Held Captive By Religious Belief: A Heart-Wrenching Account of Two Kids Forced to Grow Up As Jehovah's Witnesses by Murphy Mary & Murphy Ron

Author:Murphy, Mary & Murphy, Ron [Murphy, Mary]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Unknown
Published: 2013-11-24T16:00:00+00:00

Kewpie Doll: With A Twist

Mary experienced Kingdom Hall life quite differently than I did. From her notes:

My memory of Kingdom Hall life was very different than Ron's. While he was sort of able to get along by pretending, I was not. I found the whole place boring, boring, and more boring! It was just one meeting after another where, as a female, I was told to be quiet.... or jump up and perform.... whatever the male in-charge wanted. And, there was always some male wanting something.

At the Service Meetings, held once a week, everyone was taught how to go door-to-door by practicing at a fake door on the Kingdom Hall platform. I had to go up on this stage and say a speech I was taught to memorize in preparation for “placing” The Watchtower and Awake magazines. I was so scared up there, I could hardly talk. My mouth felt like it was filled with cotton. In addition to the speech, I was told to be really “cute” to get the attention of the people we called on. And, I knew just how.

Before we were Jehovah Witnesses, our family would regularly go to the Beach (Daytona, St. Pete Beach, and New Smyrna). Daddy would sing and clown around. He was so funny he could make anyone laugh anytime. Consequently, he got lots of attention. And, he taught me how to get lots of attention also. So, I would dance and clown around at the food shacks where they sold beer and snacks. They had a jukebox and daddy taught me how to be “really” cute. “Men really like cute,” he said more than once on these excursions.

The only time I recall any JW smiling at me was when I left the Kingdom Hall stage that night after acting really cute. Other than that, no one ever seemed to laugh or smile at me. So I just tried harder and harder to be cute to get their attention. All-in-all, though, for me life as a JW was simply cold and lonely, so I cried a lot. But, I did keep working on “cute”.

Several years later, when our family moved to a new Kingdom Hall, I really found out how “cute” could be rewarding. There were a couple of boys there a little older than me who seemed to like my brand of cute. As I grew older, being cute took on new meaning that I was not really prepared for.

Ronnie, on the other hand, seemed to be mired in cleaning and ironing our family's clothes, cleaning the house, looking after me, and cooking most of the meals. I wondered how he kept this up for so many years. His JW life was definitely not cute. In the ten-plus years we were with the JW, no kids his age ever appeared. I think, maybe, he found meaning in looking after me and our folks.

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