very ancient and beautiful religion) approach:
Sweeter Than Honey: Orthodox Thinking on Dogma And Truth (Foundations Series, Bk. 3) (Paperback)
by Peter C. Bouteneff (Author)
http://www.amazon.com/Sweeter-Than-Honey-Orthodox-Foundations/dp/0881413070/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1210421150&sr=1-4
A beautiful book by an Anglican Christian:
Mere Christianity (Paperback)
by C. S. Lewis (Author)
http://www.amazon.com/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926/ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1210421326&sr=1-2
I have included Amazon links so that you can investigate the books further. I'm not a book salesman (ANY MORE!!) If you are near a good library, you might be able to get them there.
Maybe others can list reading selections from their perspectives.
Pax,
Ruth
http://nanaruthann.blogspot.com
 
minimus
minimus 8 years ago

Flyin' said," I should add that there would be many happy priests if the celibacy rule were ever to be lifted". And I think there would be many less pedophile priests and homosexuals too.
It simply is not a "healthy" environment for a man to be in, one who has normal sexual desires and wants to be with a woman for companionship and marriage. The natural desire in most men is to be sexual with those of the opposite sex. If a man had less feeling in that direction and simply was not at all that sexual (which some people are), then they could be a good candidate for a single lifed ministry.
 
StAnn
StAnn 8 years ago

Min, there are several reasons a priest does not marry. Yes, it is in part financial, as was mentioned earlier. However, the Church considers marriage to be a sacrament and a vocation to be lived out very seriously. Priests generally get up at 4:30 in the morning to begin their morning prayers and get ready for morning Mass. My priest usually doesn't get to bed until between 11-12 midnight. He's busy all day with the needs of our two parishes. I've never known a Catholic priest who would have the time to be a proper husband or father. I've heard Lutheran ministers complain that they missed their kids' birthday parties because they had to attend meetings at their churches. Families of Protestant pastors often suffer from a lack of attention from their pastor husband/father because being a proper pastor is such an involved job. The Catholic Church feels a man can't serve his parish well and still be a good husband and father. If you take marriage seriously, you have to take your role as a spouse and a parent seriously. No priest I know would have the time to do that. My priest doesn't even have one day off during the week. There are about 100 married priests in the U.S. who were ordained pastors in other denominations before coming into the RCC. As a general rule, though, it wouldn't work very well. The Catholic Church takes family life much too seriously to risk mixing it with the priesthood.
And I can also tell you that other denominations (such as the JWs) have as high or higher of an incidence of sexual misconduct, despite the fact they allow their clergymen to marry. Our local Episcopal church was shattered when it was discovered that the married priest was having an affair with a married female parishioner. A married evangelical pastor in a town about 30 miles from here was recently convicted of sexually abusing over 20 young boys. Less than 1/2 of 1% of all Roman Catholic priests have even been accused, let alone convicted, of sexual impropriety. That means that 99.5% of them are doing their best to uphold their vows. I think the whole issue of celibacy is blown out of proportion. There is more to us as individuals than just our sexuality.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

The priests I know who were once Roman and have left and become Anglicans say that if the Vatican would open up the priesthood to marriage, there would be no shortage of priests as there is today. I asked father Mick if Rome did allow priests to marry, would he go back and he told me no. He should not have had to leave the church to become a priest. He still takes communion when he goes to the Catholic church and he still wears his miraculous medal though.
 
FlyingHighNow
FlyingHighNow 8 years ago

And I can also tell you that other denominations (such as the JWs) have as high or higher of an incidence of sexual misconduct,
Proof please.
 
merfi
merfi 8 years ago

I'm going to answer this without having read all 7 pages.....
I'm marrying a [lapsed yet don't challenge him. lol] Catholic. I don't know if I believe in God or not. I'd like to. But I don't know.... Anyway, I've attended a few Masses and for me, it's the ritual and the very old traditions that I find fascinating. I also like the sense of community that my town's Catholics have. I've attended a Methodist and a couple Lutheran services and found them silly. Maybe silly isn't quite the word, but it just didn't taste right. As well, the Lutheran minister got up and told the congregation to boycott a movie. Not long out of JW, that totally irked me. So much for leaving Control behind.
I realize my church/religion-seeking is pretty minimal and thinking about going full-in with the Catholics might just be a lazy move..... But I feel comfortable there. And maybe a weird reason -- I want to know where and how my funeral would be if I died tomorrow. Not planning on it as I have a million other things to do, but who knows? Right now, I'm not JW, I'm not Methodist (my up-bringin's religion) and I'm not Catholic. I don't like limbo much.
I don't agree on the "do this or you're gonna buuuuurrrrn" crap in ANY religion and I know the Catholics have their own version of that. But I think the good things about it outweigh the bad and the BS.
~merfi
 
cabasilas
cabasilas 8 years ago

I don't know of any comparative studies off hand. Perhaps someone will post one. I do know that in the area where I live there have been about 6 incidents where public school staff have been involved sexually with school children over the past 15 years. (I know of one situation personally where it was decided not to prosecute.) I do not know of any cases of abuse involving Catholic clergy in this area. This is not to minimize where abuse did happen. I'm just relating comparative situations locally.
 
LearningToFly
LearningToFly 8 years ago

I would like to share an experience I had very recently. I am volunteering at a hospital in my community, and had a remarkable experience while visiting for the first time the Catholic Chapel in the hospital.
I walked in, not thinking anything other than that I was viewing a place of worship. The moment I stepped into the doors, I felt something I cannot describe. It was beautiful, and lovely!
I can say that prior to this visit, I had no desire to belong to any religion at all, and I still feel the same way. But, upon walking into this beautiful Chapel I had an experience I cannot forget.
I felt beauty, peace, and some sort of higher power. I cannot name what it was, but I felt it. From my experience, I have come to the conclusion that their is a higher power somewhere, and I believe the same higher power that each individual religion, sect, believes in.. is the same higher power that everyone feels. Who or what it is, I do not know.. but I do now believe there is something out there. Not the God that most of us were raised to believe in, but something bigger. I truely did feel it.
I am not going to go out and become a Catholic, nor join any other religion due to this, but it was a true eye opener for me.
LTF
 
hillary_step
hillary_step 8 years ago

Learning To Fly,
I walked in, not thinking anything other than that I was viewing a place of worship. The moment I stepped into the doors, I felt something I cannot describe. It was beautiful, and lovely!
I am not a believer but I have to say that the closest I ever come to belief these days, apart from when I listen to a sublime piece of music, is when I am wandering in some of the great cathedrals in Italy. There is a breathless shift from one life to another in the contemplative atmosphere and stunning creativity of such buildings, which was of course their purpose.
HS
 
BurnTheShips
BurnTheShips 8 years ago

Proof please.
Here is a great deal of evidence FHN
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_sex_abuse_cases
Abuse within the Catholic Church is not higher than in other institutions.
BTS
 

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Topic Summary
out of all religions, catholicism, to me, is wrong and clearly could never be the truth.



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