The Reluctant Apostate
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The Reluctant Apostate
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Author : Lloyd Evans
language : en
Publisher: Jle Publishing
Release Date : 2017-01-20
The Reluctant Apostate written by Lloyd Evans and has been published by Jle Publishing this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2017-01-20 with categories.
Jehovah's Witnesses, well known for their enthusiastic evangelism, are a global religious movement boasting over 8 million members. Despite being a familiar sight on doorsteps and street corners, little is known about their doctrines and practices. What are their expectations regarding Armageddon, and who do they believe will survive? How do they justify their ban on blood transfusions? What happens to members who decide to leave? In this remarkably candid part-memoir, part-history guide, former Witness Lloyd Evans comprehensively explores the religion of his upbringing, charting the organization's metamorphosis from unassuming 19th Century brethren to global brand in the modern age. The Witness rules on sex are dissected, as are their far-reaching ramifications on the private lives of millions of devotees. Evans also delves into the controversies surrounding child abuse and the prohibition on blood transfusions with the aid of first hand accounts from those who have been personally impacted. Intertwined with the historical narrative and commentary is the story of the author's journey from devout Witness youth to outspoken ex-Witness activist and atheist. Evans lays bare the circumstances leading to his "awakening" with startling honesty and reveals how the heartbreaking loss of his mother played a profound role in keeping long-held doubts suppressed. In the final chapters, the author discusses the various means by which Witnesses are controlled by their leadership. Evans analyzes the role of shunning (disfellowshipping) and the stigmatization of "apostates" in enforcing loyalty among Witnesses, and reflects on the indifference of society in general to human rights violations by high-control groups. The phenomenon of fundamentalist brainwashing, or "undue influence," is also scrutinized, and those in search of a new life free from its pervasive effects are given reasons for hope. Rather than being a sensationalist rant by an embittered ex-member, The Reluctant Apostate offers a relaxed, good-humored tour of Witness history and teachings supported by extensive references (to be found in the "Notes" section). Though written predominantly with the non-Witness reader in mind, special boxes are also provided for Jehovah's Witness readers. Reviews "Both memoir and reference book, Lloyd Evans' work is an extensive compilation of Jehovah's Witness history and theology. In his honest and exhaustively researched expose, Evans has written what is sure to be the most important book on the religion in this century. The Reluctant Apostate is a must-read for Jehovah's Witnesses and anyone else who has been touched by the faith." -Scott Terry, author of Cowboys, Armageddon and the Truth "Insight only an 'insider' can bring to a subject difficult to understand for those who have never been part of this world, and unthinkable to contemplate for those inside its bubble. Lloyd does a magnificent job of speaking to both audiences and everyone in between. Compassion for the plight of those still held captive bleeds through every page." -Mike Rinder, former senior executive of the Church of Scientology, as featured on the A&E series Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath "A compelling and informative window on the world of the Jehovah's Witnesses that will be a vital and life changing resource for former members and many others too in forming an authentic understanding of this group, its beliefs, methods and effects on individuals and families." -Professor Rod Dubrow-Marshall, Ph.D. Co-Editor International Journal of Cultic Studies and co-founder RETIRN UK Dr. Linda Dubrow-Marshall, Ph.D. Co-founder RETIRN UK
Cowboys Armageddon And The Truth
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Author : Scott M. Terry
language : en
Publisher: Lethe Press
Release Date : 2012
Cowboys Armageddon And The Truth written by Scott M. Terry and has been published by Lethe Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2012 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
Cowboys, Armageddon, and The Truth: How a Gay Child Was Saved from Religion offers an illuminating glimpse into a child's sequestered world of abuse, homophobia, and religious extremism. Scott Terry's memoir is a compelling, poignant and occasionally humorous look into the Jehovah's Witness faith-a religion that refers to itself as The Truth-and a brave account of Terry's successful escape from a troubled past. At the age of ten, Terry had embraced the Witnesses' prediction that the world will come to an end in 1975 and was preparing for Armageddon. As an adolescent, he prayed for God to strip away his growing attraction to other young men. But by adulthood, Terry found himself no longer believing in the promised apocalypse. Through a series of adventures and misadventures, he left the Witness religion behind and became a cowboy, riding bulls in the rodeo. He overcame the hurdles of parental abuse, religious extremism, and homophobia and learned that Truth is a concept of honesty rather than false righteousness, a means to live a life openly, for Terry as a gay man."
Heretical Fictions
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Author : LAWRENCE I. BERKOVE
language : en
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
Release Date : 2010-04-15
Heretical Fictions written by LAWRENCE I. BERKOVE and has been published by University of Iowa Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2010-04-15 with Literary Criticism categories.
Heretical Fictions is the first full-length study to assess the importance of Twain’s heretical Calvinism as the foundation of his major works, bringing to light important thematic ties that connect the author’s early work to his high period and from there to his late work. Berkove and Csicsila set forth the main elements of Twain’s “countertheological” interpretation of Calvinism and analyze in detail the way it shapes five of his major books—Roughing It, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, and No. 44, The Mysterious Stranger—as well as some of his major short stories. The result is a ground-breaking and unconventional portrait of a seminal figure in American letters.
The Forgotten Power Of Fasting
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Author : Sister Emmanuel
language : en
Publisher: Children of Medjugorje. Inc
Release Date : 2020-10-28
The Forgotten Power Of Fasting written by Sister Emmanuel and has been published by Children of Medjugorje. Inc this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2020-10-28 with Religion categories.
I read your book from cover to cover. Your words completely captivated me and have convinced me on the importance of fasting. I knew already the benefits of fasting, but I wasn’t aware of all its attributes, that you explain so well. Reading this book one discovers fasting. As we know, Our Lady in Medjugorje continuously insists on the importance of fasting, but we avoid putting into practice something when it means we have to make a sacrifice. We struggle to convince ourselves to actually fast. The arguments you present, and the examples that you give in this book, show very clearly the reason why Our Lady insists so persistently on something so precious for the soul and the body, for the apostate on earth and for the souls in Purgatory. I thank you for emphasising such an important topic, very often mentioned in Sacred Scripture, so precious for the living and for the intercession of the dead. The final part of your work, with the words from the saints, will convince even the most reluctant. This book will be nothing less than a true discovery of fasting to whoever reads it. Don Gabriele Amorth
Existential America
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Author : George Cotkin
language : en
Publisher: JHU Press
Release Date : 2003-01-24
Existential America written by George Cotkin and has been published by JHU Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2003-01-24 with History categories.
"As Cotkin shows, not only did Americans readily take to existentialism, but they were already heirs to a rich tradition of thinkers - from Jonathan Edwards and Herman Melville to Emily Dickinson and William James - who had wrestled with the problems of existence and the contingency of the world long before Sartre and his colleagues. After introducing the concept of an American existential tradition, Cotkin examines how formal existentialism first arrived in America in the 1930s through discussion of Kierkegaard and the early vogue among New York intellectuals for the works of Sartre, Beauvoir, and Camus.
Disenchanted Lives
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Author : E. Marshall Brooks
language : en
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Release Date : 2018-08-27
Disenchanted Lives written by E. Marshall Brooks and has been published by Rutgers University Press this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2018-08-27 with Religion categories.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS or Mormons), often heralded as the fastest growing religion in American history, is facing a crisis of apostasy. Rather than strengthening their faith, the study of church history and scriptures by many members pushes them away from Mormonism and into a growing community of secular ex-Mormons. In Disenchanted Lives, E. Marshall Brooks provides an intimate, in-depth ethnography of religious disenchantment among ex-Mormons in Utah. Showing that former church members were once deeply embedded in their religious life, Brooks argues that disenchantment unfolds as a struggle to overcome the spiritual, social, and ideological devotion ex-Mormons had to the religious community and not out of a lack of dedication as prominently portrayed in religious and scholarly writing on apostasy.
Journey To God S House
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Author : Brock Talon
language : en
Publisher:
Release Date : 2013-08-09
Journey To God S House written by Brock Talon and has been published by this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2013-08-09 with Ex-church members categories.
A naive young man named Brock Talon journeys to the World Headquarters of Jehovah's Witnesses in New York City, seeking a spiritual paradise. But things are not at all what he expects. Once there, he encounters a creature called The Hanger Man, a blubbery dude named Big Tex and a cute girl with epic breasts. He also chances upon the music icon Michael Jackson, an oddball named Mr. Coffee and various other denizens of that unique place called Bethel. Join Brock as he rubs shoulders with the powerful leaders of the faith, explores the mysteries of Armageddon, investigates the secrets of paradise and wrestles with the conundrum of sex, romance, drinking and sin. This nostalgic tell-all from the 1980s is an adventure that will keep you laughing and crying, as well as inspire you to reflect upon your own personal journey to God's House.
Judgment Day Must Wait
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Author : Poul Bregninge
language : en
Publisher: YBK Publishers
Release Date : 2013
Judgment Day Must Wait written by Poul Bregninge and has been published by YBK Publishers this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2013 with Religion categories.
Fear of the apocalypse that never comes! It is what holds a Jehovah's Witness power-bound by the Watch Tower Society in Brooklyn. Armageddon is always just a little way around the corner. Poul Bregninge in this, his second book on the Witnesses, presents a complete history and ideology of the Society and why it keeps a keen focus on the Day of Judgment. He tells of multiple "days of reckoning" that pass uneventfully and how each failure of Christ to reappear is reevaluated by the Society to foretell of yet another apocalypse still to come. It is the fear of that moment that keeps Witnesses firmly in the fold. Judgment Day is the carrot dangled before them. Every American knows the Jehovah's Witnesses, right? Those somber people who appear at our doors, offering literature and the everlasting salvation of our souls? What do we know about them? We see at our door their facades-their Society-devised disguises-directed to convert anyone willing to follow their Witness-ways of believing and living. In this book you will confront the thinking that motivates those beliefs. Poul's book is a comprehensive view of JW history, its upheavals and struggles, and a raw demonstration of the manipulation and cruelty dealt those it charges with expanding its membership. By keeping Judgment Day ever coming, the Watch Tower Society ensures a ready supply of workers to proclaim the ever-coming coming. The author dismantles their main biblical storage battery, Matthew 24, from which the movement takes their many "signs" of the impending end. His reinterpretation of these readings is a virtual bomb beneath the understanding they find in those key biblical texts. Poul Bregninge was born and presently lives in Copenhagen. He was raised a Witness but informally left the movement in 1959. In 1964 he published several letters, articles, and features about the Society that the Witnesses deemed unacceptable. A three-man committee expelled Poul. Two years later he published his first book, "Jehovas Vidner under anklage" (Jehovah's Witnesses Accused) in Danish. This book, "Judgment Day Must Wait, " is a massive reworking (two and one half times its size) of his first book, now propelled by many years of continuing investigation that brings the history to the present in a text edited for the American reader.
The Know It All Girl
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Author : Joanna Foreman
language : en
Publisher:
Release Date : 2013-02-10
The Know It All Girl written by Joanna Foreman and has been published by this book supported file pdf, txt, epub, kindle and other format this book has been release on 2013-02-10 with Biography & Autobiography categories.
Knock, knock . . . Who's there? . . . Jehovah's Witnesses . . . Uh-oh. That's how it started for Joanna Foreman at the age of five. From there, she gave up almost everything in exchange for the promise of Everlasting Life in a Paradise on Earth. No Christmas tree, Independence Day fireworks, Halloween costumes. No birthday parties or chocolate Easter bunnies. She was not to pledge the flag in school or stand to sing the National Anthem. She wasn't allowed to attend college or vote in political elections. As a youth, she was instructed to dump her worldly friends and would not be allowed to date or marry outside of the religion. Not one to be dismayed, she cleverly found ways around religious obstacles, jumping undaunted through the hoops of man-made beliefs. She managed to make friends, family and happy memories. When she backed away from religion's grasp, her congregational comrades rapidly vanished-she stood entirely alone. The author portrays herself merrily waltzing her way through life despite all religious speed bumps, until she has the emergent need for a blood transfusion after the birth of her third child. Obeying yet another rule, she refuses the treatment and survives to proudly wear an invisible halo which congregation members had bestowed upon her. She keeps her doubts secret until Emma, her best friend of twenty-five years, also refuses a transfusion, with tragic results. Cancer didn't kill Emma-religion did. The lies and back-stabbing that occur immediately after Emma's death allow Joanna to finally see the real truth. She perseveres and endures, coming out of this cultish religion stronger and wiser. While she'd thought she knew it all, the answers Jehovah's Witnesses spoon-fed her no longer satisfy. As she gains the freedom to think for herself and choose her own beliefs, she finds herself more content living in a world among millions of people who don't have all the answers than trapped within parentheses with a few hundred-thousand know-it-alls.