Goodbye, Lois.....you were a good JW (page 3)

I quit!

Wow, great job. I hope it makes its way around the internet. I might get some to realize how they are wasting their lives before it is too late for them. I see people I know in your story. I'm sure some will see themselves.

Gayle

I have seen parts of this all my life. JW parents having children disfellowshipped and they followed the shunning rule toward their children. I also saw a few that were elders that had children grown that had been disfellowshipping but the elder father chose to help them in some way and he chose to step down as elder to do that. I honored them as they chose to do that. One had a young daughter that ran away and came back pregnant and he chose to take her in to help her. One had a daughter who had been married with a child, got divorced, disfellowshipping and homeless. He chose to help her, re-built an old mobile home for her. The congregation felt that was not right for him to help so he stepped down from elder position.

Then when I had children I totally considered this. Would I shun one of my children if for some reason they didn't take to the WTS. NEVER! I knew I would never shun them, no matter what. With time, I left the WTS as I began to think for myself and make my own decisions in life and left when the children were young enough so they were never baptized JWs. Now I am a grandma and am very content with the full circle of life.

I have a friend and a couple of relatives, that grew up JWs. Their mom's shunned their daughters and one relative had her sister shun her. I have seen over the years how those mom's would call or write letters occasionally and how they became strangers to their own grandchildren and were not there emotionally for their daughters. Now those JW moms are very old and have come around to visit their daughters and grandkids some but there were so many lost years and loss of too many occasions that should have been shared. There seems to be something amiss in those elderly moms, they stopped developing emotionally. The WTS stunted them. Their grandchildren have seen and known about the JW control over their grandparent and they all have very firm decision to never be a JW. They have seen the true ugliness of the JW life.

Shunning definitely does not inspire love. It is love that conquers all.

Mary

journey-on, that was truly a heartfelt post. I don't know if you based it on someone that you know personally, but even if you didn't, I think we can all relate to it, or parts of it.

journey-on

Thanks to all of you for your comments. Lois' death is a composite of three old friends who suffered terribly later in life for the choices they made and came to realize that the greatest gift a mother can be given had been ignored, neglected, and tossed away. (Talk about "no natural affection"!)

Gayle, those you know who chose to step down rather than disown their own flesh and blood are indeed to be honored. Love covers a multitude of sins and, like you, I, too, knew I would never ever shun the children I was honored to give birth to. The WTS can quote and twist every manner of scripture to support this horrendous practice, but I will never believe it is scriptural nor god-like. RIP Lois.

changeling

Beautiful, JO. :)

Scarily accurate scenarios, except...I don't picture the old dying woman thinking anything other than: "I'm going to sleep now, and I'll wake up in the new system". :(

carla

Good one to print out and leave places.

dgp

It makes me sad because it seems to be the way a witness I know will end her life. It's sad that she doesn't realize what she is up to...

jamiebowers

I can only hope that this story is not written about my mother when she passes. At that time, will she doubt or question her decisions to shun her only 2 children, or will she self righteously think to herself that she did Jah's will?

Exactly what I was thinking.

linp24

Journey and AK Jeff. gotta step away from the computer now. Can,t see the screen through the mist in my eyes.

LUKEWARM

Wow - very powerful indeed!

All those wasted opportunities reminded me of an email I received a while ago which really made me stop and think about priorities in life

*********

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the basement ham-shack with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time. Let me tell you about it:

I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net. Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind; he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business. He was telling whom-ever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles." I was intrigued and stopped to listen to what he had to say.

"Well, Tom, it sure sounds like you're busy with your job. I'm sure they pay you well but it's a shame you have to be away from home and your family so much. Hard to believe a young fellow should have to work sixty or seventy hours a week to make ends meet. It's too bad you missed your daughter's "dance recital" he continued. "Let me tell you something that has helped me keep my own priorities."

And that's when he began to explain his theory of a "thousand marbles."

"You see, I sat down one day and did a little arithmetic. The average person lives about seventy-five years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about seventy-five years.

"Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime. Now, stick with me, Tom, I'm getting to the important part.

"It took me until I was fifty-five years old to think about all this in any detail", he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over twenty-eight hundred Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be seventy-five, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy. So I went to a toy store and bought every single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside a large, clear plastic container right here in the shack next to my gear."

"Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out and thrown it away. I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focused more on the really important things in life. There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight."

"Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign-off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

"It was nice to meet you Tom, I hope you spend more time with your family, and I hope to meet you again here on the band. This is a 75 Year old Man, K9NZQ, clear and going QRT, good morning!"

You could have heard a pin drop on the band when this fellow signed off. I guess he gave us all a lot to think about. I had planned to work on the antenna that morning, and then I was going to meet up with a few hams to work on the next club newsletter.

Instead, I went upstairs and woke my wife up with a kiss. "C'mon honey, I'm taking you and the kids to breakfast."

"What brought this on?" she asked with a smile.

"Oh, nothing special, it's just been a long time since we spent a Saturday together with the kids. And hey, can we stop at a toy store while we're out? I need to buy some marbles..."

Goodbye, Lois.....you were a good JW

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