Lets Advertise - even when it's inappropriate






Funerals at the Kingdom Hall are in most cases both crass and cringeworthy.  A funeral should celebrate the life of the deceased, remind the mourners of the qualities the person displayed and provide their friends and families with a memory of their passing.

If that is the send off you want for yourself or a family member you might want to think twice about having the funeral at the Kingdom Hall.  JW funerals are like pop up adverts on a computer - annoying and inappropriate.  

The deceased almost always takes second place behind unashamed proselytising to a captive audience.  Everything revolves around the Witness belief in a resurrection to a paradise earth where the children can play safely with poisonous snakes and lions will play with lambs without harming them.  Why God would create poisonous snakes and wild lions only for his ultimate goal to ensure they are harmless beggars belief - why not just create them harmless in the first place?  But to use the death of a human to advertise ridiculous beliefs is an insult to all the non- Witnesses attending the funeral who simply want to honour their dead friend or relative.

Even when I was a dedicated and believing JW, funerals used to both embarrass and anger me.  There is a time and a place for everything, including pushing your beliefs on non-believers.

Five minutes of reminding the gathering about the dead person and twenty minutes pushing their beliefs or those of their wife / husband / family member detracts from the one time they should be the centre of attention.

Witnesses believe in the resurrection - that doesn't ensure it will happen.  They believe in a grand creator who has an ultimate goal for mankind - it doesn't follow that their belief will materialise. They believe that only Witnesses will inherit a paradise earth - so what?  Their beliefs are contrary to every other religious and non religious organisation on the planet - it doesn't make them right or wrong.  But the dead person is dead, there is no argument on his or her condition, so why should any organisation be allowed to use their demise to further the organisations particular beliefs?

Yet JW's use funerals as advertising campaigns to try to further their aims - namely converting as many as they can to their religion.

Witnesses will argue that they have the 'Truth' and they are simply trying to encourage as many people as possible to learn the truth and have the opportunity of living in Gods new order.  The fact that their teachings are ludicrous is irrelevant in this argument.

Funerals should be respectful, they should have the deceased as the main theme and they should never be a vehicle for promotion of anything.


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