***PART 3 ***THE JUDICIAL TRIBUNAL***

by zev 7 Replies latest jw experiences

  • zev
    zev

    Part Three....
    The Judicial Tribunal
    -
    Well, I got my help. As soon as I had asked to meet with elder ‘w’, and explained briefly what happened, he said: “if I had known it was this serious, I would have had another elder here, this is a judicial matter”. WHAT?!?!? How the hell is this a judicial matter? This is an unbaptized child, and I’m just looking for a little ‘help’, a little direction here. Why a judicial machine? I was in a tight spiral, and I was going down. My head was swimming. He calls for another elder, elder ‘n’ to step up to the plate and take his swings at the youngster. Here we go, the games afoot! In a matter of an hour, the matter is decided, and young “C” is given the sentence. Back then, in those years before the changes to unbaptized/baptized book seller (I mean publisher) there was an arrangement where those who were unbaptized publishers could literally be shunned if they screwed up and did something wrong. This was a ‘loving provision from Jehovah”. Yeah right. I could feel the love pressing against my back orifice and desiring entrance into the dark regions. So here we go. He’s to be shunned, no one is to talk to him and that’s the sentence. In reflection, the authorities I feel were more kind and loving than this ‘provision from Jehovah’. The wife and I were upset about this. It just didn’t seem right.
    I appealed and asked for some time to get him examined by professionals. He was taken all over to different doctors, and examined for chemical imbalances and who knows what else. In the end, as I said, the psychologist got it right. But this wasn’t satisfactory, and the decision stood. Well, I wasn’t stopping there. I went right home and called the c.o. at the circuit assembly and made him come to the phone. I explained the situation to him best as I could, yet he stuck to the elders decision, and backed them up…without taking anytime to investigate what I was trying to tell him. I was frustrated. This was going no where fast, and I was running out of options. In fact, I was at the end of what I could do. I’m thinking it was about a year this young person was in this condition, being shunned by all. During this time, I still being a m.s. took him out right after the meetings and sat in the car, while waiting for ‘the wife’ to come out, sometimes I’d have to go in and remind her we were still waiting, as she liked to wait till lights out, before she left. In the meantime here we were sitting and waiting, while she was inside, not forsaking the gathering of themselves, as she considered this ‘association’’ so important, while her shunned son sat in the car, being ignored by all.

    And this led to my beginning feelings that I should resign, and step down. I expressed this to the elders, yet they didn’t see the need for me to do so. Well I did. I saw more reason than they were told. Besides “C”’s plight, there was a lack of respect from ‘the wife’. There was the TMS school I wasn’t allowed to attend, yet after if, I was told I could have, as I hadn’t yet stepped down. At the time, this pissed me off. That school was important to me then. And they got their asses handed to them when they said I could have gone after the fact. Told you, I pull no punches.

    The c.o. makes his rounds again. This time he’s a temp. at the time I had been assigned the bible lowlights (sorry-highlights) for nearly two months straight. I was good at it, and adopted a tantalizing way for people to look forward to the next weeks reading, by not only doing the preparation for the highlights, but doing the next weeks too, so I could have a few questions ready just to make you think about what was coming for next week. I took a type of “sitting on the edge of your chair” approach. Nearly everyone liked this, and I got a lot of nice comments about my ‘style’. At the time we were covering Acts and Romans. As if this wasn’t enough, the first night of the temp c.o. visit, I got assigned two more parts for that same night, totaling 3 in all. Can you see the picture here? Can you see what was going to happen? I did, I saw it all to well, to clearly. I wanted no part of being made an elder. Nope, not me. I had seen enough, and I haven’t even started telling you about the other things that developed along the way, attitudes, behavior, and a case of fraud I saw, by an elder. But I’ll get to that shortly.

    So after my night being paraded in from of the c.o., he meets me in the parking lot, and comments on how much he loved the way I did the highlights, and wonders how I managed to make it so captivating, where I got all my information, and yadda yadda.
    I smile, make light of it all and blast home. I immediately start writing my resignation as a m.s. the next night was a Wednesday, the elders and m.s. meeting, and I planned to resign right then and there. I really had seen enough, and put up with enough. This was my beginning of using a new word in my vocabulary. The word was, “NO”. Use it I did, from that moment after. I go to the meeting, and sit through the m.s. part, and after the hour, we break for a few minutes. I’m debating what to do here. I pace the floor in the back a minute, walk up to the c.o. and hand my letter to him. In it, it said, I was stepping down, as I couldn’t fulfill my obligations any longer. It was short, simple and sweet. And I was never questioned. The only thing said to me, as I imagine the elders got into some hot water with the way I did this as they didn’t see it coming, was if there was anything they could do to help. My answers were as short and sweet as the letter. NO. .

    next up;
    part 4
    The Company Man

    -Zev
    Learn about the Wtbts and the U.N.
    ** http://www.geocities.com/plowbitch69 **

  • ashitaka
    ashitaka

    interesting...still reading....

    ashi

  • Kep
    Kep

    Wow Zev,
    You must have been the pride and joy of the elders.
    At least you knew what was coming up.
    Its a pity they were more concerned about appearances in front of the co than the real issues you were going thru.
    Man, you sound like an awesome speaker, I would loved to have been in the audience.
    Can't wait for the next issue.
    Thanks Zev
    Kep

  • Imbue
    Imbue

    shunning a child? That's sick

  • buffalosrfree
    buffalosrfree

    Zev I know some of how you feel, especially about your son, i had in the past went to the elders about a problem also, and soon found out it was my children that were being investigated. I had a todo with some of the elders over it. I'm large and very imposing and believe me after 20 plus in the military i can get in your face. it wound up with a couple coming to my place and wanting to ask my children questions and i very unpolitely told them no, there's the door you have no further need of being in my house. Just another nail in the wt coffin for me. After they left, they came up with the idea I might not want to play MS anymore they were right I didn't and, didn't.

  • somebody
    somebody

    zev,

    Do you happen to remember any questions the elders asked your minor child in order for the elders to have judged him as an unrepentant sinner and therefore, in reality, disfellowship him? It STILL amazes me how cruel and unloving people in the so-called "loving" congregations of wbts loyalists can be and not even see it.

    peace,
    somebody

  • zev
    zev

    Gwen,

    you know, i cannot really remember the exact questions used to determine his "guilt" .

    maybe in time as i think about it, i might be able to bring back the moment and be able to replay that time over and tell you what they were.

    i can however remember this.

    he was about 12 or 13 years old, as you know. and the way he was delt with him was unbelievable. the "men" who interrorgated him, were about 30 something, and 50 something. he had to be scared out of his mind. i know i was shaking inside. (you know how i get) but what really got to me, was here is a young child, who just made a mistake, yet they not only determined he wasn't repentant, but that he premeditated the act, and did it on purpose. now, these "men" are not professionals, so what do they know? the professional who did help him got it right. its plain to see, as i and many others have said before, most elders are NOT QUALIFIED to deal with these kinds of situations. they don't know how people "tick" inside, and even if they did, they don't deal with people in a loving way. they just shun them and toss them off to satan.

    i hope my thoughts helped answer your questions.

    -Zev
    Learn about the Wtbts and the U.N.
    ** http://www.geocities.com/plowbitch69 **

  • zev
    zev

    kep,
    thanks for your comments. its nice to read and feel the warmth of love form people like yourself and the many others who have responded to this story.

    in all honesty, i wasn't that great of a speaker. i never gave a public talk, but the bible highlights, were something i put alot of work into to do, and really made something out of it. i did receive many comments from people, telling me how much they loved what i did, and to be honest, alot had to do with the material i covered, acts and romans.

    but even so, that was my moment in the spot light. it really came off well, and i will remember those days with a keen fondness of how good it felt to share thoughts, "from the bible" without the wtbts slagg altering its meaning, to much.

    i'll be posting part 4 late tonight, then i have to get the writing going again.

    buffalo:

    i am NOT a large person. just an average "joe". but i have been told, by somebody i trust, that i am or can be intimidating. i never thought of myself like that, but i guess it is true. the picture in my profile is the real me, and you can see, i'm just....well, me

    but i do have a way, it seems with words, when i am confronted. and its not so much what i say, as the cold cut dry tone and total lack of emotion. i just have a way i guess

    Imbue:
    "shunning a child? That's sick"

    short and sweet, and your absolutely right!

    ashi:
    thanks for following along. i have read some of your stuff with much interest. and this weekend i want to go back and reread your series again. i do love the personal story telling like this of you and many others who have done this. it really helps me, you, and lurkers as well.

    god bless you all, i got work to do now.

    -Zev
    Learn about the Wtbts and the U.N.
    ** http://www.geocities.com/plowbitch69 **

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