Often times, I read in the magazines that ONLY among Jehovah’s people will you find true friendship. They go so far as to imply that unless people are drawn together by a mutual love for Jehovah (the organization?) they will not have a rewarding friendship.
My husband and I are not ones to sit back and expect people to chase our friendship. We try to be very hospitable – we have a group of people over for dinner at least once a month. We regularly have movies & snack nights, or have people over for coffee and dessert after the meetings. We organize big group outings, and in our old hall we even held a watchtower study in our home on Friday nights for all of the young people. We acknowledge all of our friend’s anniversaries with small gifts, and anytime a family has had a new baby, we bring over meals for them. The point I’m trying to make is that we try really hard to be good friends.
But when the organization says that you will only find true friendship among Jehovah’s people … well, that statement has always been a little hollow in our experience. We’ve never found this anywhere in the organization. In the three years since we’ve left our old hall, no one has kept on touch with us. We’ve had friends that we’ve known for over 5 years and not once have we been invited to their home. When I recently gave birth to our son, no one brought over meals, and only a handful of people visited or called. In all the congregations that we’ve ever been in, there always seems to be these already established groups of friends or “cliques”, and no matter how hard we try, we still always seem to end up on the outside looking in. This is not really what I expect from people who are supposed to be willing to give their life for you. Having being conditioned to never cultivate friends outside "the truth" ... sometimes it can get a little lonely.
I don’t mean to complain … I am just very curious to know what your experiences in the organization have been like when it comes to friends?