Describe a typical Saturday for a jw child

by carla 18 Replies latest jw friends

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  carla

  Please describe a typical Saturday for a jw child. Reason being my jw once told me that all jw children love the door to door (yeah right) and they have all afternoon to play. Don't they need to get ready for the Sunday service? more reading, family study, etc...?

  By the way, how did you guys manage to get homework done during the week? My jw is gone sometimes 3 hours on Tues & Thurs. It's going on 10:00 sometimes (I have no idea why this is from what you guys say the meetings don't last that long). How do jw kids manage during the week? My non jw kids were up late sometimes doing important projects, I can't imagine how jw kids get it all done. I suppose kids in sports could compare though they usually have practice after school, then home, dinner and homework.
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  Mary

  Please describe a typical Saturday for a jw child

  I think this describes it better than any words:
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  zagor

  meetings don't last that long

  Actually in my experience whenever there was a meeting that whole day was screwed. First you lived with that feeling hanging over your head that you MUST be at the meeting tonight, then the meeting came and went, when you got home you are usually so exhausted because it wasn't only two hours that you were there but the whole freakin day behind you was in expectation of that.

  Anyway, back to topic, those kids that "enjoy" going to door-2-door are in my experience feeling like that because it would be the only outlet for them, only opportunity to actually go out. Also, that often meant visit to bakery or a coffee shop after the "service". Really sad, no wonder most of them grow into anti-social outcasts.
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  free2think

  I hated Saturdays, min ALL morning, then home to procrastinate about preparing the dreaded watchtower(this usually took up the whole afternoon). Then sometimes my dad would test me to see if I'd really done it. He did it in a jokey way but I knew he was serious.

  Now I get to enjoy my weekends as rthey should be spent relaxing and enjoying the weather. Well when it's sunny lol.
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  Tuesday

  Well I visited with my non-JW father, but on the months where my time wasn't where it should be I got to get up at 6 in the morning to go downtown and street witness. Which was god-awful talking to college students when you're like 13 about God is not the best expirience.
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  daystar

  Well, my family was not exactly regular in service. We attended all meetings for the most part, but Sat. service was hit or miss.

  When my parents insisted we go out in service, I absolutely hated it.

  When we didn't, I had a blast. Watched Saturday morning cartoons nearly until lunchtime, then played outside for the rest of the evening.
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  InquiryMan

  Even as an elder I rarely brought my children out in service. But I guess I was a closet apostate, so I did not have enough impetus to do it.
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  ex-nj-jw

  Saturday am, get up go in streetwork for 1 1/2 hours, then a short meeting to decide who worked with who and what territory was to be covered, then about 2 hours knocking on doors, then lunch. Go home have a little down time then family study time, prepare for Sunday watchtower, my dad gave us a certain "quota" of comments, if we did not meet this quota, then no down time on Saturday afternoon. This was the only thing he could take away, as we weren't allowed to do much of anything, that is if it envolved "fun".

  School was not important, because your goal (female) is to get married right out of high school to a fellow JW, full time pioneer, have little JW's and obey your husband!!!
• 

  Crumpet

  Please describe a typical Saturday for a jw child. Reason being my jw once told me that all jw children love the door to door (yeah right) and they have all afternoon to play. Don't they need to get ready for the Sunday service? more reading, family study, etc...?

  By the way, how did you guys manage to get homework done during the week? My jw is gone sometimes 3 hours on Tues & Thurs. It's going on 10:00 sometimes (I have no idea why this is from what you guys say the meetings don't last that long). How do jw kids manage during the week? My non jw kids were up late sometimes doing important projects, I can't imagine how jw kids get it all done. I suppose kids in sports could compare though they usually have practice after school, then home, dinner and homework.

  Okay I really hated the door to door work but did my best. Never had sat afternoon to play - I wish - we had chores for pocket money and the watchtower to study which usually we did half on Friday night and half on Saturday afternoon. Saturday nigth was usually nice and involved some kind of recreation though with the family - usually a relaxed dinner and board games as opposed to very early rushed dinner before going to the hall like on Tuesd and Thurs. 10 pm sounds about right - Tuesdays were the shortest meeting - the book study but as it was usually at someone's home - afterwards it was often a social event depending on the house hold. AT the best ones this would involve a bbq in the summer which I definitely enjoyed and are amongst my happiest memories. Thursdays well it doesnt finish til 8.45 and then people linger to chat for a long time afterwards. Homework - well somehow we just fitted it around all the JW activity - really there was very very little time for fun as a JW teenager.
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  restrangled

  Weekends were filled with dread. Friday after school, you needed to prepare a sermon for Saturday a.m. from the Kingdom Ministry and practice with other siblings. No staying up late. Saturday a.m. we would lay in bed dreading the "It's time to get ready announcement." There were very few Saturdays in my life at home that we weren't to the hall by 9:00 a.m. I would think of all kinds of excuses, I don't want to go, my stomach hurts, etc., etc., Unless we had fevers or were puking, out we went. We usually didn't get home until 12:30. Saturday afternoon we did home work if we had it and any chores. Maybe a few hours of free time and then the dreaded study for the dreaded Watchtower study the following early a.m. Sunday morning: off to the the 2 hour plus meeting which entailed at least 3 hours total including before and after time. If anyone was short on service hours (usually my dad at the end of the month), we made return calls after the meeting to meet the 10 hour requirements.

  Tuesdays and Thursdays were filled with dread all day anticipating the meetings ahead. Thursday night was especially bad because thats when my dad, an Elder, had to conduct business afterwords. Sometimes we sat in the seats until close to 11:P.m. waiting for him.

  If a Circuit or District overseer was visiting you could count on an extra hour at least on Sunday.

  There were entire weekends taken up by circuit assemblies, special one day events and lets not forget the summer assemblies that use to last 8 days and slowly were pared down to 4 in later years. In the summer we usually had to pioneer at least 1 month. That meant in addition to all the meetings at least 2 to 3 hours daily door to door.

  Is it any wonder so many of us have had enough religion to last us a life time?

  r.