{"id":127533,"date":"2024-06-26T14:48:39","date_gmt":"2024-06-26T21:48:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=127533"},"modified":"2024-07-25T15:53:33","modified_gmt":"2024-07-25T22:53:33","slug":"letters-of-resignation","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/?page_id=127533","title":{"rendered":"Buford letters of resignation from Peoples Temple"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BB-7-R1<\/p>\n<p>I, Teresa J. Buford, hereby resign my membership in Peoples Temple Christian Church. I am resigning because my beliefs and activities are at variance with the beliefs and activities of Peoples Temple Christian Church, and Jim Jones, the pastor of said church. I have no criticism of the church or of the beliefs or standards of the Peoples Temple Christian Church. My only reason for resigning is that I do not feel that I can uphold these beliefs and my current activities take up too much of my time.<\/p>\n<p>I have been treated fairly with justice and love by Pastor Jim Jones and the members of Peoples Temple. At no time have I had any reason to be unhappy or to disagree with any of the treatment that I have received.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Signed <u>Teresa J. Buford<\/u><br \/>\nWitness______<br \/>\nWitness______<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;-<\/p>\n<p>BB-7-AA6<\/p>\n<p>Dear Pastor Jones,<\/p>\n<p>In that my religious beliefs have changed and because my own activities would not fall in line with the principles of the church I feel that it is only just that I resign from the church membership. This doesn\u2019t mean that I don\u2019t appreciate what the church has done for me. I wish to thank you, Pastor Jones, for all the help this church has done for me.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Respectfully,<br \/>\nTeresa J. Buford<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>BB-7-AA52<\/p>\n<p>Dear Pastor,<\/p>\n<p>Due to a change in my lifestyle I would like to resign from this church. Thank you for the help you gave me when I was on drugs. I just can\u2019t uphold church anymore.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Respectfully,<br \/>\nTeresa J. Buford<\/p>\n<p>&#8212;&#8211;<\/p>\n<p><a name=\"AA57\"><\/a>BB-7-AA57<\/p>\n<p><em>(<strong>Transcriber\u2019s note<\/strong>: The mention of an arson at a Temple location dates this to 1974.)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Dear Pastor Jones,<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m sorry to have to write this letter but I think that the time has come that I parted with Peoples Temple. Not that you haven\u2019t done a lot of good for me \u2018cause I know that you have; taking me off of drugs, helping me with school, etc. But your peaceful approach to everyone has me so frustrated that I don\u2019t want to hang around anymore. I\u2019m talking about the Muslims now. I think that they burned down the Temple and I don\u2019t see why we have to tolerate that kind of shit. I\u2019m tired of looking at them and I\u2019m sick of being nice to people that I hate. You say that there is good to be found in every man but there isn\u2019t any in them.<\/p>\n<p>The only way that I can do the things that I think ought to be done is to leave cause I know that you will try to change my mind if I stay. Don\u2019t try cause you can\u2019t change my mind now. Maybe someday you\u2019ll understand that kindness doesn\u2019t always pay off.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Sincerely,<br \/>\n\/s\/ Teresa J. Buford<br \/>\nTeresa J. Buford<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BB-7-R1 I, Teresa J. Buford, hereby resign my membership in Peoples Temple Christian Church. I am resigning because my beliefs and activities are at variance with the beliefs and activities of Peoples Temple Christian Church, and Jim Jones, the pastor of said church. I have no criticism of the church or of the beliefs or [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"parent":127477,"menu_order":5,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-127533","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/127533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=127533"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/127533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":127909,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/127533\/revisions\/127909"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/127477"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jonestown.sdsu.edu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=127533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}