Coming Out of the Watchtower: Why Is It So Difficult?

Reprint from Jul/Aug 1991 Bethel Ministries Newsletter (used with permission)

By Randall Watters

"Why can't you just walk away from that religion and never go back? They don't have any hold on you!"

Have you ever said that to a person struggling with leaving a cult or manipulative church? If so, you were no doubt unawares of the degree of emotional and psychological control that cults have over their members. Why is it so hard for them to leave, even when they know that something is seriously wrong with the religion? And, once they leave, why is it so hard to be "normal" and go to church like anyone else?

Finding Jesus: Leaving the Watchtower and other False Practices Behind

Before my family joined the Watchtower Organization in around 1971-1972, my family was Roman Catholic. But we were not really good practicing Catholics. My family, especially my father’s side of the family was heavily involved in astrology beliefs and the occult. My father and my grandfather seemed to love the false prophecies of Edgar Cayce. We had books on meditation and visualization in our house. I read all these books. I used to go over to my aunt and uncle’s house and my cousin taught me how to use a Ouija board when I was 9 years old. I got my own spirit board and used a pendulum to talk to spirits. I got books on witchcraft and learned how to read Tarot cards. I was heavily into these practices by the time my mother began to study with Jehovah’s Witnesses.

When I had heard about the apocalyptic teachings of Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Watchtower, I thought much of it sounded very much like what I had learned from Edgar Cayce’s writings. So prophecy was what interested me because it sounded so much like what I had already believed. There was only one problem: I really enjoyed my belief in astrology and occultic practices. The Watchtower does not allow their members to practice such things as they rightfully say that these things are of satanic origin. I never gave up my desire to read my horoscope and my desire to practice visualization even though I was joining the Watchtower organization who forbids such practices.