by Christ Alone 60 Replies latest jw friends
I was handed a tract about living in paradise as I was exiting the womb.
Rub a Dub
Yeah, but their stuffing Watchtower literature between your poor wobbly little baby legs before your eyes were even opened was totally uncalled for. Shame on them! At least its placement down below made it easier for you to later sh*t it out.
There is no simple answer to this question because the reasons are varied and complex. CA I did do research before joining but because of my own upbrinbging, came from a premise that the Bible was truly god's book. The ability to answer questions from it is powerful in these circumstances. What I checked was the things presented in the study material eg Origin of Christmas, birthdays, cross etc. I also looked up scriptures in a variety of translations. The progress of the material presented is designed to elict trust and eventually cross checking everything becomes less important.
To be honest I am still trying to understand the young me that fell for it all and in my defence I didn't have the internett then and research was far more difficult. I definitely stayed too long, but the enlightenment I felt from feeling I was learning about the Bible from the jws, is shadowed now in the freedom I feel from shedding the indoctrination. After critically analysing the org, I moved onto doing the same to the Bible inself. I no longer need definitive answers and am content to view life as a journey where my ideas will evolve over time as I add experience and knowledge to the path I tread.
BTW there is a veiled judgemental attitude in comments from born ins that makes converts like me think twice about commenting on a thread like this. All the exjws I know personally were converts, don't know any born ins. Perhaps that is also of being a convert, "birds of a feather flock together " both in and out of the organisation, or more accurately I personally never felt fully included in the congregation. I am a woman with a husband who never checked into the org. Unfortunately I stayed long enought to have one of my children remaining a fully fledged jw.
Wow... Thank you UA and Halo!!! Yours are actually the comments that I think most of us like to read! I'm fascinated by converts, and I hope my OP did not sound ridiculing! I was more interested to know if someone actually researched it and did not find enough to turn them away. I was not implying anything about intelligence.
Of course prior to the late 90's, all research had to be done through the library and info was not as available as it is now. Research may have been limited to a few references in some older books.
i personally feel that the WTs growth is soon going to drastically slow down and possibly stop due to the overwhelming info that is readily available. I think the GB knows this too and are doing everything they can. I would not doubt that they have people at bethel posting many of the jw videos that you see on youtube. I think that this will increase and they will majorly ramp up their positive media exposure very soon.
thank you guys for sharing. I hope us born ins did not push any other lurkers away. If you were a convert, PLEASE post your story!!! I think we all would like to know what got you in, and what got you out.
At a Crystal Palace assembly, my proud study conducter was showing me off to her friend who asked the same question as to what attracted me to the "truth", I could tell by the look on her face that a sense of Humour was somewhat lacking in this organisation when I replied that it was the delicious donuts they used to sell at the assemblies back then.
My Dad reckons it was because they were they only ones that could answer all the questions. He never noticed that the questions they were answering were supplied by them.
If I ask him the kinds of questions that should have been asked at that time, (seventy years ago), he'll sell his soul to the Devil to get out of answering them.
The first questions they answered were my own, still not the right ones I guess. CA the thing that got me out was reality of shunning hitting close to home along with the exposure of a few skeltons residing in the wt closet. My deprogramming was extremely rapid. I had already done it once before when I left the religion of my birth and hd not been indoctrinated by the wt from babyhood. Anyway it's all like a bad dream now except for the reality of still having family in.
born in
Christ Alone,
I am a convert. I first began studying with the Witnesses when I was 14 with two girls I met in school. Probably the first thing that attracted me was the promise of living on a paradise earth forever. I knew there was no burning hellfire and I didn't want to go to heaven. I loved animals and liked the idea of being at peace with all of them. The time period was the mid sixties. The Vietnam War was in the headlines. The Witness' neutral stand on all things political appealed greatly to me. Also there was no collection plate passed, just a contribution box at the back of the hall. I liked the fact that none of their ministers were paid but served voluntarily. I had a belief in God but couldn't wrap my mind around him being part of a Trinity, and him having a name made sense.
Did I do research? Yes, I can honestly say that I did. Before I was ready to commit I wanted to know the history of the organization. The only book available at the time was "Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose". I naively thought that if I wanted to know about Jehovah's Witnesses I needed to go to the source which would be their own books. So I read many other of their publications. I would also ask different Witnesses the same question just to see if I got the same answer. I usually did. I did look for books about JWs in the library but found none.
I had an interest in science which changes as new facts are found. Faultily applying this to religion, I reasoned that because the Witnesses changed their beliefs over the course of their history that they were open to new ideas. So when I saw some things that didn't make sense I became sleepily content to wait for "new light".
After a few Bible studies indoctrination sessions I was ready to believe that Armageddon was due in 1975. And by this time I greatly feared being destroyed.
Thirty three years later researching on the internet started my journey out.
Reopened Mind
Promises to get me in with the opposite sex led me into studying, and then getting baptized, under the false premises that Jehovah would take care of it if I dedicated my soul to him. Instead, he welshed on it and bound my soul so it would not be free to dedicate to anyone else. Plus, he is stopping anyone else (i.e., Satan) from fixing this problem--rather, Jehovah would make it an offense for me to so much as communicate in any way to the opposite sex, whether in the congregation or in the world.
And I am waiting for the witlesses to show up somewhere and promise to fix it if I "come back". Failing that, they will start using threats, first of death and destruction, then of legal "breach of contract" action. And finally, force. If I "come back", there is a good chance I will be able to (at least initially) just do 2 mornings of field circus a month and use whatever field circus bag I want. If they use legal force, they could set minimum hour requirements at pious-sneer or special pious-sneer levels, force me to verify what I did, minimum placements, minimum donations, and even worse conditions than what they already impose.
They go and blame Satan for what Jehovah actually did himself, promise to fix these issues if I join, and then welsh. All the while, inciting me to give Satan many an undeserved slap in the face (Astaroth, too--actually locking me right out of what they promised to get me in). The whole thing is a scam that needs to be brought down immediately if not sooner, and they need to submit to whatever punishment Satan and Astaroth can come up with for them (including having Jehovah forced to release my soul).
There is truth in the suggestion by Halo that often the question about what attracted converts to the Watchtower is slyly judgemental. I know I bring a lot of my own strong views to the answers I give. I do think it has a lot to do with intellectual functioning. Although I was raised in the religion, I could never in a million years imagine the type of person I am being attracted to any religion that mistakes slogans for deep thinking. Puh-lease!
So am I saying you have to be simple-minded to have "researched" the JWs and concluded they do have "the Truth" ? Yes. But I'd also suggest the JWs are experts at tailoring their message to people's inherent need for clearcut answers to their "God" questions. And, to have fallen for simple messages does not mean you are forever doomed to be misled. Look at all the people who join up in a state of utter conviction that "This is the Truth!" and who eventually have their eyes opened when they see the huge misfit between what the witnesses claim for themselves but end up not practising. Hypocrisy is an effective eye-opener for sure. Even the misled can change their minds and conclude, "This is NOT the Truth!" So, in a way, if you were misled and have now un-misled yourself, you are smarter than a hell of a lot of other people who keep believing it is the Truth. You have demonstrated the ability to use your intellectual functioning and become perhaps sadder but undeniably wiser.
Like every good salesperson who ever existed, JWs attract people by appealing to their own needs and wants. Many people are searching for absolute answers to unanswerable questions such as, "What is the purpose in life?", "If there is a "God", why does "He" Permit Suffering?" and "Is There Such a Thing as a "True Religion"?
I'm afraid that the Watchtower's confident and blindingly simplistic answers to these sorts of "eternal"questions appeal to people who are not that well read. If you are well read, you realize that theologians and philosophers have grappled with these and more complex "Purpose of Life" questions for thousands of years. You are not easily impressed with the once-over-lightly answers that the JWs give. But even if you were at one time not well read, you give pretty good evidence now of being far better read and not so gullible.
So, if I can be so bold, when I hear people say that the JWs are the first religion that answered all their questions, after a feeling of "Uh - Oh" inside me, I conclude these people are not so smart to begin with or - in the desperate search for meaning - have settled far too prematurely for slogans masquerading as "Truth". Either way, converts to the JW religion - as is the case to converts to any other cult-like religion you care to name - are at best optimistically gullible and at worst victims of their own ignorance - and somethimes both. Oh, perhaps a fraction of converts do so in order to get into the pants of a potential marriage partner - and sometimes not even their own. Increasing the odds of having sex with a lovely person is perhaps one of the most compelling reasons for joining the worst club on the world in order to have what promises to be the best sex, as people often find out to their well-deserved long-lasting regret
