Did you see/know other people who left the Truth before YOU did?

by skeeter1 10 Replies latest jw friends

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  skeeter1

  I am wondering a few things...

  When you were an active JW, did others in your congregation leave for true apostacy reasons and did you know?

  When (year) did they and what year did you leave?

  How many people were in your congregation and how many left before you did (or you think left)?

  What did you think when the others left?

  Did anyone try to personally tell you why they left?

  Did seeing others leave make you question anything?

  How did personal experiences from people you know inside the Hall affect you (more or less) then Internet apostates?

  Explain as much as you can. I really appreciate it.
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  Nice_Dream

  I knew an elder and his wife who left. There was a talk about apostasy afterwards, so I assumed that was why they left. No one talked about them though, and I was afraid to see them around town because I thought they were evil. I can't remember if they left 8-10 years ago? No one else left the hall at the time.

  They had a question about the UN issue, and the elders never got back to him and just DF'd him and his wife without them knowing. I asked my sibling who was friends with the couples daughter why they left after listening to a Steven Hassan video last year. He said "they must have had a good reason," and that made me wonder.

  Growing up, the majority of kids left the religion after they gradutated. I questioned why so many left, but rationalized they must have been "weak." Then my sister left 3 years ago. I would get depressed and wonder why such a good person would die. I also wondered why most of the people who left the religion were so happy, and why the witnesses in my cong. were so dysfunctional.

  I would say personal experience made me question things, and the apostates on the Internet helped me deconstruct my beliefs and realize it was all a lie. Seeing an elder leave was something that stayed in the back of my mind, but I needed to be ready to investigate my doubts first...and that took 10 years!
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  Snoozy

  Yes but they eventually went back..at least then. I have no way of knowing now, lost contact.

  Some of them I don't want to contact..real nutso's.

  Snoozy
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  jam

  yes, A fellow elder. He told me about Crises of Conscious, in the late 80,s.

  At that time I tought he had lost it. Never forgot what he reveal to me.

  In his case he did not leave, he was DF (adultery). So what he told me

  did not register until years later.
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  wobble

  One guy left after being very badly treated by the Elders. I suppose I did the judgemental thing and put him down as "weak".

  I am due an ass-kicking for that.

  As soon as I left for good I went and saw him, he kindly gave me much advice on how to fade, as I have most of my family in, he gently led me to investigate all my beliefs, and to persevere with this site. I owe him big time.

  The sad thing is his wife is still in, and she takes the children along, she respects his right to counter , and limit, what they are learning, so I think there is hope she may wake up. she too is a lovely person and the kids are beautiful so I do hope so.

  The fear of being DF'd for us who have most of our family still in, stops us being effective as revealers of the truth about the JW/WT beliefs, until someone seeks us out, a pity.
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  jaguarbass

  I left in 83. I never saw or knew anyone who left the tower before I did, personally.

  I knew of people who left the tower were called apostates. I knew of the book "30 years a watchtower

  slave" by William Schnell.

  It was my mothers religion and I was looking for a loophole and I found it in 1975. It just took me 7 more years

  to figure out or realize that I could just stop going to meetings.
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  cheerios

  i knew of many who left, in every cong i was ever in. some were piosneers, some were elduhs, some were regular blokes. two stick out in my mind - both were elduhs. the first one left because his wife became an 'evil apostate' and actively hindered the local jw's (sounds like she woke up) and the 2nd left (was df'd) because i am certain that he cracked. he was a full time piosneer, an elduh, worked full-time and had a horrible shrew of a wife. was only a matter of time but the guy cracked bigtime. after awhile, people were gossiping that he was an apostate.

  in all cases, we avoided them like lepers. makes me sad that i did that now, but unfortunately that is what we were taught we must do.
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  DagothUr

  I was the first to leave from my ex-congo congo after the Romanian revolution, during the legal era of the JW movement in Romania. There were some old brothers and sisters who left during the communist era, during the era of secret illegal meetings. Some of them returned recently.
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  BluesBrother

  When I was a lad, the "Assistant Congregation Servant" and his family were "pillars" of the congregation, almost obsessive in their zeal..Then he just quit. In those days he was not d/f'd since they could not pin 'apostasy' on him and things were more lax anyway. Everyone was shocked but carried on regardless.

  Some years later I met up with the family and got to talking with him and he gave some reasons for being dissatisfied with the Org. but no major doctrinal differences. They moved North and I never saw them again.

  I heard on the grapevine that he sent some "apostate literature" more recently to someone who knew him..I heard later that he has now died but his son is back and an elder...............

  Just think what he could have done with the internet if it had been around then??
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  designs

  The first couple to leave was in the late 60s with the end times and blood issues coming to the fore and then 1976 came and several close friends left.