I was just visited by the Jehovah's Witnesses!

[Boltingmadonna]

Back in our former place of residence, I actually acquired a fan--a JW who came to my door at random and was so awed by my knowledge of scripture that he asked if he could bring his wife over to meet me! She wasn't nearly as impressed with me though. In fact she looked decidedly cranky as he gushed over how much I knew about the Bible. :lol: After that he didn't come around as much. I missed most of his attempted visits by being away from home. His last contact was a plaintive note saying he hoped everything was okay. After that we moved away. I should have worked on him harder--I sense there was a potential convert to the Church of Bolting there!

My husband chased the Mormons away by telling them he could never go to their church because they didn't believe in the Real Presence. They made the mistake of asking him what that was, and he cheerfully undertook to 'splain it to them. After half an hour or so, they excused themselves and tiptoed away. One of the few occasions on which I'd ever say "Catholic theology FTW!"

My favorite technique was that of a friend who answered the door in his wifebeater, carrying a can of beer, and yelled "Can't you see I'm trying to watch TV? Go away!" They did. But it helps to be over six feet tall and have muscles. The damned have a sixpack.

Back when the Moonies used to come around, I was super friendly, invited them in, and asked if I could fix them a hamburger. That usually scared them off, because they weren't supposed to eat while on duty. Keeping them malnourished was one of the control techniques. I really did hope they'd accept, because I thought if they got a good meal, it might help to snap them out of their trance. They never did, though.

[Godlesspanther-2-]

I don't think it's very many, but I remember reading a while back that (at least for Mormons), the 2 years of required missionary time is really more to solidify the faith of the people doing it--they don't convert too many people, but they come back convicted as hell, apparently.

It is a difficult question because the definition of "convert" can be changed to make it look like they have better results than they do.

I spent a few minutes talking to the boys from LDS rather than just saying -- "not interested." They can and might consider that to be a level of success. If they wanted me to go to church they would have to drag my dead body into it -- but I was willing to talk to them.

Generally they consider a full successful convert to be one who will take literature from them, read it, invite them to come back and talk about it some more, and go to church with them. This is very rare and even that is not a true convert. If they get a person to actually get baptized in the Mormon church -- that's a real winner.

I have not seen stats from the official LDS church that tells how many the average pair of missionaries gets to do that. They brag about accumulating millions of converts every year on an international level. I have read accounts from ex-Mormons who had gone on missions. They claim that the missionaries get 1-3 baptisms over their two-year stint. Many get zero.

So 3 is a great success -- but we also need to consider the attrition rate after the subject gets dunked. LDS is just like any other group that engages in heavy proselytizing. About 5% of the converts stick around for more than a year. There is a huge difference in retention between converts and born-ins.

JWs -- about the same.

[Godlesspanther-2-]

Or in vinyl if you prefer...

I want one that says, "Unless you sell dangerous drugs -- No Soliciting."

Actually it would take someone who is much bolder than I am to hang that one out front.

[Spider Burps]

I fed some Mormons muffins once! When we lived in DC, they came to the door and I wanted to invite them, but the headship said no (he claimed they wouldn't be fun to mess with and he had to go to class in an hour). So, I offered them muffins! After making sure the muffins were made by a woman, and not my evil heathen headship, they took two a piece and left--but not after leaving me with some Spanish literature. *head scratch*

Also, here in NJ, I got lazily witnessed at by some Jehovah's Witnesses in a parking lot! I was walking to my car after leaving the grocery store and I hear a "Hey!" so I instinctively looked in that direction. I saw two guys sitting in a parked car (in a handicapped spot, no less) and one of them was waving a copy of The Watchtower at me. I shook my head "no" and kept walking. I don't know WTF that was about, but my theory is that my floor length denim skirt might've been the cause for the lazy witnessing.

[E Street Fan]

If you had a no soliciting sign on your door would the JW/mormons etc.. ignore it?

They do here. I put a sign on my grandmother's door that says "No Soliciting, Religious or Otherwise." She was getting bible thumpers as well as people pushing home improvements, which worried me since she's 83. No solicitors since. (I admit I hope one shows up so I can ask if they are soliciting for the blind and point to the sign. :P )

[GeoBQn]

When I was studying abroad in Israel, I went with my friends on a spring break trip to Egypt. We were at a restaurant in Suez while waiting for a bus when a man came up to us to try giving us Muslim literature. Religious proselytizing is one of my "berserk buttons," so I did my best to ignore it. (My friends said this was "very rude.") When we left the restaurant, I left the literature behind while my friends took the pamphlets and books they had been given. As we were walking out, the restaurant owner brought the books to me, saying, "Miss, you've forgotten these." I still refused to take them, but someone else in the group who was studying Arabic took them. At the end of our trip, we were at the border crossing back into Israel going through security and all of my friends who still had the literature were detained for several hours.

[maybeizfundie]

Dh drove them off by showing them Bible verses. :D

He said "Of *course* I'd love to have an elder come and to bible studies with me!!" and then spent a very long afternoon pointing out verses and debating their talking points. It was clear that they were antsy to leave but he kept bringing up new points and they were too polite to just run for it. :p So they stopped coming to our house, but if he saw their car parked (they carpool to a neighborhood and then spread out), he'd run down there with a Bible, and say "Hey, hey! I'm so glad you're here! I found something else i want to talk to you about!!" They abandoned that street altogether, lol, for as long as we were there. I need him to find time to do that again in our new neighborhood.

I was kind of surprised to run into them at a big city park a while ago. Going through the playground handing stuff to the mommies. :s

[Pandora Moon]

I'd love to see some of those articles, if you have time! Jehova's Witnesses once gave me a pamphlet about why abortion is evil, I don't know why. The Watchtower can have some hillarious articles. Great snarking possibilities:)

If you want to see some of the magazines check out http://www.jw.org/index.html?option=QrYQCsVrGZNT You do have to download them through.

You may also want to check this out http://www.watchtower.org/

BTW they are both official Jehovah's Witness sites.

Edited because Link and URL are not the same thing.

[thoughtful]

I love the copper Craftsman-style sign! I'd have it as much for making visitors laugh as to ward (you should pardon the expression) off prostitutelyzers (yes, I made that word up).

[crazyforkate]

I've only had to deal with religious visitors once. It was a pair of Mormon women, I was twelve and home alone with a cold, and they left immediately upon seeing that I was sick.

The JWs showed up when I was a baby twenty years ago. My mother held me up and said, "This little baby was saved by a blood transfusion. Not interested." They haven't come back since.

[RR88]

FYI they DON"T like it when you turn the tables on them and try to convert them to your religion. True story. Never saw them again though! :D :lol:

My dad has done that many times with Jews for Jesus. Each time, they admitted to knowing less Scripture than he did.

[Witsec7]

If you had a no soliciting sign on your door would the JW/mormons etc.. ignore it?

I have a no Zealots sign. It does not work.

[Maude]

I don't mind talking with religious solicitors, though they don't come around here much. My grandpa solved his JW problem by answering the door in the nude.

[singsingsing]

The JWs and Mormons who've come to my door have always been very polite, only come once or twice a year, and never keep me more than a minute or two, plus I've always been fascinated with different religious groups, so I don't have a problem talking to them. But I remember once the JWs came to my door and asked me if I thought sickness would ever be eradicated from the world. I said no. Then they said, "Last time we were here, another young lady who answered the door was sick. You're not sick, we hope, are you? [i was wearing a bathrobe and it was like 1 in the afternoon, so I'm assuming that's why they asked]" I found that really creepy, that they remembered my sister had been sick months before, last time they'd come to the house. Like, do they keep some sort of record?

[RR88]

Usually, the solicitors in my neighborhood are rude rabbis who need help funding their daughters' weddings but somehow found the cash to fly here from Israel.

[Katiebug]

The LDS missionaries we've encountered have always been polite and respectful - at least outwardly.

The batch of JWs who prowl our neighborhood are pushy and obnoxious. They go around in a 15 passenger van which follows them with literature and they get out every block or so to walk. The men in particular will not take "no thanks" as an answer and I just don't answer the door anymore when I know they're around.

We also get people selling home improvement scams. And pizza and Chinese restaurants leaving their menus.

[Kristelle]

I live near a huge camp(?) of them, so every summer they come by. My old dog had a pretty intimidating bark but was the sweetest thing in the world, so I used to pretend he was too vicious for me to open the door fully. My new dog hardly barks at all and is really skittish around strangers, so I'm not sure what I'm going to do this summer.

(Also, first time poster! Hello!)

[Inky]

I don't mind talking with religious solicitors, though they don't come around here much. My grandpa solved his JW problem by answering the door in the nude.

Our son solved ours, when he was around 18 he was sitting in the living room in his underwear when they came to the front door. He answered it and they stayed away for about 3 years. Now they've started coming again. We usually don't answer the door, however we have a JW Alarm system set up with our neighbour. Whoever spots them first calls the other and says "JW Alert".

When we were all rowdy teens, we were at a party. Knock comes to the door. One Teen rushes to bathroom to hold a plant substance over the toilet should the need to flush arise. Other teens answer the door. It was a group of mormons selling bibles door-to-door. When the door opener hollered out "Anyone here want to buy the Mormon Bible" a chorus of laughter broke out. We declined buying the bibles, and the plant substance was safe from flushery.

[Mela99]

A JW tried to talk to me at the train station once. She asked me if I was concerned about what was going on in the world and if I was afraid of what was happening and did I worry about the world being too messed up or some such thing.

I told her no. She was shocked.

I then went on to say that the world has always been messed up. I said I could have it much worse. I could be a medieval peasant or live in Nazi Germany. I said that everyone thinks the world they live in is the most messed up world ever.

She left me alone after that.

^ winning.

I like Robin Williams' bit about religious people coming to your door. "Show up buck naked and when they ask you if you've found Jesus, offer to go with them naked to look for him."

[redcurls]

How often do JW's usually show up in more populated areas? I live on a farm in the middle of nowhere, and we've only been visited by JW's once in 20+ years. My mom said they were very polite and left when she told them "We already have a church." As far as Mormon missionaries go, I've never seen one, ever. However, I did attend a Mormon worship service about one month ago-and I had never felt more unwelcome or uncomfortable in my life. It was awful.

[ADoyle90815]

One way I got the JW's to quit showing up was answering the door wearing one of my blood drive t-shirts. As for the Mormons, they tend to leave me alone, even though their apartment is down the street from me. They do seem polite when I see them shopping at the local Target on their day off, as it's the one day when they don't wear the white shirts.

[SealFan1963]

The JWs (2 women) came to my place last year. I politely told them that I wasn't interested, and they removed me from their list. I actually saw one of the girls cross my adress from their sheet, and I haven't been disturbed since. Never had any LDS missionaries ring my place. Now salesmen selling magazine subscribtions, on the other hand...They are the most annoying!

I wonder how many converts do the JW and LDS get by going door-to-door?

I was visited by the Jehovah's Witnesses earlier too! It was my sister-in-law.

Jehovah's Witnesses is one of the fastest growing religions, so going door to door works pretty well. Especially when they come across someone who is looking for a meaning to life. That's how they recruited my brother. 18 year old boy, home and bored, pretty girls with long brown hair comes to door and asks him if he wants to attend their meeting. 23 years later and he is an elder at the local meeting hall.

The nice thing is that strange JW NEVER EVER come to my door. I can't recall in the 20 years that my brother and sister-in-law have been married ever meeting a JW that I didn't like as most of them were very nice people.

[lilith]

One way I got the JW's to quit showing up was answering the door wearing one of my blood drive t-shirts. As for the Mormons, they tend to leave me alone, even though their apartment is down the street from me. They do seem polite when I see them shopping at the local Target on their day off, as it's the one day when they don't wear the white shirts.

We only have a few Mormon temples and churches in Sydney, and I've been told that they are specifically asked not to door knock in the areas around the meeting houses. Apparently the locals are much more tolerant of the activities and development applications of the meeting houses if they are left in peace by the door knockers. Maybe your neighbors have a similar attitude.

We do get Mormon missionaries imported from America though. I kind of like encountering them, Mormonism, esp Mormon fundamentalism, was my original fundie interest, and I like to talk to them. Not sure if the pleasure is mutual though.

[MyNameIsJonas]

When JW used to come around our neighborhood, my dad would invite them in and debate with them in the sitting room. My mom HATED it. Eventually they figured out they weren't going to win and haven't been back in our cul-de-sac for years, even though I do see them in other parts of our development from time to time.

[Maul the Koala]

":1gdtrynj]It is a difficult question because the definition of "convert" can be changed to make it look like they have better results than they do.

I spent a few minutes talking to the boys from LDS rather than just saying -- "not interested." They can and might consider that to be a level of success. If they wanted me to go to church they would have to drag my dead body into it -- but I was willing to talk to them.

Generally they consider a full successful convert to be one who will take literature from them, read it, invite them to come back and talk about it some more, and go to church with them. This is very rare and even that is not a true convert. If they get a person to actually get baptized in the Mormon church -- that's a real winner.

I have not seen stats from the official LDS church that tells how many the average pair of missionaries gets to do that. They brag about accumulating millions of converts every year on an international level. I have read accounts from ex-Mormons who had gone on missions. They claim that the missionaries get 1-3 baptisms over their two-year stint. Many get zero.

So 3 is a great success -- but we also need to consider the attrition rate after the subject gets dunked. LDS is just like any other group that engages in heavy proselytizing. About 5% of the converts stick around for more than a year. There is a huge difference in retention between converts and born-ins.

JWs -- about the same.

I've known quite a few Mormons who did their mission work in places where a lot of adolescents/young women wanted out of said country. It was amazing the amount of women that would pay so much attention and look to go through baptism because of the young North American men. The women were out of there as soon as they found out the nice missionaries couldn't date. My heart broke when one of the guys was telling me that he had this little way of flirting with this one woman all the time without being caught.