Dear Mrs ####,,
Your letter of December 6, 1982 has been received and we note the several questions questions you have asked at the conclusion. You state that you have carefully read the Watchtower of September 15, 1981 on the subject of disfellowshipping and you have found nothing which seemed to proclude occasional association between you and your parents. From reading your letter, we believe you understand the situation with disfellowshipped relatives and the difficulty this poses. Obvsiously there are times when close family members must have communication and family members must make their own decision as to how frequent this would be. It is not the function of the Society nor of the congregational elders to "police" such association of a non-spiritual character. It is hoped that family members will understand the principles involved in disfellowshipping and seek to honour the arrangement.
We can see no reason why your parents could not see your children since they are not involved in this issue. Again this is something that must be worked out between yourself and your parents. The remaining points of your letter have been duly considered and we fully understand the difficulties you are now experiencing. Whether or not you wish to reassociate with the Christian congregation is something for you to decide. The decision other members of your family have made to stay within the congregation must also be respected as a conscientious decision.
Yours sincerely
(the company stamp)
CC The Body of Elders, ####### congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses
Interestingly the day the letter arrived at my address, two elders visited my parents and told them that the letter changed nothing and they were not at liberty to associate with me. The letter was a facade, carefully worded so that it couldn't be used by the media to show what total bastards they really are. Notice the word "communication" is used instead of association? Note too that they "they fully understand the difficulties you are now experiencing" and say it's up to me as to whether I want to reassociate with the Christian congregation, so I don't have to experience the difficulties. I think I explained to them in my letter that I no longer believed in God, so you can imagine how helpful their comments were. Nice of them to let parents see my kids. They were very young at the time so it meant handing over tiny tots in the street. (which we actually did at first). No internet back then - so we had a very hard time at first.