Real Life Fundie Encountersâ„¢ Part 2

[iweartanktops]

JB Duggar doesn't even require young men to date him for several months before talking to his daughters. That's hard core.

[HumbleJillyMuffin]

I had several new matches waiting for me on eHarmony this morning, imagine my surprise when one guy claims "it would be very good to find a help meet that would want to help me with the Lord's work." I'm a Christian and am looking for a Christian man, but when terms like "help meet" and "purposing to" and "sweet fellowship" are used, I move right along. Yikes!

:angry-banghead:

[iweartanktops]

I had several new matches waiting for me on eHarmony this morning, imagine my surprise when one guy claims "it would be very good to find a help meet that would want to help me with the Lord's work." I'm a Christian and am looking for a Christian man, but when terms like "help meet" and "purposing to" and "sweet fellowship" are used, I move right along. Yikes!

:angry-banghead:

Yes, good call! If my fiancé (who's also a Christian) had ever used the words "help meet," I would have kindly passed. He really wrote "sweet fellowship?" What's wrong with just "fellowship?" Why on earth does everything have to be so "sweet, precious, etc" UGH! Good luck! There are some good, Christian men out there who happen to have some balance in their lives! My fiancé and I *gasp* cuss!!!

[47of74]

Yes, good call! If my fiancé (who's also a Christian) had ever used the words "help meet," I would have kindly passed. He really wrote "sweet fellowship?" What's wrong with just "fellowship?" Why on earth does everything have to be so "sweet, precious, etc" UGH! Good luck! There are some good, Christian men out there who happen to have some balance in their lives! My fiancé and I *gasp* cuss!!!

Yeah that sets my alarm bells off too when someone is using terms like "help meet" or "sweet fellowship." (And I'm a male). And when I use terms like "sweet, precious, etc" it's generally sarcastically.

[HumbleJillyMuffin]

Yeah that sets my alarm bells off too when someone is using terms like "help meet" or "sweet fellowship." (And I'm a male). And when I use terms like "sweet, precious, etc" it's generally sarcastically.

No, he didn't use the term "sweet fellowship" in his profile, just the "help meet" thing. I was saying that any of those terms would set my alarms off. Just hearing Jill Rodrigues say "sweet fellowship" is enough to send me running for the hills - without my green eyeliner!

[jbeess]

I've got an acquaintance from high school that I'm somehow friends with on Facebook. She's about a year older than me (so 36?) and pregnant with number 12. She's got the home binder, giant van, giant rack of essential oils, MLM hair dodad business, and posts videos of her and her children protesting outside of the abortion clinic.

She recently redid her boys' room and now has five of them crammed in there.

I can't figure out why she hasn't unfriended me yet since I'm a divorced heathen who drinks and has a job outside the home.

[Crocoduck]

No experience at all! He tried to run away. It took him at least 6 months to call her dad because he thought the idea was so insane, but he continued to be increasingly interested in her (it probably helps that she's pretty, but there are lots of pretty women) and said he just got to a point where he knew she was serious and he didn't have a chance if he didn't call. Personally, FF is creepy as hell! If I were him I would have run for the hills after the first "date." Hopefully I made it clear that dating FF for 6ish months was one on one! Y was not present! I don't know how he did it. I think Y is a sweetheart but damn.

Thank you for sharing this!

I'm really curious to know why D thought Y was worth all the trouble. She may be a wonderful, attractive person, but what makes her SO special a non-fundie man would jump through that many hoops for her?

[iweartanktops]

Thank you for sharing this!

I'm really curious to know why D thought Y was worth all the trouble. She may be a wonderful, attractive person, but what makes her SO special a non-fundie man would jump through that many hoops for her?

That's a great question! I'm not sure what beguiled him so much in the beginning but as he met with Father Fundie, that man really started to break his spirit. Even now that they have been married for 4 years and they're happy, D talks about how he was such a horrible boyfriend and had to learn so much and he put Y through a terrible time, etc. It breaks my heart to hear him talk this way about himself because (I might be biased) but D is truly one of the most genuine, caring and kind young men I know! He is just amazing! It pisses me off to imagine what FF must have told him to make him feel so bad. He felt like he had so much to do to "earn" Y!

[church_of_dog]

I'm pretty sure I caught a glimpse of a few members of the Lockwood family today.

I was driving through their town, as I do a few times each year. I was keeping my eye out for a big family van. As I pulled up to a stoplight, I saw a white 12/14-passenger van pulling into a Dollar Tree store parking lot. As I waited for the light to change, I saw three boys in fundie outfits (nice slacks, pressed long-sleeve button-down shirts, even though it was around 90F today) and then a teen girl in an ankle-length denim skirt get out of the car and head toward the store.

I can't be 100% sure it was them -- maybe there is another fundie family that lives in that town. I probably would only recognize the oldest boy or Jaynee -- but these kids certainly looked consistent with their family.

The boys seemed excited to be at the store, running toward the entrance, etc. I couldn't see who was at the wheel or how many other kids were in the van. I didn't want to be stalkery so I just drove on once the light was green, tempted though I was to make a U-turn and suddenly need something from the store...

[antwan]

OMGoodness, I was at a local living history farm today, and I had to giggle at looking at the crowd with FJ eyes. There were several groups of fundies there, and I'm thinking they may have been from ATI because: 1) they were all youthful (teens/early 20s) and 2) there were no full families (parents, kids) nor younger children present, and 3) the ATI center was only about 15 minutes away.

All the guys had sporty/dressy sweaters and khaki pants on (a few had dark blue), and all the girls were, of course, in long skirts and long hair. One girl, in particular, was very attractive with Jessa Duggar perfect curls in her very long hair. Many of the other girls, though, were extremely plain Jane. I kept searching faces and telling hubby, "I"m half expecting to recognize one of these ladies from the families I've learned about at FJ." :wink-kitty: Sadly, I didn't recognize a soul (though one young girl looked so much like Lourdes, it was remarkable.)

[WhiteRun]

I only remembered this story after my sister reminded me about it today! 
So after Black Saturday (horrific bushfires in country Victoria, Australia that left many many people homeless) my cousins husband who's in the army helped clean up. He met a family with something like 8+ kids who had their house and all their possessions lost in the fires. Anyway, we offered to give some old toys my sister and I never used anymore (namely lego) and the family asked us to come over and give them the toys. 
When we got there, in my 15 year old mind, I just though the family were ultra conservative. And they were- women never spoke, father made the daughters (many younger than me) entertain us and do house work, all the women wore head dresses and everyone dressed in extremely conservative clothes. They didn't believe in technology and all the kids were homeschooled. 
On the bright side they were very friendly and very thankful to have a new home along with all their posessions kindly donated to them. 

[morri]

Looks like jehovas witnesses have targetted the uni, they stand in a group just outside the main building trying to give people their "lets talk about god and apocalypse " pamphlets.

[sockinshoe]

At my uni, we get a bunch of Mormon missionaries. I always feel weird because they're about my age, and have to stand around in their suits and ties proselytizing to their peers. I also feel bad about never approaching them for smalltalk. They always look so alone (even in their pairs) and I always worry that they feel isolated surrounded by a bunch of heathens who smoke and drink (coffee and alcohol). I've never seen them after about 5 PM.

[LaLele]

I fell down a Facebook fundie rabbit hole today.  One of my co-workers had a woman with an elaborate head scarf reply to a post.  The name was familiar, but I couldn't place her.  I clicked on the head covered woman to see if I could remember how I knew her/ to see what kind of cancer she had.  It turns out, I know some of her family members, and she is perfectly healthy, a fundie, and just chooses to head cover "because she prayed for something special and head covering is the payment God requested for it."

Then I spent 25minutes watching videos on how to wear a head wrap here: wrapunzel.com

[unsafetydancer]

A couple of fundie lite folks I worked with have added me on facebook. I'm seriously considering unfollowing at least one of them because he keeps posting very long and totally nonsensical religious rants at least twice a day. That, and he has a horrible attitude to women.

 

I think the weirdest RLFE I ever had was actually growing up beside a fundie family. I grew up in a small town on the east coast of Scotland, it's the sort of place where literally everyone knows everyone else. There's a couple of typical Church of Scotland churches and one that calls itself something like The Christian Fellowship and that was the church this family belonged to.

 There were three daughters living with the mother and their stepfather, I think their mum converted into the church when she remarried but I'm not really sure. They seemed like a pretty cool family to me. My family was almost permenantly rushed and stressed and worried for about a year when we moved house, lost my grandad to cancer and had to deal with another family member becoming ill all in the same year. The fact that the three girls never seemed to argue with each other or their parents and always seemed happy and relaxed seemed pretty cool to me.

I got to know the eldest sister first and I figured out right away that her family were very religious, stuff like make up, ghost stories and Harry Potter were banned in their house and the television had one of those parental control things on it to stop them watching stuff that was forbidden. We had a couple of interesting conversations about religion (I'm a pretty staunch atheist) but the three sisters never tried to convert me or belittle my beliefs so I thought they were still basically a normal family.

After I left town to go to art school I found out that the middle daughter had missed school for two weeks because she had been "punished" by her family for reading a teen book, probably twilight since every teenage girl was reading it at that time. Her punishment had been being kept in her room for two weeks with only scheduled bathroom breaks and her meals being brought up for her to eat on her own. They took her phone away as well and banned her from being in the school orchestra. The last I heard was a few years after that she moved out and her family have pretty much cut all ties with her. It seems really sad because the three of them got on really well as kids.

I've started to wonder since whether the whole perfect family thing was just how the rest of us saw them and the whole time scary stuff like that was going on. There are rumours about what happened to make the middle girl leave home in the first place and I actually met the eldest one recently and she seems to be acting like she only has one sister now.

Scary

[ladymissdiva]

Living in Texas I've had numerous fundie encounters, so I'll limit this to the most interesting.

I worked with a JW woman for 10 years. She screamed at us every election day; handed out Watchtower magazines on Easter, Halloween and Christmas; and was totally convinced that birthday parties had some sort of occult component that was kept hidden from outsiders (What do y'all do at parties? Just cake and ice cream? I don't believe it! Aren't the candles used for some sort of magic spell?)

Oh, and she was weirdly obsessed with sex and the sex lives of other people. Monday mornings she would quiz us all about whether we had fornicated or otherwise shamed ourselves over the weekend. Anybody who admitted to having a girlfriend/boyfriend was subjected to a stern lecture on the dangers of dating. She was fired after "accidentally" stumbling onto a porn site at work and staying on for several hours. She claimed it was because she was so appalled at the smut she found that she just couldn't tear herself away.

My fundie encounters today are much more banal. I'm the Democratic precinct chair in a heavily Republican area, so I'm routinely contacted by families from the nearby LDS temple who want to register and vote as Democrats. My suburb has seen a recent influx of South Asian families, so now I'm working with a lot of Islamic families, as well as people from the local Baptist megachurch (this group thinks the GOP has veered too far from the teachings of Christ). I was worried about how our first precinct meeting would go, but we had a great time discussing politics over Hawaiian Punch and cheese pizza.

[Chubbi]

I just recently found out that one of my childhood best friends has gone full-fundie.

Growing up, I knew her family was pretty openly religious, but not any more so than your typical Bible Belt family. Like, if I spent the night on a Saturday, I'd have to go to church with her, which was fine. That's just what kids would do. And it wasn't an issue because, at the time, I was still openly Christian, and my family was trying out being fundie-lite to try to fit in with the neighbors a bit better. 

But it's a lot different, now. While I eschewed religion and have slowly become agnostic, she seems to have gone deeper into the...faith? I don't know exactly what she practices but it's basically secular = bad. It's a bit strange, someone you thought you knew ending up at almost the other end of the spectrum as you are.

She has Facebook and she's unmarried (gasp!) but she mostly posts about her mission trips and stuff like that.

I found out her full-fledged fundie status because she's recently made the decision to dress more modestly and was posting about it on facebook.

Her mother also messaged me out of the blue to talk to my friend about scripture like she and I and our friends used to, but I didn't have the heart/didn't want to risk losing my friendship with her and her family by telling her I haven't practiced Christianity in years. 

It's odd, but that's basically my only recent fundie encounter. It was bizarre and weirdly emotional. 

[Ellimenopy]

Living in Texas I've had numerous fundie encounters, so I'll limit this to the most interesting.

I worked with a JW woman for 10 years. She screamed at us every election day; handed out Watchtower magazines on Easter, Halloween and Christmas; and was totally convinced that birthday parties had some sort of occult component that was kept hidden from outsiders (What do y'all do at parties? Just cake and ice cream? I don't believe it! Aren't the candles used for some sort of magic spell?)

Oh, and she was weirdly obsessed with sex and the sex lives of other people. Monday mornings she would quiz us all about whether we had fornicated or otherwise shamed ourselves over the weekend. Anybody who admitted to having a girlfriend/boyfriend was subjected to a stern lecture on the dangers of dating. She was fired after "accidentally" stumbling onto a porn site at work and staying on for several hours. She claimed it was because she was so appalled at the smut she found that she just couldn't tear herself away.

My fundie encounters today are much more banal. I'm the Democratic precinct chair in a heavily Republican area, so I'm routinely contacted by families from the nearby LDS temple who want to register and vote as Democrats. My suburb has seen a recent influx of South Asian families, so now I'm working with a lot of Islamic families, as well as people from the local Baptist megachurch (this group thinks the GOP has veered too far from the teachings of Christ). I was worried about how our first precinct meeting would go, but we had a great time discussing politics over Hawaiian Punch and cheese pizza.

Hawaiian punch and cheese pizza are definitely my kind of communion. 

I haven't had any fundie encounters recently except for people that I knew growing up hawking Ben Carson all over Facebook. 

[HereticHick]

Ran into the Bates-Websters twice today. Rep. Dan Webster  & his wife were showing the Library of Congress to what I am guessing was one of their married kids w/ spouse and baby in tow. Mrs. Webster was wearing a longish black skirt, below the knee, but it doesn't scream "fundy" for a woman of her age. The daughter (or DIL) was wearing  a knee length skirt.  Then I ran into them all again leaving the Library cafeteria, plus their daughter Tori, and their son John w/ wife Alyssa & baby Allie Jane.Tori was in a knee length skirt; Alyssa was in skinny pants. 

You would not guess they were Gothardites if you didn't know who they are!

[WeArndtMarried]

I also live in Texas and see lots of religion, but saw one family today that would fit right in the the ones we snark on.

We were at the passport office and this family had 6 kids with another on the way. The oldest child looked to be around 10-12. The mom and dad looked like they were in their early 30s, although the mom looked younger and could have been late 20s. All the girls in skirts, boys in jeans with collared shirts. Everyone in the family was getting a passport. I was so curious as to why, but my husband said I couldn't bring my fundie obsession into real life and go bother them haha. I assume it was a mission trip or something, but even the parents were getting passports (there was a screen with the wait list that said how many passports each group was getting)

The kids were exceptionally well behaved, like weirdly so. They all (except the infant, but including the 2/3 year old) sat and read books and hardly made a sound the entire time we were in there. The only time one of them spoke was to ask to go to the restroom (the oldest boy took the younger brother of course). When they were called they all quietly stood up in a line in age order and walked back. Definitely my most interesting encounter so far.

[HarleyQuinn]

I didn't encounter a fundie today, but I mentioned having a "morbid fascination with fundies" to some friends. Apparently "fundie" has more than one meaning, and this is what they thought I was talking about.

http://www.amazon.com/Forum-Novelties-Fundies/dp/B0087UL3SS

 

[nastyhobbitses]

I also live in Texas and see lots of religion, but saw one family today that would fit right in the the ones we snark on.

We were at the passport office and this family had 6 kids with another on the way. The oldest child looked to be around 10-12. The mom and dad looked like they were in their early 30s, although the mom looked younger and could have been late 20s. All the girls in skirts, boys in jeans with collared shirts. Everyone in the family was getting a passport. I was so curious as to why, but my husband said I couldn't bring my fundie obsession into real life and go bother them haha. I assume it was a mission trip or something, but even the parents were getting passports (there was a screen with the wait list that said how many passports each group was getting)

The kids were exceptionally well behaved, like weirdly so. They all (except the infant, but including the 2/3 year old) sat and read books and hardly made a sound the entire time we were in there. The only time one of them spoke was to ask to go to the restroom (the oldest boy took the younger brother of course). When they were called they all quietly stood up in a line in age order and walked back. Definitely my most interesting encounter so far.

Did they all say their names as they arranged themselves in age order? Because that's some Fundie Von Trapp family shit right there.

[47of74]

I didn't encounter a fundie today, but I mentioned having a "morbid fascination with fundies" to some friends. Apparently "fundie" has more than one meaning, and this is what they thought I was talking about.

http://www.amazon.com/Forum-Novelties-Fundies/dp/B0087UL3SS

 

Cool!  Fundies sounds like it would go great with the 55 gallon drum of lube Amazon has for sale...

http://www.amazon.com/Passion-Natural-Water-Based-Lubricant-Gallon/dp/B005MR3IVO/

[FabulousBakergirl]

I have not been baptized, but where I live everything and everyone is catholic, so I went to catholic schools for 13 years. In school one teacher taught us about the old and new testament. Then I went to the second catholic school, where I learned a lot about al the other religions. So I know a lot about religions, but I am an atheist. I also learned about the Jehovah's Withesses. I have had a few encounters with Jehovah's Witnesses. This one time I was home alone and I was baking cookies, and the doorbell rang. I opened the door and there was one woman standing by the doorstep, like you normally do and another woman was standing on the pavement, about 3  meters from our front door. The woman that was standing close-by began sniffing and said : Ow that smells really good, you must have been baking. I say : Yes, that's true. Then she says: What is your opinion on the creation of earth. Then is said that I believe in the Big Bang. 
And then she goes on and on about how the big bang must have been caused by someone greater than everything you can imagine.
She gave me a booklet and she left . The booklet was about a ''church'' meeting the coming weekend.
In the city close by from where I live, there is a tunnel for pedestrians and on the weekends there are always two people standing there with a trolley stacked with booklets. They also have shifts. When you walk through the tunnel and come nearer to them you have to be careful not to make eyecontact because otherwise they will start talking to you and you're just screwed.
Sometimes I see them walking with their plastic bags with booklets and in their dressy clothes, ringing doors and nobody anwsering them.
I also wanted to add that when we were learing about all these religions they would invite someone to come talk about their religion and one time there was a JW in our class and one of my classmates made some really good points, but she just ignored him.

 

[nastyhobbitses]

I have not been baptized, but where I live everything and everyone is catholic, so I went to catholic schools for 13 years. In school one teacher taught us about the old and new testament. Then I went to the second catholic school, where I learned a lot about al the other religions. So I know a lot about religions, but I am an atheist. I also learned about the Jehovah's Withesses. I have had a few encounters with Jehovah's Witnesses. This one time I was home alone and I was baking cookies, and the doorbell rang. I opened the door and there was one woman standing by the doorstep, like you normally do and another woman was standing on the pavement, about 3  meters from our front door. The woman that was standing close-by began sniffing and said : Ow that smells really good, you must have been baking. I say : Yes, that's true. Then she says: What is your opinion on the creation of earth. Then is said that I believe in the Big Bang. 
And then she goes on and on about how the big bang must have been caused by someone greater than everything you can imagine.
She gave me a booklet and she left . The booklet was about a ''church'' meeting the coming weekend.
In the city close by from where I live, there is a tunnel for pedestrians and on the weekends there are always two people standing there with a trolley stacked with booklets. They also have shifts. When you walk through the tunnel and come nearer to them you have to be careful not to make eyecontact because otherwise they will start talking to you and you're just screwed.
Sometimes I see them walking with their plastic bags with booklets and in their dressy clothes, ringing doors and nobody anwsering them.
I also wanted to add that when we were learing about all these religions they would invite someone to come talk about their religion and one time there was a JW in our class and one of my classmates made some really good points, but she just ignored him.

 

There were always JWs hanging out with their little tables and trolleys in the tunnel to get to the S train in Grand Central. And now that I'm in London, I sometimes see them hanging out outside of major Tube stations. I don't think I've ever seen anyone approach them or interact with them. I do miss the lady at Grand Central who used to stand in front of the turnstiles and sing a song that I can't remember except for her warbling "AND THE LOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRDDDDDDD adlfk;skf;fhs;" over and over (and sadly, she wasn't singing the final line of Ballad of Guiteau). I think she was JW or maybe another related group, since she had literature to distribute. Which no one ever took.