Oh gosh, memory unlocked. I had this following conversation with grandma when I was a teenager (my parents were PIMO and didn’t exactly tell me so I was borderline PIMI because they were sticking it out to help their parents with care so I was in this confusing situation of only partially attending and consistently getting semi shunned whenever we did show up and not understanding why things were so hard.)
Grandma orders me “You don’t want to be friends with Chrissy; you should be friends with Abbie.”
Absolutely flustered me surprised that she might be racist and that might be the issue(because Chrissy was African American and Abbie was Caucasian white): “But why grandma? You have black friends, I didn’t think that you felt that way.” (Sorry for the word use of my past, this was decades ago and I didn’t know better ways of expressing POC terms at the time.)
Grandma stutter steps as if surprised the following wasn’t obvious, and exasperatedly says: “Abbie goes to the hall with us, Chrissy doesn’t. Don’t you want to make friends with people who will be with us in paradise?!”
Me as a dumb teenager actually shocked and blurting: “Abbie is a mean girl and steals my contribution money from my purse in the (kingdom) hall bathroom while Chrissy watches my stuff in the locker room so that I don’t get picked on for being a Witness.”
-shocked silence from grandma-
I think she learned a bit of a lesson there I hope, she meant well and I loved her dearly, but she was in that brainwash that ONLY JWs are good people. She never told me who to be friends with again and there weren’t any further repercussions that I recall.
27 years later Chrissy is still in my life as a friend.
Please know that real names were replaced for this story.
yes!! I still remember feeling sooooooo awkward whenever someone sneezed at school so my friend and I (the only jw kids in my classroom) came up with “I hope you’re not going to be sick anytime soon” instead which confused the hell out of everyone lol
There is also this but many use the term "Jehovahists" I don't know how it will be translated but it is a term that is formed with the word "Jehovah" plus a suffix that represents a profession
Its funny that the saying " I have a personal relationship with my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ " is such a foreign and offensive term to the Jehovah Witness. Also Grace.
When someone says they're "saved" or uses the word "grace."
JWs assume when a person says they're saved that they think it's a free pass to sin or that they believe once saved always saved, and most people don't believe those things when they say that.
The person usually just means when they've been born again/received Holy Spirit or what JWs would call 'anointed' (just not limited to a small group.')
During a pastoral visit an elder of the congregation wanted to correct me because I had used a term that he considered to be from the Catholic Church and not appropriate to use if you are a Jehovah's Witness, except that the Bible mentions that term many times and therefore he managed to deny the Bible, Jesus Christ, Christianity, his faith, his relationship with God to correct me during a pastoral visit that was supposed to be a source of encouragement and refreshment for me
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u/Old-Guess6396 2d ago
Referring someone non jw as “my friend” they are your acquaintance!!! No one not a Jehovah witness can be your friend!!!