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Why I
Left the Watchtower Organization
By
Cynthia
Hampton
My first
introduction to the Watchtower Organization was in 1970, when my mother began to
study with an old friend of hers who had become a Jehovah's Witness. I was in
the 8th grade at the time. Soon my mother began dragging us all to the Kingdom
Hall and had stopped going to our church. We had been raised in the Roman
Catholic Church up until then. After going to several assemblies and through
heavy
indoctrination,
I decided the Watchtower was the truth; I was baptized in 1972.
We all believed that Armageddon was coming in 1975. Everyone was speculating as to
when it might arrive. Some even speculated that it might be 1974 instead of
1975. I remember the District Overseer, Brother Sales, (I believe it was him,
not entirely sure) giving a talk at the International Assembly in Oakland in
1973. His words were, When an alarm clock is ready to ring, just before it
rings, there is a click and just a split second before the alarm actually rings.
Well we are in that time period between the click and the actual ringing of the
alarm clock. That's how much time we have left before Armageddon! All everyone
ever talked about was how little time we had left before Armageddon.
Because there was so little time left many young teenagers began to get married
quite young. It is traditional and typical for a Jehovah's Witness to marry
young. Since one is not allowed to date unless you intend to be married, anyone
who dates is expected that they get married. However, since Armageddon was so
close, it just seemed like there was a frenzy of young teens getting married.
We had been told that since we didn't know whether there would be marriage in
the new system. Since it wasn't for sure that we might be able to get married in
the new system, many decided that they would be married before Armageddon,
rather than have to remain single for eternity. When young hormones are
raging, this thinking is dangerous. Many young people ended up in very unhappy
marriages, including me. I was married to another young Jehovah's Witness in
1974 at the age of 18. It was the worst mistake of my life.
This guy was a
wife beater
and got away with it. He began to hit me exactly one week after we were
married. When I approached the elders with the fact that he beat me, their
response was of disinterest and said there was no WT policy on this and it
wasn't a disfellowshipping offense. It was to be considered a family problem and
they could not get involved. Well this family problem translated into a lot of
physical and mental abuse. I always carried bruises all over my body and no one
cared. I was told to not to discuss this with anyone and to quit nagging.
Apparently they thought that I nagged my husband too much and that was the
reason for the beatings. He was disfellowshipped eventually in 1976 for
smoking. So I began to think, is smoking a worse sin than beating up your wife?
I knew something was wrong with this picture! When he was disfellowshipped, I
was pregnant with my son at the time.
In 1976, after my son was born, I decided I could no longer take the abuse, so I
left my husband, moved out and went back to live with my parents. I
subsequently divorced him after a year went by. The elders told me that I
wasn't "scripturally divorced" and was not allowed to date. I was 20 years old
at the time.
A year later, I enrolled in community college and decided I liked going to
college, after all I hadn't studied as well as I should have in high school.
What for ??? Armageddon was just around the corner. So here I was and I had no
means to get a job, and I certainly didn't want to be a cleaning woman or do
janitorial work, as I am not cut out for that type of work and prefer working at
a desk. I knew I had a brain up there and it was time to put it to use by going
to college. It was already 1977 and
Armageddon still hadn't arrived.
After a while, it began to seem to me that those in the KH were not as
intellectual as I was becoming. I was learning to do critical thinking and
believed in asking questions at a time when independent thinking was starting
to be frowned upon. I remember talking to an elderette (an elder's wife) one day
and telling her that I was taking a psychology class and that I was enjoying it.
Do you know what her response was??? She actually had the audacity to tell me
that I was studying "doctrines
of demons"
and that I should get out of my psychology class immediately. I didn't listen to
her; I did my own thing.
By 1979, I had all but quit going to the meetings. I think I went to one day of
the district convention that year in Tucson, and I did not go out in field
service at all by that time. I had it by then! In February 1980, I wrote a
handwritten letter to the elders letting them know I wasn't going to any more
meetings and not to consider me a Jehovah's Witness any longer. I gave the
letter to my brother to hand deliver to the elders.
I always had a few doubts about the Watchtower Organization and that made it
easier to leave, I think. For example, I never truly believed that it was wrong
to get a blood transfusion, so I never carried one of those "No
Blood Transfusion" cards.
I always knew that if I were looking death in the face, I would accept a blood
transfusion to save my life. Another thing that always bothered me was that the
Watchtower made an issue out of whether or not a woman screamed if she were
being raped. The Watchtower rule was if a woman did not scream, then she must
have enjoyed it, and therefore was
committing adultery or fornication
and would be disfellowshipped. How could any woman in her right mind agree with
that kind of thinking and that policy?
I never looked back, although I did attend the memorial that year in 1980 and I
made the decision then to never set foot in Kingdom Hall ever again. In 1982, a
good friend invited me to his church and I accepted the invitation. (You know
nothing in life is ever a coincidence, it's a "God Incidence") I went to his
church and discovered that Christians were warm and caring people who loved
Jesus Christ. But I was still scared. Did I really do the right thing, by going
to this church? Would something bad happen to me because I dared go into what
the WT calls "Babylon"? As Jehovah's Witnesses, we were always taught that
demons were present in the churches of
Babylon.
Then I received my answer: After the church service was over, I looked around at
the faces and saw a familiar face, I thought. No, it couldn't be, I'm thinking.
But I think it was---it was another Ex Jehovah's Witness! I did a double take
and yes, I did recognize this lady. I went up to her and asked her, Didn't I
used to see you at the assemblies? Her eyes were wide open as she asked me, Did
you just leave the Jehovah's Witnesses? I said yes, I left 2 years prior and
this was my first time in the church since leaving the JW's. It turned out that
this lady, her name is Mary Kling, well her husband is the first cousin of
M. James Penton,
author of the book,
Apocalypse Delayed!
I was just so thrilled to know that I wasn't the only person who left the JW's
who decided to go to church!
Mary took me under her wing and began showing me what was wrong with the
Watchtower organization. See, at that time I knew that there was something
wrong, I just didn't know how to prove it! She showed me old literature and how
the WT taught that Jesus was the
mediator for only 144,000!
When I read that, then I knew that the WT was a false organization and that the
truth could only be found in Jesus Christ. Shortly thereafter, I gave my life
over to Jesus Christ in May, 1982.
It was no coincidence that out of all the churches in Tucson, Arizona, I
happened to visit the one that Mary had been attending. I knew that God had His
hand in this the whole time. However, it was not without a price. I told my
father, who was not yet a baptized JW about my experience. He told my mother and
my mother and I had the biggest, most awful blowout. It ended by her telling me
that I was not welcome in her home ever again! She shunned me for 17 years.
At the end of the year, I moved to Los Angeles, CA and began a new life away
from my old friends and family who were shunning me. I met
Randy Watters
of
Free Minds
and began attending his quarterly potlucks and eventually volunteering to help
him in his home/office for his ministry, which was called Bethel Ministries at
the time. (If I refer to Randy's Free Minds site frequently in my posts, it's
because I used to type a lot of those articles that he wrote). I learned so much
from Randy Watters and I will be forever grateful that he was my friend and
teacher.
In the summer of 1998 I found that one of my JW cousins, Andy Burns, had
leukemia at the age of 39. I had heard through the family "grapevine" that he
had not been feeling well and suffering from some migraine headaches. After
some tests and a diagnosis of acute leukemia, he was hospitalized for some
intense chemotherapy. He lived another six weeks before he died. Of course, he
being a JW elder, refused all blood transfusions. His blood count became so
dangerously low that the chemotherapy treatments had to be discontinued. He is
now memorialized on AJWRB's
Watchtower Victims Memorial.
Fast forward to 1999: For some reason, my mother decides she is speaking to me
again. In 2000, she and my father come to my house and visit. They even go out
to dinner with my husband and I. I don't know what's happening there, but I
think they are tired of not knowing their grandchildren. You see, my brother is
the only one of us kids in the family who remained a JW and of course, he had
been an elder. But he and his wife never had children!
Recently, I found out that my brother has stepped down from being an elder and
has separated from his wife. (hmmmm) My sister and I both have children and my
parents never have gotten to know them until recently. Sad isn't it? My two
younger children were 10 and 13 when they first met my parents, their
grandparents. I haven't seen my parents for months now and I know that the
August 2002 Kingdom Ministry
had once again instructed the JW's to shun the former members. I know longer
know where I stand with my parents, except that I know my mother is very angry
with me, as she did find out about this website. She also refused to
acknowledge the recent issues regarding
Silent Lambs
concerning child sexual abuse in the Watchtower and claims it is all just
"baloney". I feel sorry for her because she does not know the real Jesus. After
all Jesus did say at John 14:6: "I am the way, the truth and the life, no one
comes to the Father except through me". My mother's life is tied up with an
organization that will NEVER show her Jesus Christ. It is an empty organization
with false promises and
false prophesies.
The Bible never talks about joining an organization for
salvation.
Some people, after leaving the Watchtower Organization ask, "Where else can we
go?" This comes up, inevitably because the Watchtower has so effectively
indoctrinated their followers that there is no place to go except the Watchtower
Organization. For those of you who are at that point, I invite you to read this
article:
Where Else Can We Go?
I've been a Christian now for more 20 years and Jesus has been Lord of my life.
So here we are, in 2003 and I'm all over the internet doing as much ministry as
I can. I'm just thrilled that the internet and all the ministries here has been
able to educate and inform so many of the falsities of the Watchtower
organization. Praise God!
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