Non-Believer Former Members of the Worldwide Church of God

Arkansas, USA
corkymc@earthlink.net
URL: http://home.earthlink.net/~corkymc/
Age: 57
Beliefs: Atheist
Sex: Sometimes
Status: Married

My mother began listening to H.W.Armstrong’s "world tomorrow" broadcast on the radio back in the 1950’s. When I was about 14 (1961) I started to read all the literature that was offered, the "Plain Truth" magazine was something that I looked forward to receiving each month. I went through the "correspondence course" in a couple of years. If I remember right, in those days there were 26 monthly lessons.

I was actually baptized into "the church" before my mother was. We were looking forward to the 1975 fulfillment of the "sure prophecy" of the "end time". Well, that didn’t happen. I left the "one true church" in 1976 but my mother remained a "faithful" follower of "God’s Apostle".

I joined the "Christadelphians" in 1978. They were strict and legalistic but at least there weren’t any "tithes" to pay. I was Christadelphian (BUSF) for many years but I had the good fortune to read some atheist literature, Atheism -The Case Against God by George H. Smith and Some Mistakes of Moses by Robert Ingersoll.

My mother died the same year that I joined the Christadelphians (1978), from refusing an operation that would have saved her life, thanks to "God’s Ministers". I had to preside over the grave side service myself - God’s Ministers were too busy to make the 120 mile trip from Little Rock to Helena, Arkansas. My mother’s name was Lorene Miller (in case anyone remembers).

I have bad memories of Armstrongism - the unnecessary death of my mother, because she trusted that "God" would heal her. Our Apostle said so, therefore, it was true. She was a year younger than I am now! I still remember the church "gestapo" going through my house before "the days of unleavened bread" and throwing away my new toaster. The poverty that my family went through over the "tithes" really burns me up!

Here I am, an atheist with more bible knowledge than the pope! I had once thought of just starting a church of my own and bring those tithes in - but my conscience tells me to destroy religion in whatever little way I can.

Check out my little website, send me an email - I would like to hear from you.

Sincerely,

Almon

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 3rd, 2005 at 1:26 pm and is filed under Personal Story. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site. Your comments must be approved by the moderator before they will appear.