I was raised a Jehovah’s Witness. I believe law on child abuse reporting must change
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Ten years before his election to Parliament, Sam Carling was starting to question almost everything he knew.
Britain’s youngest MP was raised a Jehovah’s Witness, and as a child was a “regular participant” in what he now describes as a “high-control religious group.”
But at 11, his strict religious upbringing began to clash with an intrinsic part of his identity when he realised he was gay.
Carling, Labour MP for North West Cambridgeshire, was highly critical of the organisation when he spoke last week in the House of Commons, where Parliamentary privilege allows MPs to discuss issues without the risk of legal action.
He claimed Jehovah’s Witnesses’ teachings regularly equated homosexuality with paedophilia.
He said there was a “culture of non-reporting and forgiveness for child abusers” within the organisation and that it had covered up child abuse “on a catastrophic level”.
Carling, 23, also claimed Jehovah’s Witnesses were ordered to shun family and friends considered to have committed a “serious sin in the eyes of the religion”.
He called for the group to be stripped of its charitable status and is campaigning to improve safeguards against child sexual abuse.
A Jehovah’s Witnesses spokesperson told the BBC that “we totally disagree with all of Mr Carling’s allegations”, describing them as “demonstrably false”.
‘We were taught we were God’s true people’
Jehovah’s Witnesses are members of a Christian-based religious movement, probably best known for its door-to-door evangelism.
The organisation claims about 144,000 active members in the UK, and about nine million worldwide.
Carling remembers growing up in the organisation in County Durham as “really hard” and, at times, “very isolating.”
“You’re very much taught from a young age that we’re not part of this world; that we are God’s true group of people,” he told the BBC.
Unlike many other followers, Carling was not home-schooled but explained how “you’re very much encouraged not to make friends outside of the religion.”
As a young gay man, he said, the experience was made all the worse.
He said barely a week would go by without “a sermon about how gay people are evil.”
“Religious teachings regularly equate homosexuality with paedophilia – they are lumped together,” he said.
‘They treat them as though they are dead’
Carling was not baptised, so when he left the religion fully at 13, was never subject to “disfellowshipping”, a practice he claims is widespread among members.
He told Parliament: “When someone commits a serious sin in the eyes of the religion, their believing family and friends are ordered to shut them off entirely and treat them as though they are dead.”
Speaking to the BBC, he said: “I was OK, but there are ample examples of children that grow up gay in the Jehovah’s Witnesses who then go on to die to suicide.”
Carling said he maintained a good relationship with his family.
In response, the Jehovah’s Witnesses said: “Former congregants are welcome to attend our religious services at any time; they will be warmly welcomed.
“Family relationships and natural affection continue in the home.”
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