Dear Friends:
Some of you have PM'd me while I was away from this site, wanting to know how everything worked out after sending in our Baptism Nullification letters to the local KH and the Society. (Search on Baptism Nullification to find these postings if you want the details, even a sample of the letter we used).
Well, in a word: GREAT. While it is clear that the members of our old congregation do not wish to associate with us, that some kind of marking took place, we are not disfellowshipped or disassociated. We still have free association with our relatives in "the truth".
Now, I have to be honest, here. Our relatives in the "truth" DO speak to us, and do not treat us as dead people, but it would be an exaggeration to say they come by frequently or call frequently. They don't.
But, that's better than them not being able to speak to us at all. It is at least a tolerable situation for both them and us. If we want to, we can call them or write them, but we don't do that often either, really, for fear of making them or ourselves uncomfortable.
We bump into people from other nearby congregations and they seem totally unaware, even after 9 months of French leave, that we are not JWs anymore. So, those folks still speak to us freely. The ones from our local congregation, where I served as a prominent upstanding brother in the lead, do not speak to us unless spoken to first and in front of other people in public places. Yes, to them we have become the Invisible Man and the Invisible Woman. But, again, this is the price of Freedom.
Also, the phone calls stopped (thank God for caller ID), and no more visits at the door. If we get one, I will wave my new UN NGO letter at them (see other post today) as proof of the hypocrisy that drove us to leave.
Would I recommend this BN resignation letter method to others? YES. DEFINITELY. And I owe a big THANK YOU to Maverick for his posting that inspired our own plagiarized version of his original BN Letter. The WTS has decided to leave us be, and we couldn't be happier about that!
We love having Monday evenings, Thursday evenings, Saturday mornings and ALL DAY Sunday to sleep in and work on whatever suits our fancy. It is so wonderful. Now, don't think me a pagan-slug-couch-potato-heathen, folks. I devote a good deal of time to volunteer work that benefits many other people. But, we have not been to the KH since the Memorial, and we will never go back again. Never. Ever.
We do miss our old "fair weather friends". We don't blame them for steering clear of us. But, we do miss them. It's too bad our relationships ultimately depended upon the constant approval of a group run by Brooklyn hypocrites. But, I guess we should have known that all along. We shouldn't have been so naive.
And our shoe leather is lasting longer, and we aren't wearing out our vehicles and tires anymore. Haven't worn a suit since the last funeral I went to, and stopped wearing ties altogether. Even grew a beard. Loosing weight from not sitting on my ass in meetings all the time.
Best of all, I don't ever have to read another chapter in that damnable Isaiah book!
Life is good. Life without the Watchtower that is.
Take care all.