Watchtower Ladies at my Door

Every now and then Jehovah's Witnesses show up at my door. Sometimes it can be years between their visits and other times only the Spanish speaking ones come to my door asking if anyone in the home speaks Spanish. I usually kid around and tell them I speak "Spanglish," does that count?
Recently I had a day off from work so I didn't get around to taking my shower and getting ready for the day till mid-morning. I was nearly all dressed up when I heard the doorbell. As I was still up in my bedroom finishing dressing, I went to my intercom to find out who it was.
Me: "Who's there?"
Female Voice: "We're Jehovah's Witnesses and we just wanted to talk about the Bible with you."
Me: "Hold on a minute, I'll be right down."
Female Voice: "Ok."
I went downstairs to my living room and opened the front door and said to the two ladies standing there, "Come on in. I don't like to stand here with the door open because I don't want my cats going outside." So they both came in and I invited them to sit down.

Dealing with Shunning

Shunning is a technique that the Watchtower uses not only to control their current members, but their former members as well. The Watchtower uses very effective methods of teaching their followers that former members (also called apostates, especially if the former member has joined a Christian church) are persons to be avoided and feared. When a Jehovah’s Witness is disfellowshipped, disassociated, or just walks away from the organization, he or she will be shunned. Family and friends are not only encouraged to shun the former member, but they are required to take steps to no speak to the former member and not even say hello to the person. The Watchtower teaches their members to practice rudeness to their former members. As someone who has experienced shunning very recently, here are some examples from my own family: While visiting a non-JW cousin in the hospital, the older brother of the non JW took it upon himself to turn his head the other way if I were nearby. If I said, “hello”, he just ignored me as though he did not hear me.

How to Recover from Leaving the Watchtower

There are four main ways that people leave the Watchtower organization. They are the “fade aways”, the “disfellowshipped”, those who leave because they are “burned out”, and those who leave because they have stumbled upon false doctrines that the Watchtower teaches.

The Truth about Birthday Celebrations

A couple weeks ago, an assistant producer from the Nickelodeon kid’s show “NickMom”, contacted me via e-mail. She was working on the premise of covering how different people in differing religious cultures celebrate birthdays. In the case of Jehovah’s Witnesses, who are known for not celebrating, she was interested in meeting families who had come out of the Watchtower but now celebrate birthdays. In reflecting on my own experience coming out of the Watchtower and not celebrating, I had begun to think about how I felt not celebrating my birthday and not celebrating my firstborn son’s birthday for the first three years of his life.

A Relationship with God or an Organization?

Jehovah’s Witnesses believe that their organization is the only religious organization on earth that teaches “the truth.” They believe they have the “truth and nothing but the truth.” Truth as they see it can only be found in the pages of the Watchtower publications. In their eyes, no other religious organization has truth.

Witnesses at My Door

By Cynthia Hampton

(Originally written January 20, 2007 Christian ex-Jehovah’s Witnesses Yahoo Group)

I had not seen Jehovah's Witnesses in my neighborhood for the longest time.  Usually what I see are the ones from the Spanish speaking Kingdom Halls and they come to my door and just ask if I speak Spanish, which I really can't carry on a very good conversation in.  So they always go away, since their first language is Spanish, and mine is English.  So needless to say, I was quite surprised to get a knock on my door today and find some English speaking JWs!

Coping with False Prophecy

(I wrote this in January 2012 and it was published at ex-jw.com originally.)

For several years I have been honored to coordinate and moderate a Jehovah’s Witness support group based in Los Angeles and San Jose, California. Our group stays in touch by using the Yahoo!Groups email system and through our ExJWsLosAngeles.org website.

I recently received the following question from a non-member of the group submitted on an automated email form located on the Contact Us page of our website:

“How does one cope with the new information that Armageddon will not come in our lifetime using the information from scripture, ‘This generation will by no means pass away until all these things occur…’? My generation? Or [the generation of] those who saw the beginning of signs that Jesus gave us to watch for that will mark the end of this system? My hope is gone from my heart. I miss my God, but I am no longer sure he is there. How does one cope with that? Thanks for reading.”