| I think that I was looking for a surrogate family. I was seventeen,
afraid to grow up, and having some... issues with my parents,
especially my father, who never seemed satisfied with anything I did.
I needed a place to belong, and additionally, I was convinced that all
“good people” become good Christians. Y’see, since I lived in
what you might call a little hick town, I knew little or nothing about
other faiths aside from, at the most, their names and that
Christianity was somehow superior -- or so it was implied. I also knew
that I didn’t want to be the kind of so-called Christian that most
of my friends and acquaintances were. I think everyone has met the
type. On Friday, they go out, get drunk and get laid; on Saturday,
they recover from the hangover and lie to their parents about why
they’re sick; on Sunday, they go to their places of worship, and on
Moday, they basically call you a heathen because you don’t go to
church. I was determined not to be like that. Like all decent, moral,
perfect people, I was going to become a “good Christian.”
At seventeen, needless to say, I was a little naive. But I was also
quite studious and perceptive of certain things. I realized that
holidays were of Pagan origin, so I looked for a religion that
didn’t celebrate holidays. I’d picked up (mostly from my dad and
Garner Ted Armstrong) that the human soul was not immortal, and that
there was no such thing as hellfire. So, I went on a quest to find a
Christian religion that didn’t celebrate holidays or believe Hell or
immortal souls.
Long story short, that’s how I got hooked up with the Jehovah’s
Witnesses. And everything was dandy... at first.
When I first started my Bible study, the Witnesses seemed like a
wonderful deal, like the ideal form of Christianity that I had been
looking for. Okay, there were some teachings that seemed odd at first
(like the idea that Jesus was really the archangel Michael), but I
figured, “It’s not impossible, and everything else they’ve
taught me makes sense. This has to be the truth; I can’t drop it
over such a little thing.” I couldn’t live up to my father’s
standards, but hey, at least I had God. I had found God’s truth, and
I was determined to make God happy by being the most faithful Witness
Jehovah had ever seen. And when I started going to meetings, everybody
liked me -- the spirited new girl who “told it like it was.” And
when I was eighteen, I got baptized.
It’s kind of hard to say exactly when things started going wrong.
It might’ve been when, after my baptism, I started picking up on all
of the unwritten rules and so-called “conscience matters” that
could get you disfellowshipped or marked if your conscience led you to
do something different from what was "suggested" in the
Watchtower. No one was allowed to watch R rated movies, couldn’t
watch soap operas, couldn’t visit another church, couldn’t give
money to church-sponsored charities, couldn’t openly disagree with
anything that the leaders taught.... The rules kept piling up and up,
and I went along with them, even the ones that I thought were absurd.
Like every faithful, dedicated Witness, I believed my disagreements
with JW teachings were the result of a faulty conscience in need of
adjustment and kept my mouth shut.
Over time, I did indeed beome the ideal Witness: frightened,
tractable, guilt-ridden, convinced that my every original thought and
desire was demonic, always afraid of saying something that wasn’t
Society-approved, morbidly depressed and not really knowing why, but
convinced it was all my fault for not living up to God’s standards.
There were times when I wanted to kill myself because I felt so
corrupt and worthless, and I didn’t find out until after I left the
Organization that many, many Witnesses felt this way but, like me, hid
it to protect the religion. That’s the thing we’re taught to do:
suffer if you must, but no matter how miserable you are, YOU MUST
PROTECT “JEHOVAH’S” ORGANIZATION. You are nothing; IT is
everything. If you’re not a Witness, after all, you’re part of the
world controlled by Satan, and you can’t risk stumbling the ones who
might otherwise be saved from their enslavement to the Prince of
Darkness and their coming destruction at Armageddon.
The more I look back on my past, the more insane it seems.
In the end, I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to leave the
Witnesses, or else I’d have either killed myelf or lost my sanity. I
even prayed to die in my sleep so I wouldn’t be destroyed at
Armageddon. When you’re only twenty-four, phyically healthy, and
longing for your death, you know that something’s wrong. But even
then, I thought it was me and not the Organization, and I planned on
going back someday, once I was “mature” enough to stop wanting to
think for myself.
Thanfully, that will never happen now. A few weeks after I walked
away, I decided to look into those evil “apostate” Web sites that
I’d been warned to not even think about. I expected to find a bunch
of obvious lies about Witness doctrine and screwy ideas about the
Scriptures. Instead, though, I found out the REAL reason why the
leadership doesn’t want the rank and file looking into information
posted by ex-Witnesses. The reason is because it tells the truth about
the Watchtower’s past, the corruption, the lies, and how familes and
lives have been destroyed by this religion. If I’d known then what I
know now, I never would’ve gotten baptized.
I don’t regret the experience, though, even if I wouldn’t care
to repeat it. If nothing else, I’ve made some interesting friends
because of having done time in the Watchtower as well as learning to
sympathize with people in other controlling religions. I’ve also
learned from my experience that there’s no such thing as the “one
true faith” or even the “one true God.” The only truth there is
is the truth that you find within yourself. |
