Last summer, my 6-year-old niece came to visit me from NY. Mind you, we are Catholics and my husband and his family are JWs. I went to visit my inlaws and my husbands 6-year-old niece was there too. I thought great, a playing buddy for my niece. I had just recently found out that they were all JWs and didn't know a lot of their little "rules". I have a tattoo on my ankle, the little girl noticed it and said that Jehovah doesn't like tattoos. I gave her a look and shrugged it off. They day went on and my niece and I went home.
At bedtime, my niece asked me, "Auntie, who is Hohova?" I asked, "who?" She repeated, "Hohova, Lily told me about him." I repeated, "Oh, you mean, Jehovah." Then I asked, "what did she tell you about that?"...My niece said, "well, Lily sneezed and I said, "bless you" and she went, 'Ooohhh, you can't say that, Jehovah don't like that'." So, who's Jehovah, auntie". She went on to tell me that Lily had told her that Jehovah don't like it if she goes to birthdays either. And here's my little niece, scared thinking she's done something horribly wrong. I tried to explain things to her in the simplest way possible, but it was hard. My niece had just finished her kindergarten grade at her Catholic school. So, imagine. I called Lily's mother and told her what had happened. All she told me was that she would give me a booklet to read about that. I didn't want a booklet, I wanted her to tell daughter to not talk to my niece about her religion. Cause we sure don't go around telling anyone things about ours. No, instead I noticed a sense of pride...as if she was proud of what her daughter had done.
One time, my niece and I had to stop by my inlaw's house before going to a birthday party. We were all dressed up and the little girl asked me where we were going...I told her that we were going to a birthday party...she said, "How come you guys go to parties, don't you know Jehovah"...I said, "Well, he has nothing to do with going to a birthday party"
I read the booklet and found out the many rules and forbidden things for JWs. All I have to say is this, they sure know how to take the FUN out of life!