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stephoswalk

AMA Series: I am an ex-Jehovah's Witness agnostic atheist. Ask me anything!

First a little disclaimer. What follows is my personal experience as an ex-Jehovah's Witness agnostic atheist. I promise to answer as many questions as I can truthfully from my perspective but I won't be identifying any individuals or the congregation I attended to protect the privacy of my family and friends. Please keep in mind that it's been 20 years since I last set foot in a Kingdom Hall and some doctrines have changed. Also consider this a trigger warning because I'll be discussing the topic of rape. Thank you for taking the time to read my story and I hope it starts an enlightening discussion.

I'm a 37 year old married woman with no children. My husband is a Catholic although he doesn't go to church and we've been together for 11 years and married for 6 years. My parents converted to Jehovah's Witnesses when I was approximately 8 years old. I was baptized when I was a young teenager and spent every summer break serving as an auxiliary pioneer, devoting 60 hours a month to field service which is what they call knocking on doors. I was also involved in a quick build where a Kingdom Hall was constructed in two days. During this period a close friend of mine was raped and subsequently publicly reproved (marked as bad association) which I felt was horribly wrong and unjust. I left the Jehovah's Witnesses in 1992 when I was 18 years old and luckily my family left soon after. I've never formally disassociated myself or been disfellowshipped. Speaking out like this would probably be considered apostasy and, if any of the people I knew growing up were still Jehovah's Witnesses, they would not have a relationship with me. As far as my beliefs go, I spent several years as a solitary Witch until I realized that I was an agnostic atheist a couple years ago. As an agnostic atheist, I simply lack belief in a god or gods until sufficient evidence is presented to me. A close family member converted to Baptist after we left which is one of the main reasons why I'm subscribed to r/Christianity.

Hopefully this introduction wasn't too vague, I wanted to keep it short and leave room for your questions and comments. I'll finish with a relevant quote and a surprising fact.

"I don't respect people who don't proselytize. How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?" - Penn Jillette

While preparing for this, I did some quick calculations and discovered that I spent a minimum of 565 hours a year going to meetings and preaching when I was a Jehovah's Witness.

Posted Jul 5, 2012, 3:41 PM UTC

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