The Jw`s are seen on every city and and town street corner with glossy brochures and a cart and are capturing the limelight by doing this that the Mormons always want.Are they expressing frustration about this?The Mormons sometimes set up information displays in public places and try to catch interested people on street corners.

I imagine it must drive them crazy. Where I live there haven't been Mormon missionaries for a long, long time. Nobody's interested here. But there are plenty of J.W.'s. They have a large Kingdom Hall, but the people inside are aging. Not many of the young are interested. But J.W. over the years have been more popular than Mormonism. I don't know why.

There are no christian cults whatsoever where I live, but in the European countries where I used to live, JWs are everywhere, and I hardly ever see any mormons. It is quite striking. At one point I went up to JWs and asked them about this. "Hi, I see a lot of you around here in Wiesbaden. But what about other groups? Do you see a lot of mormons around?"

Deer in the headlights stare mostly, and sometimes someone will ask, "what are mormons?"

On my mission in France, they were considered the "competition." Led by Satan, of course, while we were holy and righteous and correct.

When I first arrived, there was very much a "tradition" in the mission of doing "scripture battle" with the JWs. 'Cause we could, of course, show them how completely wrong they were using the bible, the BoM, and the D&C (never mind that they didn't consider the latter two anything authoritative at all). Missionaries who "defeated" them in public in such a battle were celebrated throughout the mission, singled out for praise at zone conferences, etc.

Then one such encounter in Nantes led to a physical altercation. With the mormon mishie throwing the first punch of course. Both of the combatants were arrested -- major embarrassment for the mormon church!

After that the word came down hard from the mission home: no more engaging with the JWs. Anybody caught doing so would be immediately transferred, and a second offense would get you sent home. We were also ordered to remove any/all "Green Dragons" (JW bible versions) from mission apartments.

Looking back, the "cult vs. cult" warfare seems so pointless and silly. At the time, I considered it giving way to "the enemy." So glad I'm out of the cult!

ificouldhietokolob Wrote:
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> Then one such encounter in Nantes led to a
> physical altercation. With the mormon mishie
> throwing the first punch of course. Both of the
> combatants were arrested -- major embarrassment
> for the mormon church!

So awesome!

I'm guilty of allowing them to tract me out at a particular apartment. I think I had every anti-mormon piece the JW had published on our "coffee" table. Every visiting elder that came over for district meetings couldn't resist reading them. If the so called Mormon lies weren't so slanted to the JW's ridiculous beliefs then a bunch of us missionaries would have been out sooner!

In the UK we'd encounter the JW's all the time. Often they would be on one side of the street while we were on the other, or we would be tracting a street and the people would say that the JW's had just been there.

Once we sort of just met the JW's in the middle of the street as we both knew we were messing with each others contacting and we had a little chuckle about it. We didn't get into anything doctrinal.

I was amazed though at the number of JW's we encountered. I had no idea as a greenie from Utah that the witnesses were even in England.

We even ran into some Moonies a few times. They were actually pretty nice.

There are about three times as many active JWs as Mormons in the UK! Where I live no Mormon wards or branches but two kingdom halls! When I was on my mission we bumped into JWs all the time. My companion and I were both from London serving in Northern England. The JW Pioneers were also from London so we had lots to talk about. One family we were teaching we were teaching the mother and the JWs the daughters!

Britboy Wrote:
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> There are about three times as many active JWs as
> Mormons in the UK! Where I live no Mormon wards or
> branches but two kingdom halls! When I was on my
> mission we bumped into JWs all the time. My
> companion and I were both from London serving in
> Northern England. The JW Pioneers were also from
> London so we had lots to talk about. One family we
> were teaching we were teaching the mother and the
> JWs the daughters!


That's funny,so who won?U guys or the JWs?

They did! We could never progress the mother and the girls were taught by JWs their age so ended up joining!

So how did you get a long with your American companions? The English elders I knew on my mission seemed to have trouble getting along with the Utah guys - especially the Utah Valley boys.

I had companions from California, and Wyoming that I really got on well with but had a bad experience with a Utah boy! I had only been a member a year when I went on my mission and non of my family were members also the branch I came from was very small. This Utah comp came from a very rich family and he faulted his wealth! Lots of massive care packages from home which he didn't like to share. He could afford lots of suits and coats. I served in Northern England so very cold. The only money I had was from the church missionary fund. So when my suit wore out I had to get another from the second hand store and I regularly ran out of money for food! He was also very sporty ,I wasn't, so he wanted to play basket ball or soft ball every p day and I didn't! So lots of conflict.But I have happy memories of lots of other US elders!

When I was a missionary in Switzerland in the early 80s the JWs were not allowed to contact people on the street. They could stand and hold brochures but could not approach people. The Mormons were free to set up their street display and walk up to people and start conversations. We felt so superior to the JWs because of this.

When the JWs tracked they would carve a little "x" on doors and doorbells if they were rejected by whoever opened the door. They were also very aggressive, telling people they would go to hell if they rejected their message. Sometimes we would unknowingly knock on doors just after the JWs. People were very angry and would threaten to call the police.

I have never known JWs being aggressive and as they believe hell is another name for the grave I can't believe they would tell them they are going to hell! Perhaps you have mixed them up with Evangelicals?

The JWs were very aggressive which is why they were not allowed to contact people on the street. They stood on the sidewalk, holding their brochures for everyone to see but were not allowed to talk to people unless they were approached. The Mormon missionaries were allowed to stop people on the street and ask questions and also set up their ridiculous street display. Today, Mormon missionaries from the U.S. are not allowed to do missionary work in Switzerland without a work permit or visa (can't remember which). It's pretty much killed the Mormon missionary program in Switzerland.

Not just the JWs but also the Salvation Army! When I was in Zurich in the 1970s they would stand in the streets and hold up their War Cry newspaper. I asked them why they didn't talk to anyone ? They said the law forbade them from approaching anyone!

In 1975 in Finland. I know, ancient history....

The Mormon church had 40 baptism that year. The same year the JW's had 4,000 baptisms. It was not even a close competition.

The world, as many of you know, did not end in 1975 as the JW's prophesied. They lost a third of their membership when the world continued on. We could not compete against the JWs who literally were everywhere. Somehow there are now more active JW's in the world than Mormons. The end of the world prophesy was just a speed bump to the Watchtower, even though it ruined many lives.

I remember that 1975 JW prediction. The Mormon missionaries used to talk about it and laugh. Before the prediction didn't come true, there were tons of JW's around trying to warn people for the last time. Afterwards, there were few to be seen. But they would still drop lots of literature at the local public library. I used to read it, proud of the fact that I had chosen the RIGHT religion. Mormons had true prophets--they would NEVER prophesy something that didn't come true! I had learned LDS church history in Seminary, so I knew for sure that no failed prediction had ever happened. Mormons were so honest, they would NEVER dream of whitewashing anything!

We were often confused with the JW's. What fun going out to tract in a small town and having the little kids running in front of us yelling 'Bibelforscher' (the slang word for JW's).

No-open-doors-for-us-ly yrs,

S

In Germany they used to be called ,Ernest Bible Students! before calling themselves Jehovah's witnesses.