Scully,
NICE!!!! How thoughtful of your 'friend' and 'sister in the truth'.
I could probably fill volumes with 'loving' acts and words of the brothers, but here are a few:
1) An MS in a congregation in Conroe, Texas (should I put his name...hmmmm) was a very heavy drinker, and his wife was an alcoholic. She would show up to the morning weekday service with a travel mug full of diet Pepsi and vodka. I was at his house one night and he was really totalled, along with his brother, and they begin to chase his well-endowed 13 y/o daughter around the house trying to take off her top and her bra. Shortly thereafter, my oldest step-daughter somehow wound up going to Galveston with this girl and her alcoholic mother. Her mother, drunk, pulled down her pants and urinated on the Strand and offered to 'sell' her daughter to a group of drunk businessmen. When I brought this up to the elders, one was sympathetic, but two turned to me and said "Well, we don't see that you have much room to talk, as you are rarely at meetings. Maybe if you were as concerned about your spirituality as you are theirs, you would have advanced in the congregation by now."
2) Same alkie sister went to the elders several months after this (I'm sure someone mentioned my issues with them) and told them that my wife (at that time) and I were spreading gossip about two couples who had been reproved for wife-swapping. They threatened to take disciplinary action against us. It was a real neat story except neither one of us had a clue that they had been reproved (it happened before we moved into the congregation) and certainly had no knowledge of why.
3) A sister I know very well, after 30 + years as a pioneer and elders wife underwent harrassment, slander, gossip, invasion of privacy, and a host of other things at the hands of a body of elders who are so petty and small that they got their jollies by trashing the reputation of someone who had invested 20 years and countless hours into the local congregation. They would drive down the street and 'spy', but never once offered to come over and help when her home was damaged by a storm. Her worldy neighbors helped, but not her 'brothers'.
4) After having a small wine and cheese party after a memorial one year, my wife and I were counseled about engaging in 'drunken revelry' and how we could stumble some. When I told them it was a very subdued gathering of a few friends (including two MS and their wives) and there was no 'revelry' by any stretch of the imagination, I was told "Well, who are we going to believe? A ministerial servant in good standing or you?" I guess one of the 'loving' brothers had spread a little story of his own.
5) This may seem petty, but it goes to show the mentality of how they won't lift a finger unless they can count time for it. My grandmother, who has been a witness for 50+ years, had surgery. After she came home, my parents were her sole caregivers. Of course, the brothers asked my parents at the meetings that if there was 'anything they could do', to just ask. They needed someone to sit with her for a morning during the week, but couldn't find anyone in the cong to do it. Later that morning, they were driving past the hall and saw a number of cars there of people going in service. Nice to know they're ready to help...
6) I've been in healthcare for 15 years, and treated a number of witness patients, usually from the congregations I've attended. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've seen an elder come and visit them. On the other hand, you can't beat 'worldly' clergy off with a stick. Nice to know they ignore the scriptural advice about 'praying over the sick' to engage in the unscriptural practice of door-to-door ministry.
O.k...that's enough.....as with most people here, I could go on and on.