Converts from Jehovah Witnesses

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I was thinking about this the other day. I had a friend not to long ago who was a Jehovah’s Witness who (obviously) wanted me to convert to JW. I’m a ‘what if’ thinker so I think a lot “what if this had happened” and one of the things I thought about was “what if I had been raised a JW, but found out about the Watchtower’s lies?” I thought that I would’ve probably felt a reluctance to join Catholicism because of the power of the church.

Please don’t misunderstand me, I think that the church is right in defining our doctrines and beliefs and I believe that it is defended by God and kept from error. My thought was that it would be very, very hard for me to trust The Church if I had just found out that an organization that I had thought was directed by God was not, an organization that had defined what I believed.

So I was just wondering, was it difficult for any of you to trust The Church after leaving the WT? Did anyone convert straight from JW to Catholic?

Another thing, just purely curious, what was your first celebration of Christmas like after leaving? 😛
 
yes. me. i was a baptized Catholic, and when i met my first husband who was never a jw, but his parents were, i became one of them to please them, and the lady who studied with me.
anyways, i left the falsetower in 1999, and it was hard for me to come back to the Catholic Church because of the heavy indoctrination of the falsetower. it was not until 2003 that i officially came back. i had to let go of the false doctrines of the watchtower society before i could come back fully. despite the fact that i did come back, during 1999 to 2003, i attended mass a few times, but still would not let go of the blood issue.
that and the fact that i thought God hated me because i had disappointed Him as a witness by thinking of leaving them. so it took me a long time to come back. but i did, and i no longer hold onto the blood issue, or that God may hate me. it is hard for some to leave and rejoin the church. but, most of the time, we do come back. sooner or later:) as for Christmas? i never did let go of that! not even as a witness did i let go of it. perhaps that was one of my anchors that kept me from being fully indoctrinated? i don’t know. all i know is i celebrated my first real Christmas alone when i left the society. it was sad for me because i had no one to share it with 😦 but then in 1999 i celebrated my first real real Christmas with my new husband in Canada and it was wonderful to say the least! alot of ex witnesses are not ready to celebrate the holidays when they leave the falsetower, sometimes, it takes time for them to embrace it because of the heavy indoctrination. sometimes they never celebrate it. its too bad you know, how much control the society has over people 😦 :mad: sometimes even long after they leave, they still do not accept the Christmas holidays 😦 for those that do, the holiday is incredibly joyous!
 
You can read some conversion stories at
www.catholicxjw.com

From my past dealings with ex-JWs who were brought up entirely in the faith, I’ve found reluctance from the majority of them to believe ANY religion when they find out the truth about the watchtower. Sadly, I can sympathize and understand their skepticism and point of view in this because of their experiences. However, there are those that eventually do find other religions that they can be comfortable again with. Miracles still happen everyday.
 
My experience on ex-JW websites is that
the vast majority of ex-JWs are SO disgusted with religion when they find out the truth about the Watchtower Society, that they become fanatical atheists.
I remember the old H2O ex-Jehovah’s Witness site, and it was
over 90% atheists on the forums.
On the other hand, that’s where I first met Jeff Schwem, but I was already in the Catholic orbit when I was posting on H2O.

Jaypeeto3 (aka Jaypeeto4)
 
my epxerience is somewhat different. the exes i know usually are born again Christians. Seems the ones who were Catholic before they became witnesses usually go back to the Catholic faith. others i know of become born again Christians.
 
My ex was raised with a jw Mom and an agnostic Dad.
All 5 kids were indoctronated to the watchtower. All 5 have “fallen away” (jw term).
HOWEVER, though none of them practice jwism, none of them attend ANY church and will still argue the jw position on issues if challanged.
It’s very sad.
 
My DH still kind of celebrates Christmas. Even though he’s still longing to become a JW again, he celebrates it. But not in the sense of celebrating the birth of Jesus. He celebrates in the sense of gift-giving. His sister and mother are also disfellowshipped. Even though disfellowshipped they struggle w/the change. The mother still wants to be a JW (but her DH is Catholic), the sister doesn’t but has not decided if she wants to be Catholic again. She doesn’t attend any church yet, but my hopes are high because she detests the WBTS. As for Christmas, she’s just as mi DH on that one…
 
Good/bad/sad news. My mother JW just got off the phone with me. 😦

She wants a list of all the non-trinity “christian” faiths out there with a brief synopsis of their beleifs so she can “get out” of the JW faith to something “more pure”:confused:

I hate to admit it, but I was pretty rude in response.

I told her she should be picking her own cult and I dont want to aid her in it since the very definition of Anti Trinity=Cult.

:o

She did not get mad, but she says she’s going to the library today to get some lists on non-trinity “religions”.

jumping from one frying pan to another and both are on fire. Geeze.
 
Damascus,
Your mother leaving the JWs is a step in the right direction, at least.
Maybe after she researches Christianity, she’ll be led closer to the Truth and in turn, closer home. 😃
 
mrs_abbott said:
Damascus,
Your mother leaving the JWs is a step in the right direction, at least.
Maybe after she researches Christianity, she’ll be led closer to the Truth and in turn, closer home. 😃
Click to expand...
But I dont think she is gonna research christianity, she is gonna research another cult is all.
 
Damascus said:
Good/bad/sad news. My mother JW just got off the phone with me. 😦

She wants a list of all the non-trinity “christian” faiths out there with a brief synopsis of their beleifs so she can “get out” of the JW faith to something “more pure”:confused:

I hate to admit it, but I was pretty rude in response.

I told her she should be picking her own cult and I dont want to aid her in it since the very definition of Anti Trinity=Cult.

:o

She did not get mad, but she says she’s going to the library today to get some lists on non-trinity “religions”.

jumping from one frying pan to another and both are on fire. Geeze.
Click to expand...
Tread carefully. Mommies are still mommies even when they have been brainwashed. 😦 In my experiences, I hate to say it, is that I’d rather someone remain a Dub rather than go toward an outright rejection of God and become Atheist. God’s grace is beyond my understanding and he loves everyone.

Just don’t even give her the website that I posted in another thread about the bible students. Her thinking right now is probably how that group started.

The only books at the library that I saw with her description(that wasn’t about Judaism or Islam) were books about cults. I think she may come home empty handed.
 
I think I’ve heard of a group called Oneness-Pentecostals who don’t believe the Trinity, but I don’t know how widespread this group is or if they’re even real, I might have mashed up a few groups in my head. Pretty sure they’re real though. 😛

Thanks for responses everyone. That’s scary to me; that people would still defend and feel guilty about the doctrines of the JW after they’d left. I read those conversion stories on Jeff Schwim’s site and a lot of them are like that. Even after leaving they thought the WT was still true and they were going to be abolished or destroyed or whatever at Armogeddon.

That’s just scary, the indoctrinization, the brainwashing.

Thanks for your responses everyone. It was interesting!
 
I felt that if the JW’s were wrong - nobody was right. I’ll never forget the feeling I had the first time I attended a church service… scared to death that Jehovah was going to start Armegeddon right then & there just to destroy me. What took me forever to grasp was the whole idea of “worship.” I didn’t get it at all since JW’s don’t “worship” God. They take in information about Him - but nothing is ever about worship.

It took me 12 years to even entertain the thought that Catholics might be Christians (despite being Catholic.) After the JW’s, I became a born again Christian so between the JW’s telling me that Catholics were evil & the Born-Again Christians telling me that Catholics were totally un-Biblical, it was a looooooooooooooooooooong road home & I’m suprised I ever made it here. (Praise be to God!)

I didn’t “do” Christmas for several years after leaving the JW’s. Now I enjoy it alot, but it’s still low-key.
 
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