Old clothes, old pictures, painful memories

heipauli · 01-26-09 3:20 pm

The picture below has been taken either 1945 or 1946. As you can see, I'm decently clothed. And as you probably guessed, the clothes came from United States. The packet were sent by American SDA's. How long the packet kept coming? My guess is 1½ - 2 years. Maybe even 3 years? But the rationing here stopped not until the end of 1953. Actually not until I was nearly 19 year old, I had better clothes than in 40's. What was peculiar was the fact that my parents could not keep all the clothes and other items they got from America, even of monetary reasons. Namely the worth of the packets was evaluated and from all we kept, my father paid tithes! And because the salaries of the SDA preachers at the time in Finland were lousy, my parents could not afford to keep all the contents and pay huge sums of tithes; so they donated a substantial amount of the contents of those packets to other adventists. When the packets ceased to come, my clothing grew worse and worse. Finally I had the lousiest clothes in my class. <img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/messages/6/270.jpg" alt="C:\neljäkö v.jpg"> But there is another picture. It was taken c. 31th May 1960, the day I graduated (if that is a correct word, from my pre-university school, i.e. grade 12). I had not time enough to find the statistics for 1960, but two years earlier there were 6 454 persons who tried their luck in the matriculation examination. Of those 1 186 failed. IOW, less than 10% of the age class passed. And the cap you see me wearing, is the sign in Finland for the fact. But more important is my expression. Not very happy (although I was the most succesful pupil in my school at the time). Rather I seem to be unhappy and worried. That is spite of the fact that just one week earlier I had got my suit, the same you see in the picture. Actually it should have been a black one, but I got a all-purpose suit; better that than the sweater I had used 2 weeks ago. Why unhappiness? Why not? Wasn't I an Adventist? There were reasons enough. Persecutions looming up in the horizon and after them the end in Hell. After all, how could I presume to be just that one of the famous twenty! <img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/messages/6/271.jpg" alt="c:\pauli yo-lakissa">

elaine · 01-26-09 7:49 pm

Tell us more about the "end in Hell." You've piqued our curiosity.

heipauli · 01-27-09 5:09 am

Elaine, what part of Hell needs looking further into the matter? - 1:20 ? - how it feels to be in H? - how I estimated my changes of not going to the H? - some other aspect?

maggie · 01-27-09 12:15 pm

I have pictures I could post also, Pauli. Oh my....

heipauli · 01-27-09 12:19 pm

Maggie, as long as the pictures do not depict Hell, why not show them? IMO this site has been, ahem, not very pictorial ;-)

maggie · 01-27-09 12:24 pm

I just checked my hard drive - I think the one I'm thinking of must still be in Texas. It is a family picture taken around the time the SDAs thought it best to exorcise me for 16 hours. A portrait of bondage and misery.

maggie · 01-27-09 12:28 pm

Vacant eyes, like yours.

maggie · 01-27-09 12:30 pm

I'm the third from the right, front row, gold sweatshirt: <img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/messages/6/277.jpg" alt="Bockmann family reunion"> Happier now. <IMG SRC="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/clipart/happy.gif" ALT=":-)" BORDER=0> (Message edited by maggie on January 27, 2009)

heipauli · 01-27-09 1:00 pm

Maggie, how can the crowd be so big? Are all the persons in the picture relatives to each other, either by lineage or by marriage? How many of them are current or ex SDA's? My parents more or less severed the ties to the non-SDA relatives. Therefore I've never seen about 50% of my cousins. What a pity

elaine · 01-27-09 4:44 pm

Pauli, As a PK, that was also my experience. I don't know whether it was from my parent's relatives or my parents where the severance came. Also, because we moved so often (every 2-3 years), I have many cousins I've never seen, just like you. Fortunately, in the past few years while researching my genealogy, I have gotten acquainted with several cousins who have shared pictures and much information about my family which has really given me roots. I now have pictures of my great-great-grandfather; I know my maternal grandmother and my mother's sister lived well into their 90s and an uncle lived to be over 100. None of this I had known before. This helped to fill in both my family and medical history and encouraged me that I, too, maybe could live to be 90+. Too many SDAs took it to heart about leaving your father and mother when becoming an Adventist. How terribly sad! With the attitude that all other religions were Babylon, it is no wonder there was ostracism or rejection.

cadge · 01-27-09 5:33 pm

Nice Photo. Hey Paulie, If someone hung a flower on me at that age it would have wiped the smile off of my face also. I like flowers now though. I always want to get into growing orchids, but I never know whether I'm staying or going. I need to get the nail gun out and fasten myself to the deck. You were a handsome cuss back then though. How many hearts have you broken?<img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/clipart/wink.gif" border=0> Cadge

cadge · 01-27-09 5:42 pm

"I'm the third from the right, front row, gold sweatshirt:" Well Madge,<img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/clipart/happy.gif" border=0> you've certainly dispelled the myth about blonds being dumb. Cadge

maggie · 01-27-09 10:06 pm

<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!>quote:By Pauli: Maggie, how can the crowd be so big? Are all the persons in the picture relatives to each other, either by lineage or by marriage? How many of them are current or ex SDA's? My parents more or less severed the ties to the non-SDA relatives. Therefore I've never seen about 50% of my cousins. What a pity<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>The people on the front row are the "oldies," i.e., the children and wives/husbands (or ex-wife, as the case may be) of my ex-husband's parents, with the exception of my beloved granddaughter. The people further back are all the children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren of my ex-husband's parents' children. The group is predominately Nazarene, with only my ex-husband and his brother and children branching out into Adventism. The whole reunion was themed on honoring the deceased parents that founded the group, and also those who have been tragically lost in the past few years. It was quite moving. Here is a clip from a recent e-mail that I don't think my SDA nephew Chris would mind my posting:<blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!>quote:Paul Clem [Nazarene] said something amazing during the Reunion, or was that Mike Wiebe [Nazarene minister]? Speak up! He said that, regardless of the differences in Religions that we have, we all serve the same God. And I bring this up because this University that Beau Bockmann attended is of 1 of those Religions. And, really, I don't think it matters, I think that what matters is a student who can't afford an education will be going to a University which teaches great values. Here is what you do: Step 1: Make your check payable to: "Southern Adventist University". In the Memo Section write: "Beau Bockmann Scholarship" Step 2: Send your check to: Southern Adventist University Development Office PO Box 370 Collegedale, TN 37315<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>Beau was killed by a drunk driver a year and a half ago. Beau's parents want to make sure the teenager who killed him is not destroyed by what happened. Such love. I went to Beau's funeral at Auburn Adventist Academy (Washington). There were probably six or seven hundred kids there. Here's Beau: <a href="http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.sevenworshipministry.com/Beau/Beaus_Video_files/beau4.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.sevenworshipministry.com/Beau/Beaus_Video.html&usg=__T8dwApu8yK7XgOvZFOORbgfEGe0=&h=371&w=247&sz=29&hl=en&start=7&tbnid=k4_jZ_7isSg-IM:&tbnh=122&tbnw=81&prev=/images%3Fq%3D%2522beau%2Bbockmann%2522%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den" target="_blank">Beau Bockmann</a> (Message edited by maggie on January 27, 2009)

maggie · 01-27-09 10:27 pm

Here's an AOL video of Beau's memorial: <a href="http://video.aol.com/video-detail/beau-bockmann/4159239453" target="_blank">http://video.aol.com/video-detail/beau-bockmann/41 59239453</a>

maggie · 01-27-09 10:38 pm

<> (Message edited by maggie on January 27, 2009)

maggie · 01-27-09 10:43 pm

Robbie, my son, a year before he died: <img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/messages/6/280.jpg" alt="Robbie in Walla Walla">

maggie · 01-27-09 11:21 pm

Thanks, Cadge, but as I'm sure you understand, there are more pressing and urgent myths to dispel. Lives are at stake.

maggie · 01-28-09 12:02 am

<a href="http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/b/bockmann_robert.html" target="_blank">http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/b/bockmann_rob ert.html</a>

maggie · 01-28-09 1:01 am

Robbie disappeared on the weekend of the tenth anniversary of the burning of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco. Old pictures, painful memories.... <img src="http://www.atomorrow.net/discus/messages/6/287.jpg" alt="Branch Davidians die....">

maggie · 01-28-09 1:50 am

<hr width=75% size=2> <center>We learn geology the morning after the earthquake. --Ralph Waldo Emerson</center> <hr width=75% size=2>

heipauli · 01-28-09 7:15 am

Cadge, you stated: "...You were a handsome cuss back then though. How many hearts have you broken" Did you try to be humorous? The humor of that remark did not open up to me. IMO I was pathetic. But, there actually is a story to be told later on...

heipauli · 01-28-09 7:22 am

Maggie, last night I looked at the document on Wayne Bent. That experience made me insomniac and therefore I had to resort to some pills. Unfortunately I belong to those people labelled "slow hydrolyzers" and therefore the effect of the medication is over not until 3 - 4 p.m. So just now I'm not fit to comment your messages. But later, when my brains are functioning again...

maggie · 01-28-09 10:45 am

No comment called for, really, Pauli. It all is what it is. What is it about Adventism, though, that creates these strange spinoffs. Maybe Episcopals have them too, but we just don't know about it? Not that you're not welcome to comment, of course. But, as Freud said, <blockquote><hr size=0><!-quote-!>quote:All symptoms are overdetermined...everything of significance is overdetermined. Everything we are thinking about has more than one cause...for anything of importance there are multiple reasons.<!-/quote-!><hr size=0></blockquote>It's unreasonable to say Ellen White caused the Waco tragedy, or my son's death, or the Wayne Bent cult fiasco. We must learn to do more nuanced thinking about Adventism, the good and the bad, IMO, with the intent of safeguarding our children's development and leaving a positive legacy for the future. There are very positive things about Adventism, as I'm sure we've all experienced. I hope those can be preserved without passing on the memes that put people's development at risk. Children first. (Message edited by maggie on January 28, 2009)

heipauli · 01-28-09 1:50 pm

Elaine was curious about me and Hell. It is a long story, but it must be told. It was early 50's, when I for the first time heard/read of the (in)famous ratio of 1:20. As customary was, most of us lay person had no knowledge on the important question: When did EGW give that utterance? I myself assumed that it must have been sometimes between 1888 and 1900. At any rate earlier than there were SDAs more than a handful in Finland. So she could not have had in her mind us Finns. OTOH, it seemed to me, that 1:20 could not be an exact constant, applicable to every country. Namely if God had decreed that 1:20 would it be in every country, that would have meant predestination and that would have meant that I were decreed to go to hell. In my mind EGW had in her mind chiefly the English-speaking countries (U.S.A., Australia etc). Actually they had the prerogative having the "messages" readable in their own language. And in addition to that, God's special blessing had targeted United States. There were the famous pilgrimage destinations (Hiram Edson's famous cornfield, EGW's home, Pacific Press etc etc), SDA high schools and universities (at least one). The Americans had seen stars falling, the dark day etc. So, if the odds were 1:20 in America, they had to be much more unfavorable in non-English-speaking countries, for example in Finland. That of geography. In addition, the situation was aggravated by the time factor. Namely, it was obvious for even me, that the enthusiasm was diminishing in these less favored countries like Finland. My mother had pitied me sometimes 1948 - 49, for the reason that I could hardly finish my education before Jesus' 2nd coming. That did not encourage me educationalwize, to the contrary. But for years before 1960 she had ceased speaking of the imminency. So, for geographical, linquistic (only a portion of SOP was translated to Finnish) in 1960, and devotional reasons the odds in Finland had to be much worse than the often cited 1:20. Maybe they were even lower than 1:100? But even if they were 1:20, what conclusions could one draw? At the time we lived in Lahti, and the local congregation had about 80 - 100 active members, if I remember correctly. 1:20 makes 4 of 80, and five of 100. Who could these fortunate 4 - 5 SDA's be? When I started to count, there were 3 preachers and everyone of them had a wife. That made already six. Maybe my mother was not fit enough? And some of the lay members seemed to be ready to be translated, too. That made my situation even riskier. And is spite of how diligently I juggled with the numbers, it was clear that I was not one of those rare, fortunate souls. And the situation was aggravated year by year, as it occured to me that the more I listened to the pastors, the less I understood about salvation. Every pastor has his own salvific idea, but none of them favored my situation. But there was not only discrepancy between sermons, but even the songs had a message different from those of the sermons. One reason was that many of the melodies and lyrics were composed/written by non-SDA's. Sometime I've thought that perusing old SDA songbooks would be a suitable topic for a theological dissertation. Namely even between the songs there were doctrinal discrepancies. So it was a total mess for me. And I could not speak of my misgivings with my parents. Father was for the most time far away, winning souls, and my mother had no major in theology. And the topic was very sensitive. My guess is that the only advice they could give me would have been "you must pray more diligently".

elaine · 01-28-09 2:38 pm

there was not only discrepancy between sermons, but even the songs had a message different from those of the sermons. Yes! Is it any wonder the worry and confusion of young minds when there is so much discrepancy in the teachings, as well as songs? It is well known that even Alzheimer's patients can recall words of a song when it is played, indicating that music lasts longer in memory than mere words alone. SDA written songs had an especial message of end times and judgment, while other Christian hymns differed greatly. How few people realize the permanent impression, often very discouraging, has been given young minds about the 2nd coming and lack of being ready? There was never assurance there, as you so eloquently speak of, Pauli. Only fear.

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Old clothes, old pictures, painful memories

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