The universe is paying me back for all the doors as a JW I knocked on uninvited and unwanted. I'm sorry World! Mormon missionaries three times in two weeks at my door. My fault - I don't say NO decisively enough.

First it was two pretty young women. One said "We are here representing our church. We'd like to talk to you about Jesus Christ." "No thanks" I promptly responded. Then, perversely, felt guilty because as a Christian I should welcome a discussion about Jesus (right?) The missionary smiled but looked so disappointed she touched my heart. The previously silent one piped up "We would like to do some service for you". Then, my fatal error - I hesitated. There were some tasks I could use help with that leaped immediately to mind. Due to my unexpectedly slow recovery after my Christmas flu-ish-ness, the effects of which linger, but mostly because of my mom, who lives with me, who has been ill for a good while. Between the two of us sickies things slide. Especially yard work. Not that I'd ask sister mishies to do that type of task (I know, sexist). But I thought maybe they could sit with Mom while I ran out and tended to some business. Hence, the hesitation that they pounced on, while I was pondering these stray thoughts.

So I said yeah, maybe there's something you can do. I'll call you. Give me a card. Of course, whether it's a ploy or not, they didn't have any cards. (Seems strange to me but maybe it's a way they have to get your number). So I gave them mine. I said I'd think about it and let them know what, if anything, they could do and *I* would call *them*. Within a day my phone starts ringing and it’s them. Predictable. I missed a couple of their calls. Within two days, mishies at my door again – couldn’t answer – busy with sickbed stuff. Next day, mishies again – this time two “elders”, looking all of 16. It may have worked for me to ask the females to sit with Mom for an hour but not the males. They can’t do it anyway due to their rules. I wasn’t thrilled about the switch from the young women, whether I would have got their help or not. I don’t think that in the middle of a week/middle of a month it’s transfer time so why different mishies within a week?

They said they were following up on the chance to do some service for me, as discussed with the other missionaries. I told them I was not comfortable with them working for me for nothing as I knew they couldn’t take money. I said it was mainly just a fleeting thought that the sister missionaries could have visited my Mom (not that Mom would have been likely to say OK to that – I have no clue why I didn’t say a decisive no in the first place). The second lot of missionaries were friendly and chatty and personable and started explaining to me their theory of “service” and said they and others often do service in the community. “It’s what we do”. Maybe my eyes are failing me but their name tags didn’t appear to be the same as the ones I’m used to. I didn’t see a church name on them at all. Is that possible? Also, they never once used the word ‘Mormon’. The first set referred to “representing our church”, which they didn’t name. Neither set ever used the new and improved complete name of the church either. No Mormon. No Latter Day Saints.

The male missionaries sounded positively evangelical. When I told them straight up that I was not the least bit interested in discussions or conversions they smiled and said oh no it’s all about service. “We just want to bring people to Christ” or "celebrate Christ together" - I can't quite recall. Say what? Sounding a lot like Billy Graham more so than any Mormon I’ve ever spoken to. “I’m already there” I said reflexively. They went on about how people of all different beliefs and churches all work together for Christ and it’s not about converting each other (my major paraphrase – I can’t remember their exact words but that was the meaning or message I gathered).

Significant, because that’s a big change from any Mormon message I’ve ever heard.

I said I would think about it and get back to them but that they would have to take food from me as I couldn’t let them work for free (especially doing something I would pay someone else to do if I couldn’t do it myself). I meant I’d give them a few tins of beans and spaghetti type meals to take back to their apartment with them. I’m not a cook so wouldn’t subject them to a meal I prepared. They brushed it off at first but then said “We usually call on people between 5 and 7 and a lot of people are eating then so sometimes there’s food”. Could that be WHY they call around at those times? Are they still hungry? (As were many of the missionaries I knew when some of the bishops laid down the law against members feeding them any more). Don’t they know, though, that for most people that’s a fairly annoying time to call, especially without notice?

I ended up saying “I joined your church and stayed in a few years [3 to be exact] but then I went back to my previous EV church”. From their low key reaction I think they already knew. Maybe I’m still on their list somewhere – I have had other elders drop by from time to time in the past few years. One time, because they were pressing so much, I finally agreed for them to wash my outside windows. They likely still have my name as a prospect? Wouldn't you think that people who have left their church are far less of a conversion prospect than those who are new to their spiel?

I wish I had cut it off in the first place. I think I would have if it had been the male missionaries to start with. Something in the expression of the young woman got to me and I did the fatal hesitation thing. Now, for whatever reason, it’s the elders who are calling. And speaking of calling – I had left it that I would get back to them if I had any jobs for them (same as I had said to the other two). Within ONE DAY, again, they were phoning me.

It’s annoying that they don’t respect your decisions – I said *I* wanted to call them *if* I had a job for them. If they would even leave it for a few days between calls but no, they call back the next day or within two days. High pressure sales techniques.

What bugs me is that I liked them, all four of them. But I have no desire to discuss Mormonism with them, at all, and no inclination to try and convert them to mainstream Christianity (I am not the best EV Christian in that regard). I do often have a hard time saying no. In this case, I do want a bit of help with my mom, and I do need major assistance with the yard work this year. So that was their entry point. They came by just at a weak moment for me and when I do have work to do. But apart from the whole Mormon thing, it’s a bit strange to get people you don’t know to rake your leaves and sweep your sidewalks, no? I guess partly I know that they would rather do that than search endlessly for people to take the discussions. Weird how I end up thinking I can help them and they are likely thinking they can help me or even convert me. No danger of the latter.

So, in that event, we each want something from the other. An uncomfortable interaction for me, Mormon or not.

I don’t need advice telling me to Just Say No. I know that. I will likely do that. But I thought it was interesting, and wanted to share, how much the missionary message has morphed, from the frantic scramble to "take the discussions”, with member involvement, to this focus on “service” and the message that all believers of any stripe are in one big happy family together. No emphasis on everybody becoming Mormon. At least initially.

This should be a good thing – like the Mormon Church is moving towards more mainstream and inclusive ideas. Except is it really true? Or just another ruse to get people into the font? And has their basic belief system really changed? And does it matter if so or if not? What bothers me the most is the probability that it’s still not honest. “We don’t want to convert you”. “Whatever your beliefs are that’s fine”. “We just enjoy doing service”. “Representing our church” without disclosing its name. Etc. It’s nothing like the message the missionaries were armed with when I met them and there was such an almighty rush to get people baptized. I took four months to make a decision about it (having been introduced to the missionaries by a friend) and they told me that was a really long time. Now they just want to cut your grass? And they’re even bringing the lawnmower!

I know, I know. I need to Just Say NO.

I will.

Probably.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 03/29/2019 05:17PM by Nightingale.

Sometimes the cost of being friendly or just plain pleasant can come with a price if the one you are being friendly to has an agenda. Whatever the individual qualities of the young men and women you met I am sure that behind them is someone pushing for conversion numbers.

I guess I have been fortunate. I have been at my current address for about 14 years and have had missionaries at my door only once in that time. They came seven or eight months after I moved in and I have no doubt my next door neighbor at my previous address (he was the bishop of the local ward there) quickly passed on the details of my new location. I have looked more than once to see if my house has some kind of marking that alerts any potential door knockers but none have shown up since.

Most of us want to be friendly and neighborly people and I don't want to become cynical about the motive people may have. Sadly, though, we have to ask ourselves if opening the door even a smidge might be too wide an opening.

kentish Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sometimes the cost of being friendly or just plain
> pleasant can come with a price if the one you are
> being friendly to has an agenda.


That was my thought exactly.

You let the foxes into the hen house. Mormons will use any favor that they do for you to guilt you into further meetings. It's like a crack dealer giving out free crack to 1st time users to get you hooked. Now, your going to have to be rude to get them to go away. It's like The Godfather. Now, they make you believe you owe them. Cut it off now and forever.

ask them if they would read Galatians out loud to you OPie ~

You must resign! Mishies kept coming to my house incessantly...they were arrogant jerks, never offering to do service (not that I would have taken them up on it), and I knew that my parents were sending them to harass me because I live in the same neighborhood (same 'ward'). I was born into this horrible excuse for a religion and stopped participating when I was 18...once my parents gave me an ultimatum...live under our roof and attend church, or move out. I chose the latter and never looked back. That was back in 1997!!! They harassed me for the next 21 years...until I finally resigned last year. I HAD to...and guess what? The mishies haven't darkened my door since. And I've seen them in my neighborhood a plenty! :-D

Anyhow, knowing how I was treated by them...I find their tactics very suspect. I will never trust a Mormon EVER. Especially not my own parents.

We're not the only ones scratching our heads over this change in approach/direction;etc.
A young woman who I knew in my old branch/ward posted on a social media site about how all the changes had her searching for answers in the New Testament (imagine that),
And how she believed it to be the same as Mark 7 where Jesus responded to the rebuke of the Pharisees by the "tradition of the elders". She said, "I guess we're shedding the accumulation of 189 years of elder's traditions".
She is an intelligent person capable of rational thought, although, her family(what's left of it),
are steeped in the church and the covenant.
I imagine we all are going to be witness to another directional shift to the church, formerly known as The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints. Stock up on your favorite snack and beverage and enjoy the ride!

Decades and decades ago, it was "get converts."
Then it became, "Get baptisms" (i.e. low retention among converts)
Then, "Get inside people's homes, and give lessons."
Then, "Get people to accept a Book of Mormon from you."
Recently, "Get involved with people any way you can" i.e. service.

Point being, with doors increasingly shut in their faces, the mishies (and levels further up) are proportionately desperate to show that they are actually accomplishing something.

Regarding the "we-don't-want-to-convert-you," that is classic cultic scam. Unless and until they renounce their claim to being the One True Church, they have to convert people--everybody else is lost. It's a soft but deceptive position to penetrate the defenses of people of other faiths.

Nightingale, send them to my place. I haven't started spring clean-up yet!

I'm sorry that you are being hassled by the missionaries, Nightingale. I doubt that the pressure for numbers is any the less (hence the quick phone calls to you.) They are just going about it a different way. Perhaps you can block their calls?

The question is how do you get the help that you need? Perhaps you could try a local church or the Scouts to see if you can get some volunteer help. If you give your community office in charge of senior services a call, they might have some ideas. Or if you call a high school guidance counselor, she might know some kids looking to make some pocket money.

You might be able to get some volunteer help out of the Mormons, but it comes at a price.

It's not worth the price.

Unless you want a fanatical interchange.

You won't convince them as they have canned answers for anything you say. Their only trust is to try to drag you into a crazy belief system.

If they’re offering free labor, get some chores lined up.

That's what I thought at first, bab, but the price is too steep in the end. First, I don't like to take advantage and get free work out of people. Second, the whole Mormon aspect of it disturbs me. Third, obviously they have a hidden agenda and that bugs me mightily. Fourth, I can get my brothers and some neighbour kids to help. The neighbours are saving the money they earn doing yard work for school and I'm happy to contribute to that effort. I feel much more comfortable when both parties get something positive out of the arrangement. I don't appreciate the pressure for me to find the Mormons someone to take their so-called discussions with the purpose of railroading them into a church I didn't like myself and wouldn't recommend to anyone else.

I forgot to include in my OP one of the main issues for me: Mormon Double Talk. The way some/many Mormons I have met, especially missionaries, make two entirely opposite statements, one right after the other, and don’t seem to notice their own double talk. I don’t know if it’s a contagious thinking error amongst them or if it’s deliberate with the intention to obfuscate, confuse a listener or dishonestly persuade a person to the Mormon point of view. Maybe both and more. It does my head in. I like things to make sense. Especially if it’s two statements one after the other. It’s not sensible for the statements to directly and immediately completely contradict each other. Conversations with missionaries, in my experience, go around in circles as they duck and weave and agree with a statement you make even if it directly contradicts something they just said themselves. Just like a bob-and-weave style sales presentation to blind a prospect with a bait and switch.

I am often left shaking my head. How can you state (words to the effect) that we’re all together in Christ and yet immediately after essentially say the total opposite? Either you are confused or you are desperate to find common ground with a prospect and/or are trying to convince someone of something by dishonest means (i.e. approaching outright lies, as missionaries have done, in my experience; claiming a belief the church doesn’t really teach or bending or hiding a Mormon doctrine so as to be more palatable to someone you’re trying to convert).

As I said in my OP, the missionaries at my door the other day were personable, cheery and ostensibly bringing a message of inclusion. None of the four missionaries (first visit two females, second visit two males) ever mentioned the word Mormon or uttered the name of their church (maybe they’re confused about what to call it, given the recent major change or maybe they’ve been told to downplay the whole Mormon thing altogether – sneaky and deceitful if so). After the first of the pair of male missionaries engaged me in conversation the most and essentially indicated that (1) they weren’t looking to convert and (2) all those of any faith are all in one big happy acceptable family and (3) “we just want to be of service” and I had said OK I’d think about whether I had any outside chores they could do in the name of service, the second one piped up to state “but it’s about sharing our message”. You mean the “message” your comp just told me was about service? Of course not. So one comp goes on and on about how it’s to do with service and I ask several times if that is true, while the other one remains silent until the end of the conversation, when I’m nearly lulled into actually continuing to interact with them and perhaps even accepting their help (out of my feeling a bit desperate just in that moment about some current life circumstances). Then the second comp brings up the sharing spectre. Meaning proselytizing. It makes your eyes cross. Does not compute. Doesn’t make sense to have two people, apparently on the same errand, stating two completely opposite goals.
I finished off the interaction by saying that if I knew of anyone who was interested in their church I’d let them know. “But don’t hold your breath”, I added. At least they both laughed.

I had told them that I returned to my pre-mo EV church (Mennonite Brethren) after leaving the Mormon Church. I could not have been more upfront about where I stood regarding Mormonism. Tried it. Left it. Do not want to be converted. Do not know anyone else who does. And yet they persisted. I know – I didn’t shut it down quickly, well or decisively.

Also, I lied. I haven’t gone back to the MB church. I felt annoyed that I ended up lying to them just to make it stop.
Too, when they said they would gladly do the yard work (with no ulterior motive but really then of course it comes out that there IS an ulterior motive – that is one of my top three peeves about religion in general – there is all too often an ulterior motive involved) I said I didn’t have any tools like mowers or rakes even (long story). They said they had yard tools they could bring, including a lawn mower! I was surprised. What are they doing all tooled up like that? It seemed unbelievable to me. But it was part of seeming to be all things to all people and maybe truly equipped to do a lot of helping things in the name of "service". I asked them if they had a vehicle as they couldn’t carry all that equipment from their apartment on foot. Only then did they say that a MEMBER had the tools and could give them a ride. “We do it all the time” stated one.

See how things change from the beginning to the end of the spiel? Now there’s going to be a local Mormon, from the ward I used to attend, coming to cut my lawn? I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at how the whole thing evolved to that place. It brought back the memory of how I so often tried to duck my VTs and HTs and how they insisted that they must visit me every month. I absolutely hated it. Now I'm going to INVITE one (or two or ??) to come over and have to end up exerting a lot of effort making them go away again? NOT.

The longer you’re out, the weirder things seem and, as a “convert” (I don’t refer to myself as a convert as I told them before my baptism that I didn’t believe in the JS thing – so yeah, even more fool me for getting into their font) the whole thing seemed beyond weird to me at various points. Now, after years away, it’s even worse.

On a recent RfM thread the poster Exminion said “…when we were in the Mormon cult, we all felt confused, like something was weird and wrong”.

Yeah. Confused. At the time. Upon leaving. Still now.

Weird. Wrong.

Truer words…

They give religion a bad name. :)

I appreciate all your comments and suggestions. Thank you for reading and for sharing your ideas. I really appreciate it.

And yeah. I'm not gonna do it...

I think it was tacky that a different set of mishies returned at a later date. That's a big turnoff. If the sisters were in the area to do a "knock-out" or there to cover a bunch of streets, then they should have explained so. I think it leaves a bad impression.

I guess that I am too old schooled, but we were quick to point out that we were not the regularly assigned missionaries. We always told people so if they wanted to hear more then they would not be shocked. Surprisingly, many people were genuinely interested in how missionaries were assigned to areas and how they covered different cities. Looking back, discussion of mission logistics probably got us into homes more often than we realized.

The missionaries are desperate for interaction. Not too much is going on so, whatever phone numbers they can ring they will. If you used their service for 3 or 4 more times for them to do things it's hard to say if you would eventually be dropped because of no progression in the discussions.