How "Strict" was the mentality in your congregation?

by JH 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  JH

  Like I said earlier on another thread, in the late 80's in my congregation, a brother could not shake the hand of a sister entering the hall. No touching !!!

  I also recall going out in the field service and it was cold, like -20C, and I went to a MS house just to say hi, and I saw his wife waiting in front of her house for a lift to go out in the field service. Seeing that it was very cold out and my car was warm, I told her to sit in the car until her lift arrived. So she sat in the back. Then her husband came outside and saw that both of us were in the car "alone", me in the front, and her in the back, he told me, "this shouldn't be". She souldn't be alone with you in the car. I said why, she is in the back and it's cold out.

  Also, she used to cut my hair, so I had to wait for her children to be back home from school, so that she wouldn't be alone with me in her house. She said, I trust you, but what will the neighbours say, if they see you enter my home and my husband isn't here?
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  JH

  Oh yeah, when I was driving people home after the field service, I had to drive the sisters first even though it was a much longer ride, so that I wouldn't end up alone with a sister in my car....

  Now you know why I'm single......I had NO opportunities to pinch a sister....
• 

  Gopher

  In our area, it was acceptable for a brother to drive a sister somewhere in service, or give a ride from Point A to Point B, if their consciences permitted it. But one elder almost had a fit when I took his daughter (about my age) along on a Bible study. So maybe not.

  Maybe it's a good thing you aren't stuck with a dub-wife.
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  MadTiger

  Reading this is actually embarrassing for me. Honestly, even if I didn't have the same exact extreme views, just being a little imbalanced like that is disgusting to me now.
  
  Principles gone crazy.
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  Bonnie_Clyde

  JW's are not the only ones that have some strict ideas. Clyde and I were being visited by two Morman boys. It was summertime and we sat on the front porch. One of the boys asked to use the bathroom. I opened the door to lead him inside and show him the bathroom, but he said he wasn't allowed to be inside the house alone with a woman. Clyde had to go with him instead.
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  jaguarbass

  90% of all the witnesses I knew from the 60's and 70's got divorced. They mus have seen they had a problem. But they couldnt do anything about it.
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  Soledad

  Those strict rules should have been implemented in my congregation. Brothers were way too touchy feely with sisters. Maybe it was because it was a Spanish congregation. Latin people are like that. But I know that all too often I felt uncomfortable with the way I was touched.
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  Highlander

  For the most part, my congo was very strict.

  bf/gf couples coud not sit together at the meeting until they were engaged.(even that was frowned upon, they wanted you to be married in order to sit together)

  A friend of mine wasn't alowed to ride alone in a car with his step-aunt.(she was in her 60s or 70s, he was in his late 20s or early 30s)

  Two sets of unmarried couples couldn't double date without a chaperone.

  I'll add more as I remember.
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  Inquisitor

  The congregation that I gew up in had this unwritten code where a sister can be reprimanded for quoting or citing scripture to a brother in regular conversation. That act constitutes as "teaching in the congregation" or "not showing proper respect for the headship of brothers". The "obvious" exception being when a sister comments at the meetings.

  INQ
• 

  WTWizard

  I think not only was the mentality in our congregation strict, but was unevenly imposed. They did everything possible to ensure I would never have the opportunity to meet the opposite sex, taking advantage of my problem in that area, so I would have no choice but to go to Beth Hell or on some mission to help push Nigeria up so high that there would be, not 7 million, but 7 billion Witlesses. That is what they hoped to accomplish.

  They made all these rules--every time I was doing something that they felt might lead to a potential sister encounter, they banned it for me (even though it was still allowed for others). They seem to think that being nice to the children now would make them attracted to me when they became of age, so they put their heavy foot down on anything that might have that effect. They even reproved an innocent person and forced them away from me on this account--hoping that they would not be able to set me up for a member of the opposite sex at that time or at a later time. It was transparently obvious that they wanted to make 100% sure that I would be celibate for life, as if Jehovah hadn't already done a thorough enough job of that before.

  And they arranged the book studies, from whom you are supposed to select your closest friends, so all I ever got was the men and the really old (and ugly, sickly) "sisters". They could not create an all-men book study for me, because they needed some of those men to conduct the other book studies. But they frequently rearranged it so that I could not draw toward anyone that might be, or become (when they reach age 18), a potential marriage partner. Of course all this was done behind my back.

  Well, instead of going to Nigeria and giving them a boost, I now try to expose the Watchtower Society and its boringness both here and on MySpace. Hopefully someone in Nigeria will be able to translate it into the local language and spread the apostate word there. Now, if only we could have another Danny Haszard working in Nigeria, that would help pay them back by ruining the Watchtower Society's party of hitting 7 million.