 In my totally overwhelming 53 years of human existence, I've finally learned that "it isn't what you think you know; it's what you've been through" that matters to most other people. So, as an unwilling, though also willing, participant in that cycle of life and death, belief and unbelief, I will offer more to you more than I've ever said to any group of folks than I've ever known. That's JWN for ya.
I hope that it counts for something, perhaps even a little thing, in your lives as ex-JWs.
I will absolutely not name names, so don't ask.
Part 1
I was their first-born son, in 1952, to parents that had only been "introduced" to the WTS in 1951. Neither of my parents had any strong religious affiliation beforehand, but their own experiences were difficult and extreme: living through the Great Depression, being abandoned as children. Throughout every decade since, they have been denied and ignored by their families, to this very day...and not just because they became JWs.
But, naturally, and as a human need, they then searched for, and supposedly found, a purpose for their existence, first offered to them by a now "Nethinim" member, as they engaged in a Bible Study with that person. They also took great offense at a person who is now in a position of considerably higher responsibility in the WTS; a person who they met personally; and, to this day, I don't know exactly what happened. So be it.
But these are part of the events that formed me, as a mere child; supposedly before I even had a mind to comprehend what was going on, right?
And we're just to age 1.
Part 2
So, my life as a JW has been cast, before I can speak or understand even one word. My folks relegated their parental authority to the WTS (they told me that, explicitly), and were just tickled pink to see me grow up in accordance with the expectations that they themselves had adopted: the end is near, there is no need to worry about anything in the future, but just to devote my life to the "cause of the truth."
But this is where the cognitive dissonance comes into play. They'd already seen, for themselves, the hypocrisy within the WTS, and, to add to that, they'd both come from other religions that they found equally disillusioning. Yet, they chose to turn a blind eye to all that, and embark upon rearing us boys (me and my two brothers) as good JWs.
Not seeing the big picture, I took this all in with total glee. I studied, and studied, and studied. I viewed every word in the Bible as absolute truth, and every word in the Watchtower as the absolute truth about the absolute truth.
And so I embarked upon a life of denial, as had been the heritage of my family.
I started giving talks in the TM school when I was 6. I got my own publisher's record card when I was 8. I was laying on the floor of the living room, reading a 1950s bound volume, while Mom was ironing some clothes. I burst out and said: "Mom, I want to go to Bethel!" She said: "Craig, that would be great; I'm proud of you."
And so it began: from that point on, everything I did, and every decision I made, was for that one and single purpose--to get to Bethel.
I was baptized at 10. By that time, I was a regular little Marjoe Gortner, ready willing and able to tell adults 8x my age why their beliefs were wrong, and why our (my) beliefs were right. Absolutely no equivocation, no hesitation, no second-guessing of any kind whatsoever. I had the TRUTH!!!!! and I was going to do everything within my power to share it with the whole world.
And always, my complete confidence in the WTS was involved...and, therefore, too, all the more reason to "hold firm" to my decision to get to Bethel.
Part 3
So, at age 12, my folks move from Los Angeles to Portland, Oregon (they'd moved from New York to LA when I was 1).
Now, for most pubescent JW males, such a move would have engendered considerable angst about the meeting of new "worldly" people, how I'd "fit in" with the new congregation. But, for me? Naw. I was already so deeply involved with my devotion to whatever the WTS had to say...man, I literally ran out to the mailbox and grabbed the latest Watchtower, to immediately glean every last and latest kernel of truth from the brown-paper-wrapped issue of the magazines. And that I was an oddball in the new KH? Didn't matter to me one bit.
And then comes along the Life Everlasting book (as I recall), with its little chart on the back pages, culminating with the chronology about 1975.
If I was a fanatic up to that point (which I obviously was), then talk about adding gasoline to a fire.
I soaked up the eschatology like a sponge. Everything I'd been led to believe about the impending end of the world was only reinforced by that clear and simple Biblical accounting, and, in accord with my mathematical inclinations, and every insinuation that the WTS made along the way, left me with absolutely no doubt that Armageddon was coming in 1975. For example, I clearly remember a conversation with one of the very few "worldly" friends I had in High School (he went on to be a math professor at an Eastern college)-- He asked me: "Craig, what will you do when 1975 comes and goes, and the world does not come to an end?" I answered: "Well then, Bill, I'll have to seriously re-examine my religion." A prediction that came true, in more ways than I could ever have imagined...but not yet.
In the meantime, of course, I pursued my purpose in life with all the more vigor. I was giving public talks (yes, the Sunday talks) when I was 17, and a book study conductor as well. I was a gem of the congregation, with great prospects ahead, indeed.
And then, after a serious cross-examination with the circuit overseer, and after then submitting my application for Bethel, and waiting with great anticipation for several months, I finally received a letter from Bethel saying that I'd been accepted. When I got that letter, I laid on the floor, crying, and thanked Jehovah God for so blessing me as to be accepted to the highest honor any person could have--to serve Him at the headquarters of His earthly organization.
I arrived there on March 9, along with about 40 other new boys and girls (as we were called).
The next phase of my life was about to begin--little did I know what it held in store for me.
Part 4 - Bethel, the setting
So, that spring night (I'm pretty sure it was 1971--memory fades a bit) I'm laying on an Army cot in temporary housing, staring at the ceiling--my first night at Bethel, and the beginning of the rest of my life as a Bethelite (or so I had always thought). True enough, I'd signed a solemn oath before Jehovah, and submitted it to the Governing Body, that I would stay at Bethel for at least 4 years (that was the way they did it then)...but the real expectation (and Knorr made no bones about this in his public admonitions to Bethelites) was that you were there for life--fine by me.
What more could I ask? I was in the "control center" of the organization, surrounded by dozens and dozens and dozens of the anointed, and walking past members of the Governing Body every day...I could just feel their presence as they approached; it was almost palpable, as the holy spirit oozed from them. Now, I'd known a fair number of "anointed" ones over the years, but this was entirely different--we're talking the cream of the crop, the ones I'd read about in the magazines, the ones whose faces were burned into my memory...and especially Fred Franz.
Did it matter to me at that moment that I had sacrificed several once-in-a-lifetime opportunities? A chance to play sports (basketball--I was 6'-4" as a freshman, and each year the coaches virtually begged me to join the team)? No way: Sports, and any other extracurricular activity, was robbing Jehovah of time to preach His Word. A chip in the big financial world, cashing in on being one of only 100 high school juniors in the US to be awarded an all-expense week-long trip to Chicago for a science seminar, worthy of a newspaper article (the only "worldly" thing my folks ever allowed me to try at, and even then only because they thought I would fail--my Dad said "Go ahead, but don't expect anything good.") No way: the world was coming to an end, so what good would having a successful financial career matter? Turning down a free ride at one of the nation's top-ranked colleges? Nope: what good would a college degree be in the New System?
Well, all these sacrifices did matter to me, as a matter of fact: they were proof positive that I had the proper spirit, giving up all these things for the honor of God.
And so, when the next day arrived, and I sat, for the first time at a Bethel breakfast table, and saw Knorr's face on the TV screen, and when I was later that day assigned to the janitorial crew, I was as pleased as any person I could have imagined on this planet. And then there was Bethel Entrant's School, to really fill me in on the details of the Bible...and the "new boy" talks (a series of eight) wherein I would be informed about so many things I had never considered...and then the extensive libraries in both the 107 and 124 buildings, wherein were contained all the accumulated knowledge of a century of deep thinking and spiritual insight by hundreds of anointed ones--
you can imagine how I felt...or maybe you can't.
In any case, I was pleased as punch to start swabbing floors and washing walls and cleaning toilets...it was all holy water, as far as I was concerned.
That was very soon to change.
Part 5 - Bethel, the first shock
About 2 months after I arrived at Bethel (late spring), I took my place at the breakfast table...awakened, as usual, by the 6 a.m. bell, a quick shower, and arriving with great anticipation for the 7 a.m. Daily Comments, with a few words from the "head of the table" (usually Knorr, but they had recently started a weekly "cycling" of Governing Body members; part of the impending organizational elders restructuring). The norm was to start eating at 7:30 a.m. (read "scoop the bowl and wolf it down"), and on the clock by 8 a.m.
But, on this day, something completely beyond my anticipation. Knorr starts off by saying that we should be prepared to sit for a while, as he proceeds, for 3 hours, to outline how a homosexuality "ring" has been operating at Bethel for some time, including some Gileadites. The modus operandi was for "new boys" to be invited to join a Bethelite for a couple of "welcome here" drinks (the drinking age in NY was 18, and thus many of us were able to legally drink for the first time), and then to take advantage of them (what other phrase can I use?). We sat there, our hearts sinking to the floor, as name after name after name is revealed, and offense after offense is delineated, and one person after another is dismissed and from Bethel, with summary multiple disfellowshippings.
This went on for the entire week. At times, Knorr was so incensed that the spittle was literally frothing at the corners of his mouth.
About 40 were involved.
How could this be? How could this be??? I was shocked beyond words...none of us could talk about it...this couldn't possibly be happening, at the Capitol of God's Organization!! But it was, and it did.
I was so stunned that it's hard, now, to imagine how I was able to keep going. But (and here's where the psychological set-up by my upbringing comes into play) I found myself able to set it aside as being "God's Organization has been purified, and the sinners have been found out and removed." I had no choice, really, other than to accept that seemingly logical explanation: my entire life had been invested into that religion, and, at the young age of 19, having destroyed all other options, what other perspective could I have?
Denial began to grow like a weed. It was insidious, almost imperceptable...but the seeds had been sown both in the way I was raised, and by my own consequent gullibility. Such a fertile field I was, ripe for the reaping. And, of course, my folks reinforced that conclusion: "Jehovah will take care of it." Somehow, I found a way to sleep at night, putting this distressing episode behind me, like some bad dream.
Then, comes the summer.
Part 6 - Bethel, the second shock
So, here I am, reeling from the events of the recent weeks...and then comes a blessed respite. One of the "perks" of being on the janitorial crew was that, every summer, tradition sent us to Mountain Farm for a couple of weeks, to pick strawberries.
Ahhhhhh!! Back to the farm fields, doing what I did every summer in Oregon: picking berries, in between being a vacation pioneer (as it was then called). I did it well, and as I was very tall, I was also a prime candidate to stay on and thin the apple/pear/peach trees that were also on the property. So, when the rest of the crew went back to Brooklyn, I was asked to stay, and I gladly accepted.
So much for Bethel Entrant's School--they didn't have an "extension" university there outside of Clinton, NJ. So much for service and meetings--I went to one meeting and went out in service just once over the next 3 months. I was a worker: that was my job, and all the "spiritual" stuff was relegated to a distant second place.
Except for the rifle. There were a lot of rabbits and woodchuck on the property, and I was told that they whacked at the trees pretty badly in the spring, and so "pest control" was needed. But, because of the anti-gun feelings of the WTS (and, mind you, I'd never been a hunter), the Farm Overseer could only provide me with the weapon: he couldn't provide me the shells. So, in my dutiful way, I pulled out from the $14 a month that I was given by the WTS, and bought my own bullets.
Every evening, I would do a walk-about, bare-footed (my shoes had worn out), blasting the heads off these little critters, and (this may sound very strange) thinking that by so doing I was serving Jehovah in thereby protecting His "crops" for the benefit of all my fellow Bethelites.
No replacement clothes for that entire summer: I scabbed thread-bare shorts and shirts from a discard bin in the farmhouse. No haircut since before I had arrived there: my locks were down over my shoulders. I hadn't shaved in well over a month. And then, one day, Knorr arrives, in his Cadillac, while I'm hunkered down in the berry field. I hide myself, like some vagrant who is afraid that they'll be escorted off the property. He enjoys his breakfast, while I eat the few straggling berries that are left on the plants. I was so relieved when he left without seeing me.
And then, in the fall, I was told that it was time to go back to Brooklyn. The very first thing they did was to immediately usher me to the barber shop, and clean me up.
I was so psychologically disoriented at this point that I really can't say that I could even tell up from down. Nothing, absolutely nothing, was going according to my expectations. But, the self-denial kicked in even stronger: now that I was back at Brooklyn, things would get better, right? The homosexuality scandal was over, the episode at Mountain Farm was a mere aberration, and soon everything would be all right.
Part 7 - Bethel, the end
Ya know, it's odd how the "big" things just sometimes seem to bounce off your forehead, rather like seeing the trees instead of the forest. Well, fyi, that was the state of mind (if you can call it that) I was in, after less than a year at Bethel.
I was reassigned to the night-shift janitorial crew. Among other things, one of my duties was as a night-watchman, which every night took me right up to Fred Franz's door, where I more often than not saw the lights burning; I almost dared to knock one night, but it was like 2 a.m., and I didn't want to interrupt the flow of the Holy Spirit into his brain (honestly, and I mean really honestly, that's what I was thinking at the time).
Then, of all the things that had happened, this one thing just slapped me in the face: Knorr announced that no Bethelite was to wear jeans on the public streets. Now, since I was a janitor, naturally, all I ever wore was jeans; and so I asked my manager: "What the heck am I supposed to do? When I need to cross over to the other buildings (this was before they had tunnels all over the place), am I supposed to change into a suit?" He said "Yes, that's exactly what you're supposed to do."
Now, you'd naturally think that, on the scale of all the things I'd experienced, this would be such a small matter that it wouldn't even register...but it was like the straw on the camel's back.
Remember that fellow I mentioned earlier, who is now a "Nethinim"? Well, at that time he was "just" in the Service Department, and so I approached him. Of course, he knew me, and my folks, and I figured that if I could trust anyone, I could trust him. The conversation lasted for maybe 10 minutes...and it was the same slant that was to haunt me for another 20+ years: "Trust in Jehovah, and He will make it all right."
I was shaking, literally shaking. I walked down the street to a pay-phone, and called my Dad. I pleaded with him to buy me a plane ticket to home. He didn't understand why I was so stressed: he never has.
But, he bought the ticket. The next day I, as required, submitted my letter of resignation to Knorr.
Knorr's response was simple, a very blunt paragraph: "Because you have not fulfilled your 4 years service at Bethel, you are hereby prohibited from being a pioneer, or being a servant, for a minimum period of 6 months." They dutifully notified the military authorities that I was no longer a full-time minister: no longer 4D, now I was 1A, and though the VietNam war was winding down, my lottery number was high on the list.
And so began the explanations to my parents, an appearance before the Draft Board, and yet another attempt to salvage what I had spent my life trying to be.
Part 8 - hanging on by a bare thread
I can't remember the drive home from the airport...all I can remember is how relieved, how incredibly thankful, I was to be back on my own bed, in a safe environment, with two parents who would help me get through all of this. It was the first peaceful night of sleep I'd had in a long long time.
I also don't remember much at all about the explanations I tried to give to my folks. But I do remember this: I apparently told my Dad enough such that he was compelled to drive over to see the congregation servant (as they were then called), who had himself been at Bethel...and demanded to know why he hadn't told my folks about what Bethel life was really like.. why he had let them send their firstborn son into such an environment without any warning whatsoever. The servant answered: "That would have been disloyal of me."
But, as I teetered at the edge of the precipice, that one little rope of hope was still in my hands: 1975 was only 3 years away, and if I could just hang on that much longer...somehow find a way to bury all these bad experiences, all this pain, all this disappointment--then just a little while longer, and the former things will not be called to mind.
So, I decided to focus on the Bible itself--after all, that some few bad people at Bethel had done some few bad things didn't mean that the Bible was itself to blame, did it? To bring myself closer to the God of that Bible, I started studying Greek, Hebrew and Latin. For recreation, I'd study calculus and physics. For stress, I would drink. All this, of course, alone, in my room, until the wee hours of the morning. No more was said about Bethel.
Does anyone see a pattern of "hiding" here? Yes indeed, the same pattern that my folks had been following for the last 20 years--and I became a true disciple of that way.
I also met a sister, and we got married (my Dad married us, at the KH). I got a job at a warehouse, and started to get back on my feet as a publisher. There was even talk about how some day I would make a really good servant at the KH again, especially considering what I'd been through, and the experience I could offer.
Emotionally, things were starting to look up. I was seeing "the track" again, and pulling myself along slowing but surely to 1975.
How often does it happen that we can be asked, rather like on the witness chair in a trial: "What exactly were you doing on the night of xx-xx-xxxx 30 years ago?" and actually be able to answer that question? I know exactly what I was doing during the evening of September 30, 1975: I was fervently praying to Jehovah that I would be found worthy, in spite of all my weaknesses and failures, to find His favor and live through the next day, the day that Armageddon was happening. Those words, and the fears I had, still ring in my head.
I had no doubt about this for many reasons, some of which I've mentioned, but for many other reasons as well. I'd been to several "special assembly days" where circuit overseers and district overseers gave talks about how close we were to the end--some of them even saying "Brothers and sisters, it's only xx months until 1975. What do you think about that?" And, of course, we all broke out in almost unrestrainable applause. Fred Franz Himself, the Oracle of God, gave a talk at one of these assemblies, and did everything but put His Imprimatur on that date.
And then there was the influx of tens of thousands...no, hundreds of thousands of people into the Organization. Bible studies were quick and simple: 6 months and baptized, or drop it. The congregations and assemblies were an absolute flurry of activity; everybody was pumped: What else could this unprecedented growth of the Org mean other than that Jehovah's Hand was guiding the last of deserving humankind into His Ark, for preservation through that last day of Satan's wicked world? We were placing the "literature of the truth" so fast that the people were almost ripping it out of our hands. It was electrifying, and I'd finally regained most of the enthusiasm that marked my early years.
And then, as that day wore on, October 1, 1975, as I looked outside several times, expecting to see storm clouds, feel earthquakes, watch lightning bolts strike down the unbelieving "worldly" people (just like in the Paradise book), my anticipation began to wane. I came home from work, saying to myself "Well, there are still a few more hours left in the day."
October 2 was a unique day in my life. Something snapped. A conflux of emotions presented itself: I had now, finally, lost all confidence in the WTS as the Spokesman of God--but, also, all my family and friends and wife were JWs...so I couldn't just up and leave. So I got mad. I got mad as holy hell. I was out for revenge against these "leaders" who had suckered me. And a lot of other JWs were equally mad. We started having round-robin discussions, usually groups of 10-20, including elders and ministerial servants. We'd go back over all the things we'd been told, and virtually promised, to see if there was any possible way that it had been (as the WTS was asserting) our fault for misinterpreting what they had said. We all came to the same conclusion.
Meanwhile, my folks carried on with the same pattern of denial: "We never understood the WTS to mean anything special about 1975."
It took a little while, but soon the disfellowshippings for apostasy became a rising tide, a loss of members to match the Rutherford-era blood-letting of 50 years before. Right and left, folks I'd known for years, even "prominent" JWs with a lifetime of service, were either disassociating or being kicked out. And my day was approaching.
Part 9 - 1975, the date comes
How often does it happen that we can be asked, rather like on the witness chair in a trial: "What exactly were you doing on the night of xx-xx-xxxx 30 years ago?" and actually be able to answer that question? I know exactly what I was doing during the evening of September 30, 1975: I was fervently praying to Jehovah that I would be found worthy, in spite of all my weaknesses and failures, to find His favor and live through the next day, the day that Armageddon was happening. Those words, and the fears I had, still ring in my head.
I had no doubt about this for many reasons, some of which I've mentioned, but for many other reasons as well. I'd been to several "special assembly days" where circuit overseers and district overseers gave talks about how close we were to the end--some of them even saying "Brothers and sisters, it's only xx months until 1975. What do you think about that?" And, of course, we all broke out in almost unrestrainable applause. Fred Franz Himself, the Oracle of God, gave a talk at one of these assemblies, and did everything but put His Imprimatur on that date.
And then there was the influx of tens of thousands...no, hundreds of thousands of people into the Organization. Bible studies were quick and simple: 6 months and baptized, or drop it. The congregations and assemblies were an absolute flurry of activity; everybody was pumped: What else could this unprecedented growth of the Org mean other than that Jehovah's Hand was guiding the last of deserving humankind into His Ark, for preservation through that last day of Satan's wicked world? We were placing the "literature of the truth" so fast that the people were almost ripping it out of our hands. It was electrifying, and I'd finally regained most of the enthusiasm that marked my early years.
And then, as that day wore on, October 1, 1975, as I looked outside several times, expecting to see storm clouds, feel earthquakes, watch lightning bolts strike down the unbelieving "worldly" people (just like in the Paradise book), my anticipation began to wane. I came home from work, saying to myself "Well, there are still a few more hours left in the day."
October 2 was a unique day in my life. Something snapped. A conflux of emotions presented itself: I had now, finally, lost all confidence in the WTS as the Spokesman of God--but, also, all my family and friends and wife were JWs...so I couldn't just up and leave. So I got mad. I got mad as holy hell. I was out for revenge against these "leaders" who had suckered me. And a lot of other JWs were equally mad. We started having round-robin discussions, usually groups of 10-20, including elders and ministerial servants. We'd go back over all the things we'd been told, and virtually promised, to see if there was any possible way that it had been (as the WTS was asserting) our fault for misinterpreting what they had said. We all came to the same conclusion.
Meanwhile, my folks carried on with the same pattern of denial: "We never understood the WTS to mean anything special about 1975."
It took a little while, but soon the disfellowshippings for apostasy became a rising tide, a loss of members to match the Rutherford-era blood-letting of 50 years before. Right and left, folks I'd known for years, even "prominent" JWs with a lifetime of service, were either disassociating or being kicked out. And my day was approaching.
Part 10 - transition #1
As Mr. Spock would often say: "Interesting, very interesting."
Posting the first several parts of my life story evoked an emotional response in me that I didn't fully anticipate; thus the angst. As I've pondered what happened next, (and maybe this is one of the very best things I can derive from sharing my experiences!), what I'm discovering about myself is that, though the "stage" had changed, I hadn't. In some way or another, I was compelled to understand, to rationalize, what was going on: I simply had to find that one simple equation of life that would explain it all. In many ways, I abandoned my heart.
As had been "predicted," I'd been appointed a ministerial servant, just before the fall of 1975. And though I was completely disillusioned with the WTS, and deeply involved with anti-WTS discussions with other brothers and sisters--nevertheless, I stayed on as a MS! Now, how can that be reconciled? Most people would say "Geez, you finally 'saw the light,' and yet you not only didn't leave the WTS, but you stayed on as a servant of them????" What a hypocrite!!
That's a charge against which I can offer no defense.
I do remember trying to justify my continued participation as "I can do more good for the brothers and sisters, my lifelong friends, if I'm still 'in' the Org, than I can if I'm 'out'." To this day, I (and I dare say, many of you) know JWs who themselves have a similar perspective. I'd found yet another temporary solution.
But, on one of the semi-annual CO visits, this particular fellow comes along, a former DO who had (as was whispered in my ear by the PO) been demoted to CO...and did it ever show that this fellow was royally pissed about that. He proceeded to ream each and every single one of us servants, row by row, name by name. The look on his face reminded me of Knorr during that eventful week at Bethel: anger and froth and bile and vitriol, without human compassion or respect for any person.
The next morning, at 6 a.m., I submitted my letter of resignation to another elder (who was one of my closest friends, now deceased).
Now, in my humble opinion it's impossible to imagine that any but the most distantly involved JW could not have known about the seeds of discontent that had been growing for the last 2 years, and I was certainly included in that crop. But to resign as a MS was like sending up a flare, and the "guns" started to turn in my direction. I had several conversations with a couple of "loyal" elders, and I must say, it seemed that their intent was simply to lovingly assist me through some trying times: I would gladly sit down with them today, as long-lost friends. No action was taken.
Another CO came through, and we had similar discussions. I was very open about my disappointment in 1975, and disagreement with the teaching about 1914, and disbelief about the WTS in general. Much to my surprise, he totally agreed with me! I was flabbergasted. How could he agree with me, and yet have the gall to tell me to ignore what we both agreed was the truth about these matters?
It was the same old thing: "Wait on Jehovah."
Well, instead, I decided to test Jehovah.
This was, in probably every respect, a truly adolescent effort on my part: how often had I ever tested the God of the Universe? In my bumbling, I chose a ludicrous case-study: using tobacco. By this time, I'd been studying Greek for several years, and though by no means an expert, I'd come to know enough to know that the WTS outlawing of tobacco (based on their unique application of the Greek pharmakeia) was wrong. So, I went down to the local quick-stop store, bought a pack of cigarettes, came back and sat on the front steps of our apartment, said a prayer to Jehovah to protect me from the demons (in case I was wrong about all this), and had my first smoke.
Nothing happened, other than it made me feel good in a way that I'd never felt before, not even with alcohol.
Thus began phase 2 of my "transition."
PS: fwiw, I promised you all that I would be honest about my experiences, be they good or bad, intelligent or utterly stupid-headed. So here you are having it, warts and farts and all.
Part 11 - interlude
First, I must apologize for being so tardy in responding to what many of you have posted; you know me well enough that I mean no insult by so doing. Just started a new job, which is keeping me very busy.
It's a fairly long drive that I have, and as I watch the highway stripes zip by, I have ample time to think about all this stuff--and I feel compelled to offer an off-topic thought.
In the grand scheme of things, what is the Watchtower Society? Who are Jehovah's Witnesses? After spending tens of billions of hours doing door-to-door preaching (supposedly the most effective way of disseminating the truth) and distributing hundreds of billions of pieces of literature, for well over a century...less than 0.01% of humanity has been "convinced" that this religion is the truth.
If this is the way God is using to convince the world of humanity that the WTS is the correct way, then He's doing a damn piss-poor job of it.
And thus the irony of my conflicts: why would any reasonable person volunteer to continue in such a demonstrably ineffective way of life? Better to buy penny stocks in a business that is on the verge of Chapter 7 bankruptcy.
Just a thought.
Part 12 - my first judicial committee
I title this part this way because I was, over the course of the next couple of years, involved with so many committees (one way or another) that, even though I wasn't an elder, I almost felt like one...as subsequent parts will show.
In any case, it was inevitable that my smoking would be found out. To his credit, the brother that approached me did as the Bible says he should do: he approached me privately, inviting me to voluntarily broach my error with an elder. Of course, as much as I respected, and still have no reason to disrespect, this friend, there was the clearly implicit threat that "if you don't, I will have to."
So, I did. After a book study, I told the conductor that I'd been using tobacco, and things went from there. Interesting how things played out.
One of the first things that happened was that the (physical) brother of an elder (an elder about whom you will soon know much more), who, as being part of the "inner circle," knew straightaway that what I was "up for," approached me privately and said: "Jesus Christ, Craig, if you wanna have a smoke, why don't you just grab a cigar and go smoke it out in the grass field, like I do? Why make such a stink about this?" (That's pretty much a quote). Well, that was an interesting suggestion!
But the real issue with the elders was my "apostate thinking." The first meeting started off with my smoking, and I laid out my objections, based on the Biblical Greek, and within minutes the cross-examination turned to my opinion of the WTS. My smoking became almost a non-issue: it was that I disagreed with what the FDS had dictated that became the focus of every question thereafter.
Another interesting point: I was the only one at those meetings who ever bothered to crack the back of his Bible. As we went through, point by point, every issue about the end-times, and the supposed authority of the WTS, those brothers left their Bibles untouched on the tabletop. They didn't give a howling hoot about what the Bible said, in the context of our discussions; all they cared about was my opinion of the WTS.
If I did anything honorable in that confrontation, it was simply that I stood my ground.
After a few such meetings, the inevitable decision was made to DF me. I fully anticipated that decision, and actually, in a sad way, I welcomed it. I was finally (or so I thought) finding the strength to stand on my own two feet and rid myself of this pestiferous malign upon my soul, and drop the hypocrisy; finally become a MAN.
The afternoon before the meeting, when my DFing was to be announced, one of the committee elders came over to our house and pled, begged, and cried with me, wishing that somehow I would see my way clear to just let it all go, and stay with God's Organization. I gave him a genuine hug, and said that I just couldn't do that; my mind was made up.
I didn't go to that meeting, though I watched the clock and knew, as per WTS Service Meeting SOP, when the "announcement" was made; I felt like a huge load had been lifted off my shoulders.
My wife came home, with tears in her eyes, and we hugged each other.
I was so sad.
Part 13 - disfellowshipped
So here I was, in my late 20s, and in the late 1970s, disfellowshipped.
To offer a bit of perspective: being DFd then was not like it had been before, or since. For a period of several years (1973-1980, as I recall), the WTS had "lightened up" on the amount of communication that was "allowed" between DFd people and other JWs, especially when it was family. In fact, it was tantamount to 'if you can talk them back in, then go for it.' And boy-o-boy, did a lot of people try to talk me back in! Almost daily conversations, especially with my Mom. Same old issues, same old patronizing responses...it went nowhere.
Now, to again be very candid with you: During this period I went through what some have imo quite properly described as a "delayed teenage rebellion" episode. I tried several drugs (after all, I'd "verified" by my experiment with tobacco that the WTS doctrine was wrong...right?): cocaine, marijuana, LSD, mushrooms--though I never used a needle. In retrospect, I can honestly say that I was simply experimenting with things that had always been forbidden. However, I quickly found myself bored with the experiences that those physical substances provided; there was something missing.
In any case, it probably doesn't need to be said that I was not much of a husband during that time; the people I hung out with were not exactly what you'd call the "Christian type," and though I loved my wife, at this point we had very little in common: no shared religion, no common activities, not much intimacy. We became very distant from each other. I say this here because it sets part of the stage for the next couple of years.
However, one fact remained: there were only a couple of "worldly" people with whom I developed any kind of bond: one turned out to be a shyster, and one is a close friend to this day. Not much of a social life, eh? So, I began to feel more and more lonely for the comraderie and community spirit in which I was raised, and gradually began to override the "logical" objections I had with the WTS, in favor of again having that close-knit feeling of belonging. So, I initiated a request to be reinstated.
The elders were extremely happy to accept my request, and thus begins the next chapter.
PS: Sorry for the abbreviated sequences...I could say much more, but I'm just doing a first plod through a complicated life; I never kept a diary! LOL
PPS: For those of you who've asked if you can share my story (such as it is) with others--I wouldn't be posting it on a discussion board unless I expected, and even hoped, that it would be shared. As I said early on: if only one JW can be helped by me sharing my experiences, then it is all worth it.
Part 14 - reinstated
As I said, the elders were very happy to accept my request for reinstatement. I was almost like the proverbial prodigal son, having learned his lesson, and now finally coming back to the family, properly contrite and apologetic.
In a way I was, and in a way I wasn't.
I couldn't totally let go of the convictions I had about the WTS being wrong about 1975. But I also couldn't let go of the fundamental and needful reality of my life that this was the only way of life I had ever known!...and I had never developed any social skills to expand beyond the boundaries within which I had been raised: in fact, I was utterly scared of trying to do that, and had been more than a little (the "shyster" episode) convinced that worldly people were simply not to be trusted.
So, the elders' first question was "Have you stopped smoking?" Yes, I had.
Good enough.
The next, and most pertinent question was: "Do you now feel that the Faithful and Discreet Slave is the appointed servant of Jehovah?"
I had to struggle with how to answer that question. As I've said before, the primary reason for me coming back was for my friends and my family; my reservations about the WTS hadn't changed one whit. What was I to say?
I answered (and this is a quote that will never leave my memory): "I recognize the authority of the Watch Tower Society to dictate the doctrines of Jehovah's Witnesses."
Why they accepted that ambivalent answer is beyond me, but they did.
In the course of these events, the WTS reverted to its ultra-conservative posture regarding DFers: no contact whatsoever, except in case of extreme need.
One of the committee elders approached me at the District Assembly, just before I was about to be reinstated, and expressed his hope that this "tightening up" would not interfere with my desire to be reinstated. I assured him it wouldn't, as I sat there and stared at the Assembly and envisioned my desire to once again be a part of the community.
In those days, it was acceptable to congratulate people who had been reinstated. And when the announcement of my reinstatement was made (again, at the end of the Service Meeting, sop), and the applauses had died down, and the final prayer had been said: I stood at the back of the Kingdom Hall, as almost every one of my friends, and a few not-so-friends, waltzed by, shaking my hand, hugging me, some even kissing me--over an hour of "welcome backs."
I felt so good; perhaps the best night of sleep I'd ever experienced.
I'd finally recaptured that elusive feeling.
Perhaps it was all over?
Part 15 - betrayed
I'd recaptured the "community," (or, perhaps, better said: the "community" had recaptured me). My wife and I were invited to one party after another, old friends, and new friends. Indeed, there was a considerable degree of subliminal suspicion about me; after all, I'd been DFd, and who knew what I really thought? But they, and I, set those concerns aside. Life was again good, and somehow I found yet another psychological reason to set aside all the disappointments of my last 20 years with the WTS.; don't ask me why, or how, but I did.
Then, a really nasty thing reared it's head: the wife of an elder said that her husband had been having an affair with my wife, for at least 2 years.
I couldn't believe it, if for not that I'd known all these people (including the elder and his wife) since we were all teenagers. In fact, after spending a couple of years as a warehouseman, and then another couple of years as a self-employed janitor (yes, the good old "JW janitor" thing), I finally was offered a "respectable" job by this very elder, in his construction company. And, fwiw, I'd always considered his wife to be a snooty little bitch, born into a JW family that expected only the "best" for their children. So, I discounted her accusations as being just another evidence of her dissatisfaction with the otherwise considerable financial success of her husband.
This became a hurricane. There were two committees: one in the congregation of the elder (5 members on the committee there), and another committee in the congregation that my wife and I were now attending. We bounced like pingpong balls between the two, meeting after meeting, question after question.
In the "elders" congregation, there were almost a dozen witnesses against him. Among other things, these witnesses said that they had found one of my wife's dresses in their mother's closet. I was asked to identify it. How the heck was I to know? Did I inventory my wife's dresses? Jesus. They said that they had seen her car parked outside on a certain night, but failed to take photographs. That night, I was working late, and had no reason whatsoever to think that anything was amiss: she was home when I got home.
After a couple of hours of this kind of testimony, the chairman of the committee turned to me and asked what I thought. I said (and this is a quote): "If there is any man (and I had heartfelt emphasis in my voice when I said this) on this planet with whom I would trust my wife, it would be (this elder)."
That ended the meetings. However, based on the circumstantial evidence, he was removed as an elder, and an announcement to that effect was made at the next SM.
Then, about a week later, one of the committee elders called me, to ask if he could meet with me and my wife. Of course, I agreed; I thought it was all a done deal, and that he was going to tell me that the wife of (this elder) had confessed that all these accusations were mere fabrications.
When he arrived, he asked me to sit down.
My wife was sitting beside him.
He told me that she had confessed that it was all true: she'd been having an affair with this elder all during my DF period, and since, and had even before then had designs upon him (since he had a whole lot more money than did I).
I was blown back into my chair, as if someone had just hit me in the face with a baseball bat. I was stunned, beyond any words I can offer to describe how I felt.
She ran out the door, and, after a few utterly meaningless words, the elder left...and I was alone.
In one fell swoop, everything that I'd hoped for, and struggled for, to rejoin a community, was shattered into the smallest of pieces, ripped to shreads. In the one mere microsecond that it took for that elder's words to pass across the floor, I'd lost the wife of my virgin youth, I'd lost the vast majority of my employment, I'd lost yet another friend, and I'd lost my dignity as a man. I never again set my foot into either of those Kingdom Halls, for shame of myself.
And, as I struggled up the stairs to the bedroom, in that lonely vacant house that was once my home, I wondered why I would ever bother to set my foot again onto the ground of this miserable planet.
I opened the lower drawer of my dresser drawer, and pulled out the 0.38 Special I'd bought many years before (for target practice). I checked to make sure it was loaded, laid myself on the bed, pulled back the cock, and put the barrel up into my mouth.
As I pulled on the trigger, my religious fears overcame me: I was about to destroy any chance I had for a resurrection.
In spite of the fact that my guts were eating themselves right out from inside me, like a pain that I'd never ever experienced, and didn't think I could ever survive...I put the gun down.
There are just a very few days, or nights, that I will remember till the day I do finally die...but this one was by far the ultimately worst of everything I'd ever experienced, till then, or since then.
Part 16 - dazed and then mundane
In hardly 10 years, my psychical life had been destroyed, and then my soulical life had been demolished. I was a tatters of a man.
I went to a psychiatrist...what a hopeless effort: at $150 an hour, I would've had to spend the next 10 years, and several hundreds of thousands of dollars, to "explain" to this man what I'd experienced. Even then, he wouldn't have been able to understand. I think he knew this too; so, he prescribed Xanax.
In the midst of my financial woes, my Dad accepted my request to move back home...yes, once again, even though I was 30 years old, I had to abjectly fall back on the support of my family. Not a bad thing, really, but part and parcel of what I said in my last post: I'd lost my dignity. He gave me the very room in which I had spent so many nights reading Rutherford.
This was the early 80s, and a deep recession had gripped the US, so for the next 2 years my brother and I traveled to San Francisco and Seattle, doing commercial construction. I drank like a fish, started smoking again, and did a repeat of Mountain Farm: hardly a meeting, and no service. It just wasn't in me.
Somehow, I gradually shook that fog of pain; don't ask me how, or why--to this day, I can't explain it. Maybe just the indefatuigeable desire to live.
One night, I mentioned to my Mom that I sorta desired some female companionship; not in a sexual way (masturbating can be quite self-satisfying), but as a companion, a soulmate, someone who might understand what I'd been through. It just so happened that Mom and Dad had studied with a young lady (about my age) who'd recently been divorced from her MS husband (he'd also committed adultery against her). She suggested that we might just be a match for each other.
And we were. She had a son and daughter, from each of her two previous marriages, and we felt like equally disappointed, and hoping and searching, souls, just simply longing for some happiness in life, some small vestige of what a husband and wife should have together, with their family.
My Dad married us, at his home, with a couple of dozen of our friends.
For the next 10 years, I focused on fixing the house, raising the kids, becoming "acceptable" in the congregation.
I just wanted some predictability, some kind of "this is normal" life. I thought I'd almost achieved it.
Damn, I tried so hard to make it happen
Part 17 - AlanF, Crisis of Conscience and more AlanF
So, during all of the 80s, I raised 2 kids (my ex-wife's; I've never had any biological offspring), worked on fixing up her WW2 house; made money (the economy took a turn for the better); muddled along in the congregration.
(I love those kids, to this day. In a recent conversation wife my ex, I asked her to convey my feelings and concerns to them. I seriously doubt that those feelings on my part were ever relayed. )
btw, I said from the get-go that I wouldn't name names. However, for this part of my story, I name Alan Feuerbacher for 2 reasons:
1) He gave me his explicit permission to so do, and
2) He's been a pivotal person in my getting out of the WTS, and to this day supports me in every way he can. We oftentimes agree to disagree, but that's what friends are all about, eh?
At some point in time, my folks got to know AlanF's folks; how, I can't remember, except that it had something to do with that they all had roots in New York.
Anyway, AlanF had, in the early 80s, lost his belief in the "ransom." My Dad asked me, at the request of Alan's folks, if I would be willing to talk with Alan about this, because (after all) I was still an adamant Bible-believer. I agreed. I wasn't really too interested in pursuing the matter, and it came to a fairly quick, though mutually pleasant, end. My folks were, quite naturally, disappointed in my inability to convince Alan to rethink his position.
The years rolled drudgingly by, and in the course of visiting various "Bible stores," (looking for concordances and lexicons and such-like), I became aware that Ray Franz had written a book titled "Crisis of Conscience." Quite naturally, I was intrigued, and ordered the book (there were none on the shelves).
When it arrived in the mail, I ripped the package apart, with great interest in what this former GB had to say. My glee quickly turned to serious internal pain, as I read one page after another after another, chronicaling many of the things that I had myself experienced, or had become aware of over the years. My anticipation turned to anger, and then disgust. All the crap that I'd tried so hard to bury was suddenly thrust straight back into my soul, like a dagger. I yet again chose the "ostrich defense."
I pulled off the road, into a park, took the book out, and ripped it literally to shreads, and threw it into the trash can. I just couldn't take it.
Alan and I had separate courses for the remainder of that decade, but, in the early 90s, he called me up, and I accepted his invitation. He came over, and after the obligatory niceties, he offered me, with somewhat trembling hands, a 500 +/- page printout of his investigations into evolution and the biblical Flood. I read every page, and was thenceforth convinced that there never was any "flood" in the biblical sense, and that, insofar as I could (nay, was compelled!) to consider the scientific evidence, that "divinely guided" evolution was the most logical explanation for the existence of the human species. To this day, I imagine that "Jesus" was tinkering with various DNA combinations, and as his experiments went for better or for worse, then "God" gave him a few helpful bits of advice.
Now, can you imagine what that meant to me? Here, a life-long, absolute believer in the Bible, though sullied by the inaccurate predictions of my supposedly Bible-based religion...how that affected me? And how, in good conscience, could I support such doctrines by making comments at a Watchtower Study? Well, I couldn't, and I didn't.
One by one, the grip of the WTS, and of Biblically-oriented thinking, was losing its grasp.
Two last things remained: College, and 1994.
Part 18 - Another interlude
In the course of my "life story" posts, the life stories of others have, or are, coming, to an end.
First, and foremost, the wife of my youth is now at her deathbed. She suffered many pains because of my own inabilities to relate to other people.
How I wish I could touch her hand and express my feelings to her...but the constraints of life prevent me from so doing.
I wish her nothing less than the best and safest and most painless passage to whatever that awaits her.
And, Don Whiteman has died.
Now that he has died, I will name his name.
He was an integral part of my Bethel expectations. He was the Congregation Servant who encouraged me, promoted me, supported me, when we moved to Portland in 1964.
And then, when I came back from Bethel, a basket-case, he admitted to my Dad that he had refrained from sharing his own knowledge of that environment, as it would have been disloyal (as I stated in a previous post).
I wish his dear wife Anne nothing but the best; they were both good friends, once upon a time, many years ago.
Contributed by Craig aka JWN poster onacruse
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