“We have bloggers who are Christians, we have bloggers who are atheists, we have a blogger who is gay and God knows what else we will have next,” says Freeminds.org founder Randall Watters. “All I care about is that they are truthful and that we can all get along in spite of our differences of viewpoint, in spite of different world views.”

The Free Minds website is now home to more than a dozen bloggers, links to media stories involving Jehovah’s Witnesses and articles about Jehovah’s Witness doctrine and history. It grew out of Bethel Ministries, which Watters began in 1982 in an attempt to expose the inaccuracies of Jehovah’s Witness teachings. He says that it was a logical progression to develop a website that would host a variety of voices.

“I knew that people searching the Internet wanted the most objective facts that they could find, and often without your opinion or your biases,” he says. “So the title for the website, Free Minds, was appropriate, because I did not want to be seen as some bigoted Christian who only showed one side of the picture. … With the recent reorganization of the site, and a variety of bloggers, this has come full circle to what I intended in the beginning. It was just time.”

Watters began studying The Truth that Leads to Eternal Life with Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1971, and although he appreciated the simple answers to complex questions, he found some teachings hard to reconcile, including thousand-year creative days and the existence of two classes, one with an earthly hope and one with a heavenly hope, with one class partaking of bread and wine, and one not. Prior to becoming a Jehovah’s Witness, he had partaken privately, although he felt no urge drawing him to heaven.


“Once a year I would get a little bread and wine and pray and have my own commune in silence. That’s how important it was to me and how much I realize this was a key part of a Christian’s life.”

Photo courtesy of Randall Watters

He adds that another teaching he found absurd was that of the 144,000 ruling from the heavens, and the glory given to them by the organization.

“This favoritism did not exist in the New Testament, but I let it go as something that would be worked out later inside the organization…

“I experienced a great deal of cognitive dissonance in trying to reconcile this new world view with what I had learned up to that point all my life, and so the dissonance had to be resolved. It was resolved in much the same way as other religious experiences that are subjective — the pressure had driven me to decide on the witnesses as the one true religion. And like many decisions that are life changing, once you make them you will promote them as the way to go, the truth, and do not want to listen to alternatives, as you do not want to experience any more dissonance. So I made it a point not to doubt the organization once I had established this matter, once I had ended the dissonance in my head.”

As with a number of people who have realized that Jehovah’s Witness teachings aren’t all they’re cracked up to be, Watters spent time volunteering at the Watch Tower Society’s world headquarters in Brooklyn, New York, during which he began to experience serious doubts. When other volunteers with 10 or 20 years of service began to be dismissed for simply questioning doctrinal interpretations of scriptures, Watters did some research of his own, poring over a century of Watchtower magazines to determine how a Witness knows that he or she is anointed, the validity of the Gentile Times and the issue of two classes of Christians, as well as the dates and false prophecies the Witnesses had made.

“About this time in late 1979 I realized that this not only was not God’s organization, it did not represent or even resemble the early Christian church at all. This was primarily due to their misunderstanding of the message of the New Testament of salvation by grace, which they called ‘undeserved kindness.’ ”

As time went by, Watters became tired of the Governing Body’s treatment of anyone who disagreed with them, and he left Bethel, becoming an elder in a congregation in El Segundo, Calif. Six months later, he began attending a local church called Hope Chapel.

“I loved it, and decided to be through with the witnesses since I no longer believed it anyway,” he says.

After breaking away, Watters wrote a tract, What Happened at the World Headquarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses in the Spring of 1980?

“This was the year before Ray Franz wrote his book, Crisis of Conscience, so nobody really knew anything.”

When the pastor of his church found out about the tract, he volunteered to print 10,000 and send them around the world, which led to Watters’ creation of Bethel Ministries in 1982. Watters later became a pastor of the Hope Chapel, but separated Free Minds from that role in 1993, reorganizing it as a non-profit educational organization with no ties to any religious organization or church.

Photo courtesy of Randall Watters

“Basically, after all those years I still love Christ … but I no longer liked being in the limelight, and it does seem that most people were interested in doctrine and theology and so forth, which I’ve found rather useless in trying to help a person out of the Watchtower cult. What I wanted to do was to show people the real reason others joined these organizations and how to help them.”

After nearly 30 years of educating others about Jehovah’s Witnesses, Watters is pleased with the direction Free Minds has taken as it grew from a tract with a small circulation to a website accessible around the world.

“So far this is working very nicely, in spite of objections from the more fundamentalist side of Christianity,” says Watters. “We mean no harm to anyone, but our goal is to champion freedom of thought and to expose those who try to stifle thinking through religious, political or other types of oppression.”

Watters says that Free Minds has given his life a motivation, through which he has touched the lives of thousands of people.

“I have helped many of them to have their minds set free from the control of others, and to learn to think in new ways, and to open up new opportunities in their lives for a better future,” he says. “For several years I did interventions with Steven Hassan, so I learned a lot about how to specifically get people out of religious cults and that is one of the best things that has happened to me.”

Despite the millions of visitors to the Free Minds site, Watters says he has had very few negative responses.

“It’s probably because I am not a hateful person or bitter against the Watch Tower. They did not kick me out, I had no specific issues with any of the leadership or people in the organization — I simply knew it did not represent the Bible. I simply knew they were lying and what they wanted was power over other people. That I could not stomach and I will not stomach.”

It’s no surprise to her, either, despite the fact that she spent many years promoting the beliefs, and even volunteering for more than 10 years at the world headquarters in Brooklyn, N.Y.

“Writers should write about what they know, and I know a lot about the Watch Tower,” says Anderson, who lives in Tennessee with her husband, Joe. “I had so much invested in it. I was so heady about it, arrogantly heady, so I’m trying to passionately undo what I did for years. It’s very important to me to present the truth — I thought what I was doing was truth.”

Joe and Barbara Anderson — photo courtesy of Mrs. Anderson

Spending hours doing research is not a difficult task because every topic leads to another.

“Sometimes when I‘m working on one particular thing, my eyes catch something on the page or across the page that is enlightening. I make a note, and then I go back to it … and then I follow it through and see how they introduced a new slant on an old teaching. They don’t bring in a new teaching, they just slant it differently.

“Every rock you turn over you find a different bug. I don’t mean the Watch Tower is a rock; they’re sort of a rocklike religion — they’ve got their heavies, and they’re non-thinking like a rock,” she says with a laugh.

But proper research is about more than simply finding damning tidbits to use against Jehovah’s Witnesses. Anderson makes sure of everything she says before bringing a new item to light, a fact that many readers appreciate.

“Generally speaking, since I try to abide by an ethical approach, the comments and responses are generally very favorable because I don’t come across as having an agenda,” she says. “I don’t have agenda. If the Watch Tower has the truth, then I want it. If I can find positive things to say about them, I do, on a specific subject.

Barbara in 1957 — photo courtesy Mrs. Anderson

“People are appreciative of it, not because I’m the best writer in world, but because I’m inviting them to share in what I was part of. People are curious about Mecca — and it is like the Mecca of our past religion.”

Anderson became involved with Jehovah’s Witnesses when she was baptized as a teenager in 1954. From June 1982 to December 1992, she served several departments in the Brooklyn Bethel, including the shipping and accounting departments, and later the writing department, where she put her passion for research to good use compiling historical information for the Jehovah’s Witness history tome, Jehovah’s Witnesses: Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom.

Of  course, women aren’t usually involved in the writing department, and Anderson’s placement in it didn’t happen overnight. Although she stated on her application that she was allergic to toxic chemicals, Anderson was assigned to tape duplication — which used a variety of chemicals. So Anderson was shuffled over to the shipping department, where, at 42 years of age, she worked for almost a year with much younger men and women.

“I really became mom to those kids,” she recalls. “Our son was actually just a year or two older than most of the young men there at the time.”

She later moved to the engineering department, finally able to put her secular skills to good use.

“I did specialized bookkeeping for construction companies,” Anderson says. “I knew my way around the field.”

Her bookkeeping skills helped her uncover a scheme that explains why many Kingdom Halls built in the 1980s and 1990s have identical chairs.

At the time, construction was being simplified and congregations could pick from five or six hall designs, but they were told to buy their chairs from a specific Canadian company, for which the department’s assistant overseer was a commissioned salesperson — a fact Anderson discovered with a quick glance at an invoice.

“He found the company that could provide the chairs and signed up with them as a rep,” said Anderson. “Because he was a rep, for every chair that was purchased, he got two per cent. That man is dead now, but how many chairs have been purchased with him getting two per cent? You know it had to be tens of thousands over the years — until it was discovered, and then it was stopped.”

Anderson became a personal secretary for a Bethel project manager, and became involved in several projects, including the initial development of the Watchtower’s property at Patterson, N.Y., and the remodeling of the Bossert Hotel. Her passion for research was utilized in this role, in which she prepared environmental impact statements and studied city zoning requirements for a projected new 30-story building.

“Since this (Bethel’s Brooklyn location) was a historical area, you couldn’t remodel unless you obeyed the rules,” Anderson says. “If a group was working on the windows, they had to have a new window that looked just like the original window. How do you know what the original window was like? The building could have been built in 1914.

“It got around that I liked to do this kind of thing. When a need came up, I’d get to go and do it. I went to the library or the Long Island Historical Society, which had records going right back to the Revolutionary War — the Battle of Long Island was fought right there where Bethel is.”

1983, First winter in Brooklyn — photo courtesy Mrs. Anderson

When a lull came in Anderson’s job when the city did not approve the construction of a 30-story building on Brooklyn’s waterfront, she was loaned to another department, and spent a month cataloguing the wiring for Bethel’s telephone system — just Anderson, a computer and a rickety chair in a cold room full of wires.

“I could have kicked myself for even asking to be there,” she said with a laugh, adding that the younger workers to whom she became “Mom”, felt sorry for her and tried to brighten her day. “They felt so sorry for me that it wouldn’t be unusual for me to find a rose on my little table. It was so sweet!”

Following another lull and a loan to another department, Anderson’s supervisor received a call from the writing department, which was hoping to utilize Anderson’s research talent for the book that came to be called Jehovah’s Witnesses: Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom.

“I went to the interview and there were five women, me and four others, and they were all housekeepers — so I got the job,” Anderson says. “I do think the deck was stacked — I was with housekeepers who couldn’t even type.”

When Anderson’s position became known, she was quickly given access to files that contained some of her best known “discoveries”.

“They say women gossip, but I’m telling you it was the men who gossiped at Bethel. And that inner group passed the word.”

That led to Anderson being directed to an old cabinet from former president Charles Taze Russell’s day, full of card files that linked up with actual files stored in a vault.

“I could spend as much time as I wanted to. There were all kinds of file cabinets in there, and I just started pulling them out.”

In one cabinet, she found the Watchtower Society’s first account book from 1881 — but despite that discovery, she still maintained her modesty.

“When that discovery got around in the inner sanctum, my resume really got special,” she recalls. “I was scared to talk about what I was doing. I never told anybody. At the table, when people asked me, ‘What do you do?’ I barely let them know I was in writing because I just thought that this draws too much attention to the person — I was a purist. … You want to do what Jehovah expects of you — that was our motto — and these were God’s spokespeople.”

Anderson’s work uncovered some interesting facts about the Watch Tower Society’s history, some lost to time, others covered up. For instance, the schism that resulted between Russell and associate Nelson H. Barbour in 1878 wasn’t as much over Christ’s ransom, as over which man was God’s mouthpiece.

“The fight between Russell and Barbour — the Watch Tower keeps talking about over the years that it was all about the ransom. It wasn’t; that was secondary. It was over who was the channel. That’s what was going on behind the scenes.”

Her research on behalf of the Watch Tower Society turned up another intriguing discovery — one that started her on the path out of the organization.

“Russell was not the man the Watch Tower portrayed him as,” Anderson says. “Russell supplied the information and then later his associates supplied the information for any published material. They didn’t tell the history accurately. They were revisionists. The late material on Russell was taken from material that was written 40 years before, and that was written based on 20 years before and 40 years before, and so on, and so it was inaccurate and nobody bothered to check.

“So what surprised me the most was when the Proclaimers book paints him as this man who made his fortune from the haberdashery that his father started, that all of that income was behind Watch Tower and he was such a generous, wonderful man. The true picture is not that way at all. He was a wheeler-dealer. He was into the stock markets, and he was an oil and real estate speculator.”

He was also an abusive husband, she notes — her conviction solid because her research included reading the cross-examination of Maria Russell during the couple’s divorce proceedings, which paints a far different picture.

“There was one point when she was very ill,” Anderson says. “She had a bacterial infection and she was very ill. He was trying to get her to sign a paper that would say that she didn’t have any complaints about him. … He kept her up all night, as ill she was, and he badgered her and badgered her and badgered her. … That shocked me so much because when I was studying child abuse and domestic abuse for the society, that kind of behavior is psychological abuse. …

“When I read it, I was so moved that it was the only time in all of this, from the very beginning, that I cried. … He fit the profile of an abuser. It just blew away everything I ever thought. That probably was the first, most shocking thing.”

In 1997, Anderson severed her ties with the organization over the Watch Tower Society’s child abuse policies. In the ensuing years, she has since been actively working to increase education about Jehovah’s Witness teachings in an attempt to help others see the truth behind the organization.

“I have a passionate personality. … I’m of that nature that I would like to right injustices,” she says. “People who are in cults generally are of that nature — not the ones who are born in them, the ones who convert to a cult. … People join cults because they’re passionate about justice and a better life, and they want to share it with others and I’m of that nature.”

Her son, a former elder who served in Bethel for 16 years before he and his wife left to have children, doesn’t share her passion for the cause.

“My son hates it, of course,” she says. “He’s supportive of the Watch Tower through and through. He said I do a noble work but I should never have gone public with it.”

Because of the mandates of the Jehovah’s Witnesses teachings, her son is forced to shun her and her husband — a policy that disgusts Anderson.

“Shunning destroys families. If you destroy families in any way, through any other organization anywhere in the world, society would do something about it, but because it’s a religion, they can get away with it.”

But while she researches the organization, she always remembers that it is driven by men, not God.

“If I live for anther 10 years, it’ll probably be a smaller, well-operated organization,” Anderson says. “Will it be more spiritual? I don’t have any idea. Each bunch of Governing Body members bring in their own administration. …

“I don’t care anyway. They’re corrupt, but not financially corrupt — they’re ethically corrupt and they don’t even know it. And they’re mean as could be to do what they’re doing to people in the name of God. There’s no love. If you pattern yourself after Jesus, you’d never do those things.”

—

To learn more about Barbara Anderson and her research, visit www.freeminds.org to read her blogs.

It was the day that changed everything…

Mr. B was closing the door, sighing inwardly with relief. He’d finally had the courage to ask the Jehovah’s Witnesses not to return again. The magazines he’d been accepting for the past several months had only ended in the kindling box for starting fires. He’d not been interested in their preaching but didn’t want to be rude; it wasn’t his style. In a way, he respected Mr. K, who came to his door week after week. If nothing else, he was persistent but that too had grown annoying. Mr. B had always been one to root for the underdog and, after all, Mr. K seemed so innocently happy — there on the porch with his wife — and even though he thought they were a bit crazy he’d not wanted to hurt their feelings. But now he was about to get his Saturday mornings back to himself, his wife and his young daughter. After today, the Jehovah’s Witnesses wouldn’t be interrupting them anymore with messages of Armageddon or gloom and doom.

But could he have imagined what was about to happen, as his little girl curiously squirmed her way into the door just before he could close it? Could he have known that this would give them literally the opening they needed? Could he have known that one day he would disown this beloved child and his yet unborn son because this man’s religion should tell him so? No, that would have been unthinkable to him, but that was all about to change. It would take years but he too would change — their lives would never be the same.

As she wiggled her way through the door frame, glancing up at the strange man and woman, she said, “Daddy, who are you talking to?” And peering up at the strangers she asked in her little voice, “Who are you?”

For a moment, his resolve slackened. He looked down fondly at his child, he couldn’t well close the door on them with his little girl in the way. As he bent down to pick her up and finish his job of closing the door, abruptly the man said, “And what are you going to teach your daughter? What answers will you tell her when she asks about life and our purpose? Don’t you want to be able to give her real answers? Don’t you want to be able to tell her the truth?”

Mr. K. knew this was his last chance to reach Mr. B. He believed that God had given him this opportunity and he must do right by it. Boldly he called a challenge, a duel of theology as it were, and the challenge was this: A debate at their kitchen table in one week. On one side, the family’s Lutheran minister and on the other, Mr. K. and his Watchtower. Then they would see once and for all who had the answers, and what Mr. B. would teach his daughter as she grew.

And so, Mr. K. had his opening, his opportunity, to do what he’d be trained to do all his life. It wasn’t his fault, really; there is no doubt he was sincere. No, he was simply perpetuating a lifetime of indoctrination. After all, who could say what he’d had to sacrifice in the name of his religion?

And so Mr. B. thought he had nothing to lose. He couldn’t deny that the debate would be interesting and he believed it would give him the chance to finally dismiss the Jehovah’s Witnesses gracefully — after his minister made short work of them.

A week later they met. Mr. and Mrs. B. and their minister were grossly unprepared for the Watch Tower warrior they met. A lifetime of training had prepared Mr. K., he was armed and ready with his magazines, books and Watch Tower doctrine. He knew how to overcome objections, and he knew which issues to raise. Of course, the Jehovah’s Witnesses have an answer for everything, even though those answers tend to change over time as they are shown to be false. One could almost feel sorry for the Lutheran minister who couldn’t dodge or parry the quick citation of scripture and the answer of all of life’s big questions as arbitrary as they were. Caught up in the drama of it all, it was Mrs. B. who felt a spiritual awakening. Never had she believed there were answers to these questions. She was hypnotized by the Jehovah’s Witnesses. When the Lutheran minister responded once by saying, “Well that’s an interesting question…” she was furious. How had they let this man lead them spiritually when he knew so little? She was angry that the minister could be so ignorant, and in the end he was asked to leave. The triumphant Mr. K. then began his work.

I do not remember these events firsthand, rather only as they were related to me, time and time again. For many years I felt a swollen sense of pride that I was the instrument God had used to bring the “truth” to my family. It wouldn’t be until years later that I would come to loathe that day and the childish act of innocent curiosity that allowed Mr. K. one more moment at my father’s door. But I don’t begrudge him; in fact, I have fond memories of him and his wife. They would become like family to me and I remember them still even though I was only very young at the time. I realize that they were victims too, but how would I rue that day, the day that was to ruin our lives. For in the end, no one would find happiness. No one.

It was my mother who at first took a keen interest in the Witnesses. The debate had been a turning point for her and she was easily convinced. She began studying with Mr. and Mrs. K. and though my father was still a little reluctant, he joined in too.

We began attending meetings regularly. I still remember sitting in the old Kingdom Hall trying to be good and remain still. I’d stare at people I found interesting, fiddle and do anything I could to pass the time. It was hard for me but I wanted to be good. I knew how important this was to my parents and somehow it seemed natural. I was too young to recognize how much our lives had changed but I also realized that our family were still outsiders in this new group. The uncanny perception of children is a funny thing. Even as a toddler I remember feeling something like jealousy at some of the other families in the congregation. They were like established royalty and my family were just fledglings. Of course, at the time I couldn’t have understood those words; it’s only in retrospect that I can articulate my feelings then, and now I’m amazed at it.

Our lives took the shape of the typical Jehovah’s Witness routine of studies, meetings and service, and I accepted everything without question. Again, I was simply too young to understand the dramatic change that had taken place. My mother was baptized first and I remember it being a big deal. I didn’t understand then; I just knew that everyone was happy and so I was happy too. At the time, she was enormously pregnant with my little brother.

I wouldn’t know until later that my father had been really struggling with the Witnesses. He wasn’t baptized until several years after my mom and I remember being so proud of him when he finally did. Looking back, I realize that was an interesting shift — being ignorantly happy for my mother at her baptism but then feeling something close to condescending pride at my father’s. In only a few short years, it seems I had been caught up in the Watch Tower’s indoctrination too. My dad explained that smoking was his crutch and that’s why he took so long to be baptized; apparently he used to sneak out into the parking lot during the song to have a cigarette. It still makes me laugh to imagine that. But to this day I don’t know what the truth is. Was it just smoking or was it something more? I find it hard to believe that my dad was that weak. Smoking is a hard habit to quit but I’ve always known my father to be a strong, resolute man. I can’t imagine that he would let a habit stand in the way of something he wanted to achieve. He’d overcome so much in life and had more share of tragedy than most of us can imagine, but that is another story. I doubt I’ll ever know what his reasons were for sure, only that I believe my father took more convincing than my mom. She is a sweet, emotional being and my father is an intellectual all the way. I believe that in the end he succumbed to pressure of conformity and years of indoctrination. I believe that finally he let himself be moved where the currents led him, finally embracing it and convincing himself it was his own.

By the time my dad was baptized I had two little brothers. Life seemed normal and happy, although I was aware now more than ever that our family still wasn’t as established in the congregation as many others. I was relieved that my dad was finally baptized but was still sort of conscious of my friends whose fathers were elders. Looking back, I think it’s remarkable that a young child can perceive and be affected by an unspoken class distinction within the congregation. There was nothing that I wanted more than to be accepted among my friends and, too, for my family to be accepted within the congregation. What could be more natural?

Life continued on and school became more difficult for me, not because of the studies but because I had a very hard time fitting in. I was very vocal in defense of being a Jehovah’s Witness and even tried to have Bible studies with some of my classmates. This did not win me a popularity prize. The other Witness kids seemed to keep more low key on the topic of religion, and they were more self-assured and even popular. While I was constantly picked on, teased and bullied, they distanced themselves. I was miserable. Outside school we were the best of friends but I was abandoned again on Monday morning. Their on-and-off friendship left me confused, frustrated and unsure of myself.

My brother and I - taken when I was 6 and he was 3.

My younger brother, the middle child, also had a very hard time in school, even more so than me. As much as we didn’t really get along, my heart still broke for him when he was bullied. It was just agonizing the way students and even teachers would treat him. They seemed to rally around an oddball and we were nothing if not that in their eyes. All the while, we were praised at home for our martyrdom at school. Life was a roller coaster — on one hand we were loved and admired, and on the other we were despised.

I still remember a little boy named Jesse. I had a crush on him all through elementary school. It was the simplest thing — puppy love — no rhyme or reason. He’d never paid me the slightest attention but he’d never been mean to me, either. Maybe that’s why I liked him so much. I would pray for him before I went to sleep, begging over and over again that Jehovah would let me witness to him so that he wouldn’t die at Armageddon. A few times, I sobbed myself to sleep, so afraid that he would die. I did try to witness to him at school but he’d just look bewildered and run away to play with his friends.

It seems that around this time I began asking myself questions. Would Jehovah really kill everyone who wasn’t a Jehovah’s Witness? I’d think of my aunt, whom I loved very much. She was not a Witness and I knew from conversations between her and my parents that she was opposed to the religion. I was desperate for her, afraid that she too would die at Armageddon, and again I turned to prayer and begged that Jehovah would help her see the truth so that she could survive the “end of the system”. For her, I would cry myself to sleep more times than I could count.

These thoughts made me feel so desperate and alone. I couldn’t make sense of it and it seemed so unfair. Why couldn’t Jehovah see what good people there were in the world? There were a million reasons why they couldn’t understand that the Jehovah’s Witnesses had the “truth”. Why could God be so cruel and kill them all? I was probably on 10 or 11, and yet for the first time the weight of my “knowledge” was beginning to feel oppressive. Many, many times i wished to myself that I had never known about the Jehovah’s Witnesses. If we simply hadn’t known or had the opportunity to know the “truth”, then Jehovah would just judge our hearts. Then we wouldn’t have to live with the terrible knowledge and fear that we did. As a young woman, I longed for ignorance. And it wasn’t until many years later that I would come to appreciate the cliche “ignorance is bliss”.

The desire to fit in and be accepted drove me forward into my teen years. My father had been appointed a ministerial servant and our family became more and more established in the congregation. I learned that the best way to make my parents proud of me and to make friends in the congregation was to be “more spiritual”. But in my heart I always found this a struggle. As hard as I tried, I always felt that I could never do enough or that I was too selfish or that my heart wasn’t in it. Despite outward appearances, I feared that I would not survive Armageddon, that Jehovah would know what a wicked person I was in my heart. Sure, I went in service often, even getting pioneer hours before I was baptized, having parts in assemblies, conventions and even the drama. But I admit that I thrived on the praise and admiration that came from those accomplishments. I wondered if it was the gratification I sought, as any human being would do. We want to be thought of well by others. I wanted to know that my parents were proud of me. I wanted to be an inspiration to others and, of course, everyone wants to be popular.

It was all a double-edged sword, though. The more I did, the more I began to question my own motives. Was I really doing this for Jehovah or was I doing it for me? I had to acknowledge to myself — if no one else — that I reveled in the attention I received, and with that knowledge I became plagued with guilt.

At 17, I was one of the last of my friends to get baptized. My dad was now an elder and I admit that I was afraid of falling behind and being the only one of my peers who hadn’t taken the dip. I wanted to make my family proud. At that age too, hormones were raging and there was fierce competition between the young men and women to nab a date/mate. And for a Jehovah’s Witness, the desirability and eligibility of a potential boyfriend/girlfriend was all about status in the congregation.

In spite of all that, though, I was still sincere in taking the step to baptism. I hoped beyond hope that it would bring me closer to Jehovah. There was always this elusive concept of “making the truth your own” and having a “personal relationship with Jehovah”, but no matter what I tried it seemed that was unattainable for me. Pray as I might, I always felt sinful and wondered if God listened. I always felt alone. I was always afraid.

A month or so after my baptism, I was out in service with one of our congregation’s regular pioneers. I was auxiliary pioneering myself, and I was finding it difficult to get my time in. The days were so long and unfulfilling, and downright depressing. The pioneer sister and I were walking down the very steep driveway of the last not-at-home and she said to me, “I’m always afraid that I’m not doing enough for Jehovah. At judgment day will I be able to answer that I’ve given him every moment of every day that I could to his work?”  I can’t remember anything else from our conversation but that. I remember the panic rising in my chest. This was a woman who spent nearly every waking hour in service or study and she was afraid that she wasn’t doing enough! I was suddenly very afraid. I thought that if Jehovah would judge me next to someone like her I would never survive Armageddon. For the first time, I felt hopelessness. I felt that no matter what good I might do in Jehovah’s service that at times I had selfish motives. For the first time, I felt way out of my league. I felt like this religion that I had been raised in was suddenly alien to me. I have never felt fear like that before.

Unbeknownst to me, that too was a turning point. I tried to devote myself even more to developing that elusive “personal” relationship with Jehovah. I spent more time in service, was very sincere in my personal study and tried to help out where I could, even filling in, impromptu, in the Theocratic Ministry School. For months, I desperately sought to make the truth my own. But I was never to succeed.

I believed what I had been taught, but I was constantly afraid. I always felt that I was sinful and that Jehovah was not blessing me with his spirit. I felt that my efforts were never good enough, never unselfish enough. I became depressed and then certain events would happen that would change my life forever.

I went to the elders because of my relationship with my boyfriend. What would seem perfectly natural behavior to any normal person left me emotionally torn. Of course, there had been kissing and a little touching but nothing beyond that. I was afraid, though, that this behavior — that my sin — was what was holding me back from a clear conscience and a relationship with Jehovah.

I drove to the Kingdom Hall alone on a Wednesday evening to meet with three elders in a back room. They sat at the front of the room, in three chairs facing me. I sat alone, feeling very small and suddenly very afraid. I came to confess myself to them and to seek their help and counsel, the words of the pioneer woman still ringing in my mind. Although my palms were sweating and my voice was shaky, I was desperate for these men to help me. I expected to confess what I had done, talk to them about my spirituality and ask for their help and advice. I was prepared, even though afraid of any punishment or reprimand I may receive, but to me it was worth it to be able to clear my conscience and move forward.

What happened was not what I expected. The session evolved into nothing more than an inquisition. After first trying to explain why I had come and what I was hoping for the three elders were more interested in ascertaining the specific degree of my sin than in helping me recover from it. Two of the elders I’d known for many years but the other I didn’t know well since he was new to the congregation. One was very dear to me. I’d grown up with his children and he’d been the one who baptized me. Confessing before them was the hardest thing I’d ever had to do. While he was very kind to me, the others insensitively probed deeper for information. I’ve never spoken of this before, but it felt near to rape and so what I’m about to relate is being said for the first time aloud and only for the benefit of others.

These are exact questions that were asked to me — I remember them as if I were watching a video replay:  Was the kissing limited to the mouth or were any other body parts kissed? Was the touching over-top or underneath the clothes? Did you ever take off your clothes so that he saw you naked? Did you have oral sex? Does anyone else know about this other than you and your boyfriend? I answered all the questions truthfully, even though I was terrified at discussing the subject with these men. I wondered, Has it not been enough that I came to them to confess and seek spiritual healing? Why do they have to root through these filthy details? Why aren’t they helping me? I need to talk to them about my spiritual welfare. I’m afraid!

After the elders finished questioning me, they asked if I was repentant. Of course my answer was yes — that was why I came to them. I tried to tell them that I was looking for their help but I was cut off and asked to leave the room for a moment.

After a few minutes, I was asked to return. I sat there as though a jury were about to read a verdict. The elders of my judicial committee had determined that my sin was not too great and that I was repentant. I was advised that I cease my relationship with my boyfriend and since no one else knew about our actions it was decided that I receive private reproof. They read a few scriptures and then told me that my privileges of pioneering and answering at meetings were to be removed for a time. Then I was dismissed and that was that. I walked out into the parking lot alone and sat in my car for a time before I could clear my head enough to drive.

The months went by and I was desperate to find some meaning and healing in what had occurred. I accepted my reproof without question and without grudge but I still longed for someone to talk to to help me spiritually. I remained noticeably silent at all the meetings while putting in more time than ever for personal study.

Then it all began to happen. I was just 18 and had moved out on my own for the first time with another Witness girl who was a friend of mine. I began to see behavior that shocked me beyond anything I could have imagined. My friends, sons and daughters of elders, ministerial servants and pioneers, people who I’d held in the utmost esteem, were showing their true colors. The only thing that had changed, mind you, was my proximity to them. Now that my world wasn’t sheltered by a curfew I saw much more of them. I was horrified. I saw or learned that drinking, drugs, sex and more were common among my friends. What a goody two shoes I had been! How had this been going on? How could Jehovah let this go on so rampantly and unchecked in his congregation? How could I be treated the way I had been when this was happening everywhere around me? I was devastated. I was disgusted.

I went to my dad and talked to him about what was going on. My intention was not to be a tattletale but I loved these people and didn’t want to watch as they threw their lives away. It was a difficult decision to come forward — I felt like I was betraying them but I also felt that maybe Jehovah was testing me.

My dad was very concerned. I told him that I didn’t want my friends to know where this information came from if it could be helped but that I cared about them too much to be silent. I had in mind my own spiritual crisis and didn’t want to be silently responsible for someone else’s. He spoke about it with the elders at their next meeting, and it seemed to be taken seriously. Since it affected people from more than one congregation, a body was appointed to deal with the matter. But what happened next would forever shake my faith in this organization that claims to be led and kept clean directly by God’s own Holy Spirit.

The city overseer’s daughter was implicated but a scandal in that family was not to be tolerated. It was all swept under the rug. And the behavior continued and actually intensified. Lies were told and I was scorned. I knew deep down that I cared for their spiritual welfare but I also wanted justice. The hypocrisy was unbelievable. Even my dad was shocked and said that we’d have to leave it in Jehovah’s hands.

As months went by, I began to see that hypocrisy was not limited to my little social sphere. I distanced myself from my former friends and began to seek relationships with some of the older sisters in the congregation. But what I saw and learned there would continue to dishearten and disillusion me. Everywhere I looked there were cliques, snobbery, cheating husbands or wives, drug use — the works. It seemed there was no safe place and so I began to isolate myself. I prayed harder than I’d ever prayed before when one day the question finally came to me: What if it’s not  the “truth”?  What if this is no different than any other religion that thinks they’re right? For all their high ideals, what if they are no different than people in the world — no less selfish, corrupt or sinful? Though I allowed myself to ask these questions for the first time, I was still afraid. As if two little people whispered from my shoulders, “What if they’re right?” and “What if they’re wrong?” I simply didn’t know anymore.

I still went to meetings, though it became more and more difficult for me. I couldn’t stomach the open hypocrisy, which seemed to be all around me. I was no surely no saint but I was trying!

Since I’d moved out, I was in different congregation than my parents. I missed one meeting, then two. No one seemed to notice. I didn’t feel any different at first. After a couple of weeks, I let myself ask more questions and this time I gave them serious thought. How did I know that the Jehovah’s Witnesses had the truth? I had always taken it for granted; that was how I was raised. I remembered a lecture from a teacher in high school who, in a study on society and behavior said, “We believe the reality that is presented to us.”

Then it all hit me like a ton of bricks. Was this simply the reality I had grown to know? Were the Witnesses any different from, say, the Mormons? I knew at that moment that I needed to find the truth for myself. My parents had the choice to become Jehovah’s Witnesses; they had lived and experienced life and something that the Witnesses said had made sense to them. They were able to make it their own because they chose it. I’d never had that opportunity. I became determined to look at my religion with new eyes, pretending I’d never heard it before. I wanted to be converted. I wanted to chose my religion. I wanted to make it my own.

At the time, I saw this as a crisis of faith and believed that this approach would help me become convinced and heal spiritually. I went back to the meetings. With the perspective of an outsider, imagining what it would be like to hear this all for the very first time, I was utterly surprised at what I felt. I began reading the Bible from the beginning, again as if I’d never set eyes on it before. That was the beginning of the end of my faith. The meetings sounded more and more like propaganda. I began to notice the broad claims and unsourced quotes made in the Watchtower.

I remember clearly the last meeting I ever went to. I slipped out after the public talk during the song. I was sick to my stomach. It was like I had had an epiphany. I realized, listening to the brother give the talk, that my high school teacher had been right, that we believe the reality presented to us. I knew in that hour, listening to the public talk, that had I never been raised to believe this religion, I never, ever would have. In that moment, I decided that I was through being a Jehovah’s Witness. I would honor my values and seek truth but I seriously doubted this was it. Yet I was terrified, terrified of losing my family and friends — but was that a reason to live a life of hypocrisy in a religion I didn’t believe?

As I walked out of that Kingdom Hall for the last time, it felt as if I were standing at one of life’s great crossroads. If I left now, I knew I left for good. I would not be one of those people who flip-flopped in and out of the religion. I would lose my family. I would have to say goodbye to everyone I’d known and loved my entire life. But by now I’d had enough. I was ready to walk away from the Watch Tower and not look back. I drew inward on strength that I didn’t know I had and made myself walk swiftly and surely to the exit. I still remember the sound my feet made on the tiles. It felt like I was in a vacuum, my ears ringing, my breaths ragged. When the door closed behind me the fresh air hit me like never before. I was afraid but was committed to my course and felt the lightheartedness of freedom for the first time. I came near to weeping with relief.

Today, one of my favorite poems is by Robert Frost. In the poem he talks about two roads that lay before him and having to choose which one to take. He knew that he’d likely never have this choice to make again and so in the end, he chose the road less traveled. Frost finishes the poem with the words, “and that has made all the difference.”  I still get shivers when I read it. To me the road less traveled is the more difficult road; it is uncertain, unknown, it may be dangerous and you’ll likely travel it quite alone. But I look back at that day — the day I made my choice — and am relieved beyond words that I made the choice to take the road less traveled. I feel like I was given a new chance at life that day. There was to be much pain and sorrow along that road and yet choosing freedom and integrity has made all the difference.

I got on with my life, making new friends outside the congregation. I moved out from the house I shared with the other Witness girl. I tried my best to fade from the congregation. I didn’t want to be disfellowshipped because I knew I would lose my family. But as the months went by, I was making a new start of my life. I began seeing a young man I’d known in high school and eventually we moved in together. As young as we were, he was very understanding of what I was going through and we often talked about religion. I’d put the Watch Tower behind me and was seeking knowledge elsewhere. Then began my comparative study of other religions.

About six months after my last meeting, I received a phone call from one of the elders that had been on my judicial committee about a year earlier. He had learned that I had moved in with a “person of the opposite sex” and wanted me to meet with him and some other elders to discuss my spiritual health. He said they wanted to help me. This time I knew better. I declined.

A few weeks later, I came home from work on a Monday night and my boyfriend told me there was a message for me on the machine. It said, “since you have refused to meet with the elders, it will be announced at the service meeting this Thursday that you are disfellowshipped from the Christian congregation. If you’d like to appeal this decision you may call to arrange a meeting before Thursday.” Click.

I listened to it a few times, pressed delete and began to cry. I wasn’t sad, I was angry — very, very angry. They couldn’t just let me go, let me fade away — they had to pursue me. They were taking my family away.

It was 1999, a Thursday. That day, I lost my parents and two brothers. I lost aunts and uncles and cousins. I chose to leave a religion because I did not believe it. As a result of my choice, my family who are Jehovah’s Witnesses shun me. It’s what they’re taught to do. They will not visit me. They will not meet to have a coffee. They will go out of their way to avoid me. I have not even laid eyes on most of my friends and family since before that day. My brothers practically grew from boys into young men before I’d lay eyes on them again.

My family says I betrayed them, that I chose to leave them. But nothing could be further from the truth! They have cried and yelled and sent guilt-ridden letters. They tell me that I have the power to change it all, and all I have to do is return to the religion and we can be a family again. They say it doesn’t matter why I come back as long as I do. What is that if not emotional blackmail? And yet it’s not their fault, not really. This is how they’ve been trained to think. I know it’s not who they are, deep down in their hearts.

I’ve loved them all my life and wanted nothing more than happiness for us all. But in the end, I was true to myself — I would not live a lie, I would not condone hypocrisy. I would not give up my freedom to a religion I believed to be false, and a religion that held my family hostage in such a way. It’s an impossible situation. In order to have religious freedom and personal integrity, the religion demands my family as its price. In order to know my family again, I must sacrifice my freedom to a hypocritical religion. I know they choose not to understand that — they couldn’t possibly understand that— yet I ask, how can anyone impose faith and religion as the price of their love? I love them regardless of the beliefs — unconditionally, but their religion has taught them judgment and cruelty, both to themselves as well as others.

My father is now gray and my mother is often ill. I rarely hear their voices and I can’t remember the last time I saw them. It’s agony. I know it’s been the same for them and yet they are the ones with the choice and power over our relationship. My arms have always been open to them. Theirs came with the condition of faith and, in my mind, faith is something you simply cannot fake. My youngest brother, while never baptized, has also left the religion. He came to me when they turned him out, and our reunion gave me the most joy I’ve known in these last 10 years. My other brother is very devout, and I know little more of him. He won’t speak  to either of us now.

My Aunt and I together, the winter of 2007 in Whistler, BC.

Through all these years I’ve had my aunt, the one I used to pray for. She’s been there for me unconditionally, through thick and thin and all the worry I’ve put her through. Of anyone I’ve known or loved in my life, she has taught me what unconditional love is. While I love my mother and will always mourn her, my aunt has been more of a mother to me when I needed one most. For that I will always be grateful and she will always have the most special place in my heart.

I don’t resent my parents or love them any less. If it’s possible, I love them even more. Perhaps I’ve had enough time and distance to idealize my relationship with them. I love my mother, who is in all other ways a kind, generous and very compassionate woman and I admire my father who I’ve always believed is one of the most brilliant and interesting men I’ve ever known.

I miss them every single day. Sometimes the pain is more than I think I can bear. I grieve for the loss of them to a religion that forced them to choose. I’m angry that they made the decision they did. Yet sometimes I wonder if it’s really not the best for them now. After all these years, what kind of life would they have if they suffered what I suffered? It took all my strength and most of my 20s to recover this much. Wouldn’t it be cruel to put them through that now? And yet its hard not to be selfish and want them to leave the religion. I miss them so much! I know they miss me too. My dad once told me that he keeps my picture in his wallet and cries every time he looks at it. I’m told my brother feels like he’s been cheated out of having his sister. I understand he’s quite angry at me and sometimes cries. My mother told me that sometimes she pretends I’m dead and gone and that helps her to cope, and when that doesn’t work she takes a prescription.

I’m sure that their God is well pleased.

It’s been 10 years. I have studied many, many religions. I’ve read the Bible cover to cover several times. I’ve reread many of the Watch Tower publications, checking sources and the historical record. I now believe without a shadow of a doubt that the Jehovah’s Witnesses are a highly controlled cult group and are not a true or even valid religion. My heart aches for them — for my family and long-lost friends and the Watch Tower’s many other victims. But for all that heartache, there is simply nothing I can do. If any Jehovah’s Witness should ever read this account or come across any scrap of critical material, they have been conditioned to regard it as something under Satan’s influence. Tell me, what can fight against such a perfect impenetrable shield to logic?

Moxie - Summer, 2009.

What helps me get by is helping people. When you are faced with an impossible situation, when there is nothing you can do to improve your own situation, what could be more natural than to try to help someone else? This is where I find joy, happiness and fulfillment — in knowing that my experiences can be put to good use for others. To know that you  have made even a fraction of a difference in someone else’s life, gives you a kind of vicarious joy that you would otherwise never have known. This is where I have found healing. I have had to resign myself to the knowledge that my family will never be the same, that there is simply nothing to be done. Though I let them know that I still love them and am always here if they need me, I know nothing will ever change — things are too far gone. But for others there is still time.

The faces of my family and friends still haunt my mind — memories of childhood and better days long gone. Some days, I’m resigned to the loss of them. Other days I want to fight for them tooth and nail. And sometimes I just cry, recalling that Saturday morning in 1983 when a little girl pushed through the door and asked, “Who are you?”

—
Clock Image Credit: H. Koppdelaney (flickr)