by snugglebunny 21 Replies latest jw experiences
I was about 12. I took a friend along to a meeting and he said he didn't mind learning stuff but it was a shame it was so boring.
I was about 14. I had my very own Bible study and took him along. He just kept whispering about the girls there that he fancied.
I was in my early 20's. I took along a lady that I knew. She was astonished at the WT study. She said that she'd never heard of a religion that not only supplied the answers to everything but also supplied the right questions to ask.
Yes!
They found it weird that so any people came up and acted overly familiar and friendly!
He said it seemed so fake, and reminded him of the fakeness at an Amway meeting!
Of course, as witnesses, we thought it was the thing to do...to welcome new ones like they are family and "one of us"
Now we know that such familiarity needs to be gradually earned...not faked!
Yes. I won't be specific about who but the response was that everyone seemed friendly but sort of fake and that the meeting material seemed very basic and they were surprised that all the answers (well most of them) were directly from the material or a very minor paraphrase of the material. All in all the person said it had the feel of a high control group (forget what term they used exactly but it wasn't cult). The individual never went back.
This was from someone my wife and I both know and that she took the the meeting one time. I don't know if the individual gave my wife the same feedback I got.
One guy that came along to a few Meetings made a remark that should have woken me up at the time, he said :
" But it is all so very silly"
I left in my late teens, so most of my experiences are with my non-jw teen friends. They all found the meetings to be extremely boring. They wonder why there was no program just for children.
I'm glad JW don't have a Sunday school for children. Could you imagine the pedo perv running that school?
M first impression was of a memorial when I got my first taste without researching the JW. The impression I got was that like others, so much fake "interest". I had the feeling I was being talked to like a child when they would speak. I didn't like the feeling I had while attending and was highly offended at the passing of the emblems with every person rejecting them! The ability for the people to sing the songs was pathetic. It was not pleasing at all. The recorded music, to me, was sad. Live music is so special, surely people in that congregation could play music ( I thought to myself) It was having a a part of the celebration of coming together in Christ in my view. The strength of beautiful songs being sung that you can remember by heart is a special kind of warmth and feeling.
Later when I read some materials I was highly offended at the tone and low educational level of "audience". I got the impression this must be a religion especially for mentally slow people. (I know this is not true for some, or many JW people, but that was the impression those materials left me with)
In all I was left with a bad taste in my mouth with each contact with the WT/JW, except for a couple nice elderly black ladies that came to my door many years ago. From what I know now, these ladies had to be doubters, and were going through the motions for social reasons. I gave them some blackberry jam I had been canning. They were never pushy. I don't even recall the preaching a single bit. They would offer material. Once I took one, and other times I would not. I ever even really read it, or if I did I was left with the same type impression that it was odd and simple minded so I didn't continue reading.
My practicing JW mother in law and her sister and family also never once preached at all. The number of times the word Jehovah came up around them I could count on one hand, in 11 years of marriage. For this I am lucky and thankful. However, it also kept me from researching and learning the reality of the borg's controlling and damaging influence in the first six or so years of my marriage.
Once at a family dinner at my in-laws house, a non-JW family member remarked how "boring" my wedding talk was. I was, of course, highly indignant and offended, but today if I were invited to a JW wedding I would not go for the very same reason. To be honest, I don't remember the amount of joy and celebration that most couples experience on their special day. Just more of the same routine and ceremony as if it were a regular meeting. I didn't even enjoy the full reception, because my new husband was so eager to get to the activities of the "after party", if you get my drift
