I was in town centre about an hour ago to buy a shirt and tie for an upcoming job interview when I was stopped by a youngish, clean cut American young man (20-ish) in a cheap suit. My heart sank as I thought it was local JWs. To my slight relief, it was Mormons!
Elder so-and-so introduced himself as a Mormon and started to ask whether I believed in God or Jesus Christ. He had a German or Danish sounding surnamed that escapes me - I'll call him Elder Jensen
As I've been screwed over by JWism, not Mormonism, I chose not to say that I'm an exJW, and to go easy on him. I said that I come from a moderate Christian background, but I'm a scientist, recently-graduated from the local university.
I said that I accept evolution due to the abundant evidence, so reject creationism. At this point a local man & woman (50-ish) came up to me and introduced themselves as Mormons (I forget their names, too, but let's call them Fred & Vera - they're good northern names ).
Fred listened to my reasoning about science, and started talking about 'signs', a la Watchtower. I then told them that of all the times in history, today, in 2015, in the West, is the best time to be alive, what with the advances in medicine and science. I told them they should be glad that they're preaching in the West and not, say, in Russia (they might get beaten up) or in Saudi Arabia (they might get beheaded). They reluctantly agreed. As for his 'signs', I said that people are allowed to believe in what they like but it's just that: belief, not knowledge.
I tried to be open minded and say that I don't know whether God exists, and that evolution doesn't necessarily disprove his existence. I also said that if an invisible, magical God does exist, we scientists couldn't collect empirical data in support of his existence or against it. Then Fred hit me with: "we actually believe God is made of flesh and bone" I kid you not! So I said, being a biologist, "bodies aren't perfect, but they do have defenses against dust, pathogens, etc. In what way does God have a perfect body of flesh and bone?"
Fred: "It's perfect - it has no blemishes, disease, imperfections ..."
Me: "you're telling me what it isn't but you're not telling me what it is - you're not defining perfect"
I then said "look, don't be offended, but it's just how my mind works - if an angel approached God and punched him, would God get a bruise?"
Vera: "we don't know that much"
This made me squirm inside, because I can just imagine that JWs are similarly fake-modest.
They tried to push the Book of Mormon on me but I said "no, I'll look at your website instead!"
Apart from details of doctrine, I was struck by how similar they were to the JWs. The Book of Mormon had the same plastic hardback, gold-coloured lettering as the NTW Bible. It could almost have been printed by the WTS!
I'd be interested to hear about any experiences you've had with Mormons.
Also, my anti-witnessing - how did I do? What did I do well, where did I go wrong?