I was baptized into the J.W. religion in 1963 in the City of Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada. This essentially picked up where my father left off, who had been an inactive J.W. while I was growing up. In 1964 I married a young farm girl, who was born and raised in the JW faith. While doing field service, I had many discussions with people of different faiths, especially Mormons and Mennonites. Some two years into the marriage I converted to the Mormon religion,which resulted in my disfellowshpment by the JW's on the grounds of Apostasy. We now had to settle into the reality of a religiously divided home, which became the source of a very unhappy marriage. We had three daughters born into this environment. When our oldest daughter was in Grade One, we moved to Calgary, Alberta, trying to pursue new opportunities as well as hoping for a better relationship in the marriage. This all ended in vain, when the wife visited the principal and teacher at school behind my back, and instructed them to excue our daughter from all activities related to Christmas, Halloween, Easter, and opening morning exercises (eg. singing the national anthem and saluting the flag). I discovered what had been going on quite by accident, when I stopped by the school to talk to the teacher at parent-teacher conference. The teacher explained how some of these rules being imposed on our daughter was causing her emotional difficulties, to which I responded with shock and surprise. At that point I wrote a letter authorizing the School System to make our daughter a full participant in all school activities. The wife wanted a copy of this letter, and stated her intentions to take it to her lawyer. I could see me in a court case with me and my lawyer on one side, and my wife and the Watchtower Society's lawyer on the other side, with unlimited resources to back them up. This became the catalyst that brought our marriage to an end, and I separated from the family, painful though it was. After that, the wife and kids moved back to the farm of my wife's parents where there was a spare farm house near Brooks, Alberta, some 100 miles away from Calgary. I attended University at Calgary, but later had to withdraw because I became an emotional wreck, and wanted my family back together again. I asked my wife by phone if she was willing to reconsider, and she said "Yes, if I was willing to come back as a JW, and get reinstated." At that point, I was willing to do anything and to pay any price, so I took steps to that end. After some eight months of waiting, and visiting the family during this interim, commuting between Calgary and the farm on weekends, the big day came, and I was officially reinstated as a JW. People came from miles around, welcoming me back into the fold. It wasn't long before I realized what an awful mistake this was. How could I go out in field service, knocking on doors, preaching teachings I did not in my heart subscribe to? How could I talk to Mormons on their doorstep, trying to convert them to JW's, when I was still believing most of what the Mormon religion taught. This situation had now set me up for living a terrible lie and hypocrisy, and it was clear that no matter how painful, I had to put a stop to this before things became virtually irreversible. So before the whole family moved off the farm, and joined me back in Calgary, I wrote my wife a letter setting out in detail why I could not do this, and why I still believed in the Mormon Church. This was the end of the marriage, and in 1963 we divorced. Moving on with my life, I then set my sights on being an active and dedicated Mormon, and even considering getting married in the Mormon faith. Soon I met another farm girl who was Mormon, and in 1964 we got married in the Mormon Temple in Cardston, Alberta. It felt like a dream come true, since it had been so many years of living in a spiritually divided household by the previous marriage. First a son was born, and then a daughter. We were quite contented with the relationship and our Church life, but then another crisis erupted. I had been doing Missionary work as a Mormon Elder, and one day stumbled upon a very knowledgeable individual who told me many things about Mormonism I had never heard of before. He gave me the addresses of a number of places that had literature avaiable that could help me discover a lot of detailed information that would expose the real truth about the Mormon Church. After acquiring these publications, and studying them at length, I came to the conclusion that this could not possibly be the True Church they claimed to be. Once again, my marriage was in trouble, and two kids were in the middle. We divorced in 1983. This time, it was not about jumping from one religion to another. Rather, it was about leaving a religion I could no longer believe in, and then finding myself spiritually marooned on a sea of doubts, uncertainties and confusion. The experience of two religions, and two marriages based on those religions, had changed me forever. Never again would I fall in love with someone who loves me conditionally, basing the relationship on how good I was as a JW or a Mormon, or whatever else I might become. In the years that followed, I became a kind of armchair philosopher, studying the world's religions and philosophies and systems of thought. I explored Christianity in terms of Roman Catholicism, as well as Protestantism in its many diverse forms and fanaticisms. This included Anglicans, Baptists, Alliance, Pentecostals, Lutherans, 7th Day Adventists, Hutterites, and Mennonites, and I actually made a number of visitations to a number of their churches. I examined several of the Cults, including some that are way out there next to the Loonie Bins- Scientology, Rosicrucians, Masons, UFO Groups, Spiritualists, some of the New Age Religions like Theosophy, Church Universal & Triumphant (Elizabeth Claire Prophet), the Moonies, Hare Krishna, Mahareshi Mahesh Yoga, EST, Ekankar (Science of Soul Travel), Edgar Cayce, Nostradamus, Shamanism, Urantia, etc. I followed the sermons and the rip-off shenanigans of the Televangists, like Jim and Tammy Baker, Jimmy Swaggart and Oral Roberts, and watched the super smooth Garner Ted Armstrong and his father Herbert W. Armstrong and how they operated. I've seen the horrors of Jim Jones and David Koresh, when fanaticism goes out of control. I've studied Eastern Religions like Hinduism, Bhuddism, Jainism, Chinese philosophies, Greek Mythology, Egyptology, etc. I also spent time exploring Astrology, Palm Reading, Crystal Balls, Reincarnation, Past Life Regression, Near Death Experiences, Poltergeists, Haunted Houses, UFO's, Crop Circles, Telekinesis, Astral Projection or Out-of-Body Experiences, Voodoo, Hypnosis, Magic Arts, Tarot Cards, Palm Reading, Numerology, Iridology, Herbal Medicine, Wicca, Conspiracy Theories and One-World Government, and a host of other systems and philosophies. Obviously one could spend an entire lifetime in any one of these Groups or Causes or Subjects. Therefore, I do not profess to be an expert in any one of these areas, but rather have become just knowledgeable enough to be able to make up my own mind what Organized Religion and Institutions and Movements and Isms are all about. I have concluded that they are but instruments of Power and Control over the masses, the believers, the followers, whereupon they become exploited for their money, time and talent. For these reasons, since the time I left the Mormon Church, I have not found it necessary to run off and join another religion or whatever. I still like to explore and discover, but don't ask me to become a "believer in" or "follower of" something. I now subscribe to the notions that Spirituality is an individual matter, that no-one has all or final answers, and that there is no God of the Universe that is going to punish us for daring to explore and question things sincerely. And whatever Truth(s) we may be seeking to discover, I believe it is to be found inside of us, and not "out there" in some man-made Institution or System.