bbobrzynski:
Yesterday I was visited by two Jehovah’s Witnesses. They gave me a copy of their Watchtower and Awake! magazines. They read from the Bible and said that they would be back later.
What is the best way to handle this situation?
Did you ask them to visit you? No. They just popped by unannounced. JWs at your door are like pop-up ads when you are surfing the Web. They are annoyances that are best dealt with by being blocked.
They have come to your door in the belief that since you are not a JW, you are in the grip of Satan and, if you do not convert and join their minority religion, you will be justly destroyed by “Jehovah” God’s wrath.
It’s kind of a no-win situation dealing with them when they come to your door. First, most Catholics do not understand the Bible well enough in order to refute their carefully fashioned “proof texting” arguments. Since they travel in pairs, one of the pair is usually quite skilled in how to respond to objections. They are trained how to do so during regular meetings down at the Kingdom Hall. It is a rare person who can stump them, and even if they did, the JW just runs back to the Elders and obtains an “answer” which they share with you upon their next visit. Second, if you do not pay them the 50 cents (or whatever) for their Awake and Watchtower publications, and send them away, they consider your rejection as a sign that they are right and you are wrong, since they are convinced (i.e., brainwashed) that only they are in the “truth”. If you take their literature, they interpret it as a sign of encouragement that you are open to being “converted” by them. They will record the information concerning their visit, and they, or some other JW, will drop by again really soon.
You have to ask yourself. Why am I a Catholic? You had better have good and strong reasons for being one, and not just superficial ones, or you will fall prey to their tactics.
Open up your Bible (if you have one)…if not, get one at your local bookstore or even at a store like Wal-Mart. Reflect upon these passages from scripture the next time you are bothered by these people: 1 John 4:1-6; 1 Corinthians 15:15-19; 1 Timothy 6: 3-6; and most especially 1 Tiimothy 5: 13.
Most of all I urge you to know your Catholic faith and know it well. My brother is a JW elder. He was once a practicing Catholic but he and his wife got suckered into the JW’s because they didn’t know their Catholic faith. They just went through the motions of going to mass, saying a few formal prayers here and there. When the JW’s came to call they were easy targets.
While the JWs are nice people that mean well, the same can be said about the Moonies, and David Koresh’s group, and the Jim Jones people, and of course, the Heaven’s Gate adherents. Being a nice person doesn’t mean that what you believe is theological truth. Don’t fall for the love bombing. It is not about how you feel. Feelings change like the wind. The truth stands firm. If Jesus was led along by his feelings, he would have never gone through and endured Calvary for us all.
May you be enshrouded with the wisdom of God’s Holy Spirit, for HE (personal pronoun) is the SPIRIT OF TRUTH.
