LDS Missionaries

[Eran of Arcadia]

No offense to any missionaries, but anyone wandering around handing out "the truth" better have some evidence to back it up with.

I really believe that everyone should be allowed to believe whatever they want.. but if you're going to go around preaching your version of reality as truth, at least be prepared to back it up with some hard evidence. Otherwise it's kinda silly and annoying.

What we have isn't "hard evidence" as such, but we simply invite people to pray and ask God if what we are telling them is true. Which proves to be a lot more effective than you might imagine.

Could you really just choose not to serve a mission? I thought it was required. I do like the idea that they do it on their own free will better though because then it truly would be an amazing sacrifice...not so much as "I'm here because my church requires me to be" but "I'm here because I want to be here"...if that makes any sense.

Although the leaders of the church say that every young man should serve a mission, at the same time they say that it shouldn't be done just for that reason, but rather that they should believe in it. Missionaries who go just because they are expected to (the pressure comes from the family usually, not the church leaders) tend to be pretty useless.

 

[warpus]

I suppose if I believed in prayer and/or was religious I would be far more open to missionaries.. as I am very open minded.. and as long as I already believed in the Christian God - I would probably be far more willing to listen to another interpretation of scripture..

However, I don't.. so from my point of view, even though I do respect you.. I dont' think I can respect what missionaries do.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

I suppose if I believed in prayer and/or was religious I would be far more open to missionaries.. as I am very open minded.. and as long as I already believed in the Christian God - I would probably be far more willing to listen to another interpretation of scripture..

However, I don't.. so from my point of view, even though I do respect you.. I dont' think I can respect what missionaries do.

Well, most people who have your perspective don't listen to us. That is a fact, any missionary realizes. But what we have to offer, to those willing to listen, is more than just another interpretation of scripture.

 

[LucyDuke]

Two things.

One, I've never understood why Jehovah's Witnesses go door-to-door, or really do anything to try to convert people. If I understand correctly, one of their basic beliefs is that Heaven has a 144000-person capacity. Wouldn't they have filled up by now?

Two, to those of you who've done the door-to-door thing, have you had successes? I mean, have you gone inside and had a good talk with a person or a family and then sometime after that seen them in church or something? Does this practice show actual returns?

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

it does show returns. It is about the highest-volume, lowest-yield method of finding people to teach we have, and I never got many results with it, but I know plenty of people who joined the church after being tracted.

And you would have to ask a JW, but I think their view of afterlife is slightly different from that. The 144K are pre-ordained, so no one is taking anyone's spot; but those are the ones who are with God. The rest of us, if good, live on an earthly paradies, and the evil are destroyed. Again, this is based on what I heard they believe, so grain of salt and all that.