Well, I'm back after a couple years away from this site. I still recognize a lot of names here, but there are a lot of new ones too.
I wanted to share an expierience I had with two witness "sisters" at my door a couple weeks ago. I told the sisters right away that I was raised as a JW and my mother is still a JW. They of course asked why I was no longer a practicing JW. SOOOOO I told them. I went into how my father in law (Now ex-father in law. Thats another long story but results from the mental breakdown my husband had as a result of severe abuse as a child) ) was an Elder and congergation overseeer and how he abused AT LEAST 17 girls over a 20 year time period. I told them how even when he went to prison for it he remained a JW in good standing. I told them they would not accept the sworn testimony of 4 girls at his trial as proof he was guilty or his own lies that he was CLEARLY caught in. I told them how Mario Mareno fron the WTS was AT THE TRIAL and about the lawsuit against the JWs and still he sat in prison and EVEN PREACHED to fellow inmates. I told them that I had loved Jehovah VERY much and I was a faithful follower. I told them how I used to get 20 - 30 hours per month in field service and even auxillary pioneered for a time. I was active on the ministry school and had NEVER done anything to be reproved or DFed for. But as the trial went on against my father in law I asked the elders in my hall (he was in another hall accross the country in Yerington, NV) why he was not being held accountable. They told me to have faith and wait on Jehovah. They said that when Jehovah wanted to "bring this matter out" he would do so. I said how much more "out" could it be???? There was a trial going on. I kept asking and kept bringing it up. I was not talking to others in the hall about it, besides my mother who was a pioneer at the time. I asked for her to help me understand it. I saw lie after lie from the elders in the Yerington hall and from the WTS itself. Finally the elders in my hall decided I should be DFed for apostacy. I was SHOCKED! APOSTACY???? Anyway, it's a long story but I appealed and the appeals brothers disagreed with the first brothers, so a letter went to the WTS and they decided I needed to be DFed.
These "sisters" at my door where stunned. I told them I have the proof in my home and they said they believed me. I asked if they had seen the Dateline program about JW's and abuse. They said they heard about it. I told them my father in law was one of the people mentioned on that program and I could show them by court records and a letter from the WTS's circuit overseer to the WTS that they knew of 17 victims. These were not victims the authorities knew of and the Watchtower Society used eclesiatical (sp?) privledge to keep that info to themselves. The authorities only knew of 4 victims. That means that these MUST have been witnesses that over the years had reported the abuse to the elders, and yet nothing was EVER reported to the authorities by them.
Both of these sisters were very kind to me and one was even crying. They said they were SO sorry to hear about this and just didn't know what to say. They said they could have some elders drop by to "help" me if I wanted them to. I told them I do not want to go back to a religion that shunned all the victims of his abuse and kept him in good standing. I have heard since then that he has been DFed .....for smoking.
Laurie