Bad experience as young teenager with the YPA book and those leaving the religion

Jeni Lundblom looks at her bad experience as a young teenager going through her teenage years having all that literature which did not seem to help really, perhaps it was also presented with a collection of often foolish advice that offered her no real support. For her some of the topics she encountered were embarrassing, though at that time she really believed the book Questions Young People Ask Answers That Work, or the “YPA” book, would be able to help her answer any questions I had. Today she finds the book being nothing but a propaganda piece with contents that did nothing but attempt to bolster her paranoia of the outside world.

When according to a 2008 study from Pew Research, only 37% of people raised as Jehovah’s Witnesses continue with the religion as adults we may wonder how it comes so many leave the religious group their family is part of.


she now also questions:

When you consider the many (a number of whom I’ve privately corresponded with) who stay just to keep the community and familial ties intact, one has to wonder how many stay true believers from childhood on?

Normally we would expect it much easier for children just to continue in the religion they were brougth up. In most countries this is what most regularly happens. For people it is more difficult to come to an other religion. Though today we notice also that lots of children just leave religion at the site and concentrate on worldly matters.

Though for a religious organisation which builds its instructions and its life on the Word of God, we would expect the turn over would be much better. Lundblom notices

It turns out, Watchtower isn’t so good at “inculcating” children as Deuteronomy 6:6-8 instructs. Instead, the organization seem to be setting kids up for failure and their often-inevitable exit from the religion.

Read more about it:

The Friday Column: Questions Young People Ask – Answers That Don’t Work

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Finding dachas to live in peace

Change in traditional settlement forms in Russia continued

When we read the old Russian literature we can see that the folks in Russia went from one place to the other. Many Russians still are nomads at heart,

something that “radically distinguishes them from [their] European neighbors who tend to live in one place only. Russians on the other hand may live in Arkhangelsk but work elsewhere in central Russia or the Far East much of the year.

From those many Russian stories we do have lots of ideas of those dachas. "Dacha" is one of those Russian words ("dacha" derives from the Russian verb "to give," dat') which entered many languages, giving people many dreams about that what seems to be more than just a place.

it is a phenomenon that defies translation. {Putting the Dacha in Its Place}

The dacha made itself integral to Russian life and culture. It is not any-more that what began as a token of elite status. Today society has totally changed
 

The dramatic increase in the number of dacha owners – now some 60 million people – and the concomitant growth of the 40 to 50 million people who support them represent another aspect of life outside traditional Russian cities and villages. Such people are often far more numerous on any given territory than are the original residents. {Rural Russia is alive and well}

In the cities people are seen and noticed also by federal institutions. There the state has still a lot in control. Outside the cities the state control seems to be less. That makes that those who do prefer an other way of living, than the previous state structures imposed on their citizens, escape to the country.

In the rural areas we may find more people who do not adhere to the traditional thought. We may find more people who have stepped away from communism, atheism but also from Russian Orthodox Church. As such in the rural areas you may find several Christadelphians doing everything to survive according to the Will of the Most High. Also the Jehovah Witnesses may find it easier to live in such areas. Furthermore we can find many sectarians who also found their way to the countryside.

There are some 10 million sectarians and almost as many more agriculturalists who often take over villages that have become vacant. In many cases, both groups remain “’outside the state’s field of vision.’” But they are very much there in fact.

Many of these new or new-old settlements have no official status. That often means that any structures that are erected have no official status and that those who live “outside the state” are at least formally without the social services other Russians receive. {Rural Russia is alive and well}

> Please do read more about what, for the last decade, Simon Kordonsky with his group of scholars at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics found by investigating what rural Russia is like, why it is now so different from what it was in the past, and why because of these changes Moscow often fails to take it into account in its approach to the country.

 > Rural Russia is alive and well

>>Кочевой образ жизни помогает выжить российской глубинке

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Parents forbidden to pray in front of their children or to take them to church

Is it really worrying when a child can react in a conversation with verses from Scripture. In the United Kingdom some see in it a form of indoctrination of that child. that is what we might conclude when we hear lawyers and child psychologists talking against the right of an 8 year old boy choosing for the words and care of his mother.

In May a devout mother made a legally binding promise, backed up with the threat of criminal sanctions, never to talk to her son about her religion, take him to church or even say grace at meals in a doomed attempt to stop him being taken into care, amid claims that she was “indoctrinating” him, a judge has disclosed.

How is it possible that judges can prohibit parents to pray or talk about their belief in front of their children or even not allow them to take them to church?

The court-case in England may create a precedent and make it very difficult for parents to give their children a religious background. Quite easy it is to say they are indoctrinating their children. I naturally do not know, but can not imagine the JW mother through the use of torture, drugs, or psychological-stress techniques to implement her beliefs as to take it or the child having her to leave. Naturally I also find it wrong she would not want to have her child to go to her father. She should know it is also the rightful parent of the child, having the same rights as her to educate his child and to tell about his believes, like she does.


Having teachers saying the boy also rejected other children and that he had only a small friendship circle, describing him as “one of the most worrying children in our school”, does not have to indicate the mother is in such a way dominant to her child she manages it not to make friends with children of an other belief.

Details of the case were disclosed in a written judgement handed down by Judge Clifford Bellamy, after a hearing at the Family Court, sitting in Leicester, in which he set out his reasons for making an interim care order. {Indoctrinated son 'troubled’ by mother’s religion is put into care}
He found that the boy had suffered emotional harm as a result both of the conflict between the parents and, specifically, “immersion by his mother in her religious beliefs and practices”.
He concluded that she was doing this “with the intention of alienating him from his father”.
But the judgement disclosed that a social worker at the centre of the case rejected this assessment and believed that, while the boy was damaged by the conflict between his warring parents, the mother’s religion was not the cause. {Indoctrinated son 'troubled’ by mother’s religion is put into care}

I also would not think there lies the problem with the mother talking about God, taking her child to the Kingdom hall of the JW and reading Watch Tower publications. Far what I do know of those publications they should give enough balance to the kid to stand stronger in a society of different thoughts,  though this seems more to do with an introvert child that has worries brought on it by the damaging divorce, and not with damaging faith.

It disclosed that at one point in the proceedings the mother went to the Court of Appeal to challenge an initial care order and made a number of strict undertakings in an attempt to stop the process.

These included not to take him to her local Kingdom Hall — the Jehovah’s Witness meeting house — or any other such gatherings; not to talk to him about religion at all; not to allow him to go on to the church’s website or watch religious DVDs; and, if he raised the issue, to attempt to change the subject.{Indoctrinated son 'troubled’ by mother’s religion is put into care}

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Find also:

A British judge rules that mother can’t indoctrinate son with religion

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Change of name

Dear followers of the blog "Christadelphian World".

The last few months in Belgium I tried to reconcile two big Christadelphian organisations and create the possibility that the different Christadelphians could meet with each other and having worship services together.
Instead of bringing us out of isolation it brought us deeper in isolation. Several accusations went from one side to the other and I at the end became not only the pingpong ball but the target for both organisations.

At last the man from the North succeeded first to censor some of my sites and got the United Kingdom organisation also against me.

Christadelphian Church (St Mark's Presbyterian Church, Queen's Hall), 28 Bath Road, Bournemouth, Dorset (Photo credit: Alwyn Ladell)

The last few months I have seen several unchristian reactions taken by those organisations that I really came to doubt the group of believers.

They have created many sleepless nights for me and got me worrying several hours but got me also checking everything from the past and checking the whole Christadelphian community. I contacted people I knew from the days before I became a Christadelphian, who were then Christadelphian but had by now left the community. Several of them gave the same reason of leaving the community as I am facing now.

The last few weeks I sincerely questioned once again my believes and compared them with other faith groups. To my regret there is no other church group which believes on all points the same as I do. I encountered naturally churches were there are people who do believe exactly the same as I do, but were it is also not the general trend. It is the same as with the Christadelphians, in those churches there are several groups with small or bigger differences.

Christadelphianism has very conservative groups, moderates and a very few progressive ones.
Up until now I belonged to the English Central Fellowship and was pleased to receive support from the Christadelphian Bible Mission or CBM. But with all the trouble of the man from the North, the CBM dropped me now, plus accused me of writing unbiblical articles, having links in my articles to others than their Christadelphians and having contacts with non-christadelphian people and organisations.

Like the man from the North, they would like to have everything under control.

I would like everybody to know I am not bounded or chained to any worldly organisation or any worldly person, except my wife because I am married to her. Jesus has come to liberate us from the chains of this world. My preaching is a work for God and not as such a work for a particular Group or Organisation. I am not married to Carelinks nor to CBM. You could say I am figuratively married to Christ.

I invite everybody to look at my writings on my other religious sites, Stepping Toes, my ecclesia site and on my site which was called Broeders in Christus or Brethren in Christ. They now get the "Free" added to their name, to announce I do consider myself like some other Christadelphians a "Free Christadelphian". There you can see what I do write and compare it with your own Bibles, and compare it with other Christadelphian and other Christian websites.

John Thomas (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In a few months time an already long ago planned series of early Christadelphian writings shall be placed on the Brethren site. This will proof that I still have the same believes as the founder of the Christadelphian movement, John Thomas.

Because I took again a lot of time to consider either changing or not of denomination, I was confronted by several Christadelphians who encouraged me to keep calling myself a Christadelphian, because I myself gave the answer in my questions and in my findings about other denominations and the Christadelphian believes.

There were also two other groups which some consider also to be Christadelphians whilst others look at them as an other denomination who would not mind taking me in their circles. One group would have meant a name change for my church. But at the end I thought, why would I change again of denomination.

I do fear what I have seen happening now with the CBM, I encountered already by the non-trinitarian Baptists in the 1980ies, having the Southern Baptist Union pressing their power onto others. They being trinitarian Baptists, made thousands of Baptist going to the Jehovah Witnesses and the Church of God, whilst others went to the Church of God of Abrahamic Faith, a few hundreds to the bible Students, a few to the Nazarene Friends and some like me to smaller non-trinitarian churches like the Christadelphians.

Those who went into the Jehovah Witnesses came in a severe controlling group but had most of their teachings in common with us, non-trinitarian Baptists. But we could not keep our name anymore because of the television productions where most people saw trinitarian Baptists and would get a wrong idea about our faith.

For that reason I shall keep the name Christadelphian, because it is a very good name, denoting being a Brother in christ, and that is what I want to be, and except the ideas of slavery and some end of day prognoses by John Thomas I adhere all the same ideas as those early Christadelphian writers.
I could not become a Jehovah Witness because there are "the pre-existence of Christ", Christ being the Archangel Michael, "the return of Christ in 1914", and the Faithful Slave or all saying and directing Watchtower Biblestudy and Tract society, in which I do not believe. No human is infallible. As such a pope or a few people in a group can not dictate what all other people do have to accept or leave the organisation. There is too much mind control in the Jehovah Witnesses organisation.

Charles Taze Russell (1852–1916). (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Though I do know Christadelphians have much more in common than they would like with the Jehovah Witnesses. Logically, because John thomas was one of the many bible Students who brought a whole new movement or reformation in the Christian religion. Charles Taze Russell, was one of the students of John Thomas. Russell founded the American Bible Students, and from some offspring directed by Rutherford came the Jehovah Witnesses. so Christadelphians, though they would not like to hear it are in some way 'family' from many other bible students and 'related' to the Jehovah Witnesses.

I only can hope they would not create such controlling bodies, though it looks like some people are trying to get a good grip on the different communities.

For now I decided to continue my preaching. Though some did many efforts to stop me, I shall continue to preach the Gospel of the good News. Financially and organisational wise I shall be very limited. I apologise to the subscribers of the Dutch magazine "Met open bible" which I shall not be able to distribute any more. Paperwork and posting shall be limited.
Those whom I send Glad Tidings I ask to do a request for the magazine at Glad Tidings themselves, but I can not send it free any more.
The same for the persons who requested literature. Sorry for those who waited already more than three weeks. I do hope they shall understand it is impossible to continue from my own family funds to buy myself and distribute those books of others. I advice my readers and those interested in Christadelphian literature or free Bibles to demand it at the publishers themselves.

This redirecting the last few weeks already to the Jehovah Witnesses to ask for their free Bibles, had upset very much the CBM and some other Christadelphians. But my till is just empty, sorry.

My spirit is not yet extinguished, so I shall try to keep going on. Some websites I shall close down and all links to those who do not want to associate to us shall be taken away by time and by request.

At the moment I shall keep linking in my articles to other articles, be it from trinitarian or non-trinitarian websites, because I strongly believe that everybody should be doing good research and should be able to compare with other writings to form a solid idea.

I do hope my readers can appreciate such linking and quoting. In case it is not appreciated or not worthwhile to put so much time in it, I shall stop doing so, but for the time being, I try to continue it on this Blogger site and on the different WordPress sites.

From March the 14th, 2014 several links will be taken away from the linking pages. I also consider going to link only to other webpages when they also link to my pages. In case we do not want to help each other than we do have to row on our own.

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Certain people trying to stem freedom of speech

This early morning I was very surprised to find my blog Christadelphian World blocked for public viewing because of a complaint to Google for inappropriate postings.

I am convinced this action against my writings and also taking away others to react on my writings is a breech of freedom of speech, plus a childish and cowardly action undertaken by a person living in a country which was part of the Soviet Union.  Though that person living it that country up North came originally from the United Kingdom he might have taken over dictatorial ideas of the previous oppressors.

He took care that my defence on the accusations he had made publicly were placed on my own website and where supplemented by other people who have seen the same atrocious action that person undertook in the Christian community.

His behaviour and managing to censure other people calls for the question how it is possible that one person can get so much power that he can silence those he does not like! This is bringing democracy and the freedom of speech in danger.

First of all I apologise to those people who made a comment on my articles:Duncan Heaster en Carelinks onverbiddelijke verhinderaars and No reconciliation possible between CBM and Duncan Heaster from Carelinks and could not find their remarks published. it sincerely is not my fault, and I find it strrange that I do not have any control over the texts that are written and comments that are made on the writing on thise platform. Very scary!

 I did send a request to Google to reconsider the accusation of inappropriate writing.

Either it was one person on his own who wants to silence me, or it is an organisation which backs their dictatorial leader and is prepared to do anything to please him, not considering if it is right and justified. The organisation which has the element "care" in in its name as such did not proof until know that it wants to care for those who want to share the love of God.  it also has the element "link" in its name, though since years our small community wants to link with other baptised Christadelphians which reside in Belgium. We also would have loved to give people who ask us for an address to meet, an address of a meeting place where they could find like-minded people.

It is because that person and his organisation do not want their members to meet with CBM members that it is impossible for us those who are in need of fellowship.

In the past we always have made advertisement for a book written and edited by the person who is against us. We also still said the last weeks, to people who phoned us to take contact with that organisation which refuses to arrange contacts with us. We did not mind to send them forwards to an organisation who did not want to share brotherhood with us. But for us it was more important that the people interested to learn about God and his Son could have regular fellowship and Bible study with people who believed in the same things we do.

For the same reason I also ask people when we can not reach them are they are unable to come to us, that they would take up a Bible study with the Jehovah Witnesses, and ask them to come to us if they have further questions. We also ask anybody interested to pose their questions on the internet itself.

Naturally when an other organisation seems to be able to stem the course of our replies, we have entered a very dangerous situation of an outsider bringing censorship on our own, and not their site.

Clearly someone of their organisation is taking much care to follow everything I am writing; Either there is a mole by my subscribers or there is someone taking much time to follow the many websites I present to the general public. In case there is a spy under my subscribers we do find it a pity such a person comes to us with such bad intentions and to cause such nuisance.

I do hope by Google would be people with more sense, than those childish persons who are fighting against such a small fly like me.

Though I must confess the Australian organisation of the above so called Christian and Christadelphian organisation seem to have weird ideas of my power. (See about that lower concerning taking somebody in fellowship and putting him out of fellowship)


In Belgium, we always have been open to the man who accuse me now of slander and who is trying to block me from writing. He even asked Facebook to withdraw me. Probably it is also him who asked Google to withdraw the writings on Blogger. (For that part I must say I do not know if it is him, so it could also have been somebody else who this time managed to do what the leader or the man living in Riga could not do).

We would have loved to welcome Mr. D.H. and people he had baptised in our midst and we did not want otherwise that those baptised Christadelphians in Belgium and Holland, would come together in unity. Our world is to small and we are not with enough to go into small units which would have no voice as such. Combined forces could do so much more.

Because in May 2012 we still had not come to a conclusion and could not have the so called caring Christadelphians meeting with us because the sir of the North refused us to fellowship with them, I called him Mr. ('mister') in the term of address, instead of 'brother', so the organisation took it as I had disfellowshipped him.


In October last year having seen that the person also was on a Christadelphians Unite Group and he himself asked for addresses of other Christadelphians I thought the time was ripe to come to reconciliation and offered him to join forces again. He kept refusing and coming back on my old writing.


We (the Belgian Christadelphians) let the person know that for us it would be best if we could bury the previous period of conflict as one to forget and make steps to rebuild trustworthy contacts. We wanted and still want unity and respect for all members in the Body of Christ.

After months of trying to come to reconciliation I at last went into the pen publicly and defended myself in front of those who questioned me. It was no intention of me to make false statements that could damage a person his reputation. The things brought forward in the Dutch and the English articles can be crosschecked for their viability. (In the comments I also had given a translation of the Dutch text in English and told the Flemish readers the part I forgot to write in the Dutch article but wrote in the English article.)

To Christadelphians we can show the files from the CBM and our discussions with D.H. and C.H. his wife, so that the readers of my articles can make up their mind and see if I did tell lies or that I reacted on facts which did really happen and where said by D. H..

After I had written the articles on this platform I got to know from a member of the Belgian Christadelphians that the organisation from Australia, with the C from Care in their name, would be willing to continue talks in case I re-installed Mr. D.H.

So in Australia they consider my talking to the person of the North by not calling him brother any more, would have included a worldwide taking away of his fellowship in the Christadelphian community. I would never have thought that I would ever be considered to be so powerful to be able to decide who can fellowship or can not fellowship in the worldwide community of Christadelphians.

So it was a strange reaction of that organisation. For my part there was no reason at all we would not take in Mr.D.H. as our brother.

! But what he has done now, after still refusing to have brethren and sisters in the faith meeting with each other, continuing to blame me and to assault me, accusing me of slander, plus him trying to block everything I bring into my defence, so that I could have the right to speak, makes reconciliation impossible.

I can only sincerely state that the whole situation of Mr. D.H. not allowing baptised C.l. members to have fellowship with our CBM baptised Christadelphians, in my eyes him not willing to have us meet together in Belgium, is an unchristian act, which after many trials to come to reconciliation got us nowhere further, except much more agitation and extra difficulties for our members with the CBM now too.

A person being able to stop having published reactions on what I placed in my articles, is a very dangerous person and also a very dangerous situation for the freedom of speech. It is a real infringement of what people should be able to share ideas and communicate with each other. Taking away such a possibility to communicate and to exchange ideas is going into the law of democracy and liberty.

I also do not know how it comes that I can have no control myself of what is written on my own webpages, and why I myself am not able to judge what can, may or could be added as comments to what I have written.

I wonder what organisation is behind such censorship and why they do not have to come those matters with the people involved.

All bloggers should be aware of such a dangerous situation of censorship by somebody, out of our control.

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Please do find the concerned articles where the comments disappeared:

 Duncan Heaster en Carelinks onverbiddelijke verhinderaars and

 No reconciliation possible between CBM and Duncan Heaster from Carelinks

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