waysider

Your impression is incorrect. End. Your search will be in vain. This concept permeated the entire ministry, beyond VPW, himself, and transcended written material. Call them TVT's if it makes you happy. If written materials were all that was necessary, there would have never been a need for twig fellowships and endless reinforcement gatherings. No one I know or you know ever based their "walk" solely on the narrow constraints of the written materials.

Yes.

I don't think that's what I'm saying. But, ya know, sometimes, even though you might be holding the reins, the horse has a mind of his own.

English is a crazy language, isn't it? As listeners, we can usually distinguish between emotions and feelings based on the context. If I cut my finger, I feel pain, but there isn't necessarily any emotion involved. (Though emotion might ensue in the form of regret and anger at my own carelessness.) Or, I could experience emotional sadness even though there is no apparent physical cause. It's nuanced...except when it's not. And, there are times when the two overlap in such a way they can't be separated. I think VPW pretty much slanted this toward interpreting emotions and acting on them in a manner that contrasted Way doctrine. I mean, so what if the WOW field has you in a state of emotional turmoil? "You just gotta STAND, baby!, it's The Word!" This all brings me to my point. The concept of word studies, where we replaced a Greek word with an English word or tried to understand an ancient custom in the context of modern society, is highly flawed. Anyone who has ever seriously studied a language other than their own will eventually recognize the absurdity. We thought we were clever. We weren't. We were naive.

This. When people say "Why didn't you just leave?" or "Why didn't you just do this or that?", this is the part they're not understanding.

Has the key been used before?

He'd have gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for those meddling TVT's.

Maybe we've arrived at a Brave New World even earlier than we anticipated.

Encompassed within the larger conversation (a subset)

Isn't this a subset of the aforementioned?

I'm not trolling. It's possible I don't understand what kind of answers you're looking for. You do your best to guide them in understanding how to think for themselves and advise them on what is and what isn't acceptable behavior. What happens next is a crap shoot. What you don't want to do is hand those responsibilities over to someone who may not share the same values as you and may tell them what to think rather than teach them how to think..

Then once you have rights, exercise them.= Be the one who's in charge.

This it in a nutshell. But, if someone or something usurps those rights, all bets are off the table on what the outcome will be.

See, here's the thing, Rocky, there are lots of folks out there in the real world who don't have a solid grasp of what "family" even means. That's partly why they aspire to become gangbangers and Kia Boyz.

They could just reach up in "Daddy's Cookie Jar" and, PRESTO! Just like that. White hearts and black hearts would appear.

Sing with me, now... "I'm so glad I'm a part Of the fa...." Hey! Just a cotton pickin' minute!

That can certainly enter into it, but it can also be understood, in a broader sense, to apply to a specific culture, nation or group, while having no racial implications.

I'm having a hard time finding a way to explain what I meant when I raised the issue of ethnocentricity. I'll try, though. In The Way, we were fed the idea that "our" group was somehow better than "their" group. Hey, I mean, they were just empties floating by, right?, while we held all the power of the universe at our fingertips. But, how do you maintain that personal conviction? Simple. You "renew your mind" to the prescribed beliefs and become like-minded with each other. You foster a sense of belonging. Of course, in the process, you sacrifice your own sense of personal identity.

Ethnocentricity is different than tribalism in that it also involves a sense of superiority.

ethnocentricity?

Little Boxes

Meh. We went down this path 50+ years ago and, still, nothing about human behavior has really changed.

So, then...Kindergarten curriculum, rinse and repeat X 12? It all seems too vague and ambiguous to assign a blanket Yea or Nay.

Does the controversy rest in the concept or the implementation?

After my dad had been retired for a while, I remember him telling me he didn't understand how he ever got anything done while he had still a job. Now that I'm retired, myself, I'm beginning to understand what he meant.