So, The Missionaries Just Came By!

[saemo]

They are just young and idealistic like most kids their age who think they know everything. They do dumb stuff sometimes (often) when they are confronted with a world view that doesn't agree with theirs. It doesn't have anything to do with them being raised LDS.

I recently went back to college (in Montana) to finish my degree and this kind of attitude is typical. Try challenging any kid this age on something they truly believe they are right about and they don't often handle it very maturely. I witnessed so many kids storming out of my religious, historical, and philosophical classes that it began to feel like a spectator sport.

The best were when a Catholic, Evangelical, and atheist would get into it. Those were some interesting moments!

Yeah. I was an adult at college also, and my philosophy course was fun that way. I was the only Catholic, I think, in the class. I just listened and took notes, my concern being the grade. It was a good course and I'm glad I took it. There were a lot of students in that course who said they favored Kant. My favorite was the brain in a vat. Ha! Just think! I took it shortly after my conversion, and the course was helpful in understanding classic Catholic apologetics.

I don't have any ideas that everyone must think and believe exactly as I do, but lack of critical thinking gets under my skin. Young missionaries should have some training in critical thinking in high school. I hope our schools aren't so bad that they do not.

Edited April 25, 2014 by saemo

[saemo]

I was exactly the same on my mission.  One year out of high school, zero college, and because I had already read the Book of Mormon and most of the Bible all the way through I thought I was a spiritual giant who was an expert in ancient history and knew more than the Pope.  

 

By the way, I failed to mention that I was wearing this shirt when the missionaries came by a few months ago.  It probably explains the look on their faces when I heard them say 'hello' and stood up from the leaf pile.

 

The shirt has this quote from St. Isaac the Syrian (7th Century) on the back:

 

“The world” is the general name for all the passions. When we wish to call the passions by a common name, we call them the world. But when we wish to distinguish them by their special names, we call them passions. The passions are the following: love of riches, desire for possessions, bodily pleasure from which comes sexual passion, love of honor which gives rise to envy, lust for power, arrogance and pride of position, the craving to adorn oneself with luxurious clothes and vain ornaments, the itch for human glory which is a source of rancor and resentment, and physical fear. Where these passions cease to be active, there the world is dead…. Someone has said of the Saints that while alive they were dead; for though living in the flesh, they did not live for the flesh. See for which of these passions you are alive. Then you will know how far you are alive to the world, and how far you are dead to it.

I like it!

[saemo]

My brother, when we met him at the airport after the MTC sending him off to preach, earnestly told us how when he got back he was going to turn our extended family into spiritual giants with scripture study, family prayer, etc. (Mom would have loved to do it, but Dad was of the type rather reading about religion, go out and do it). My husband and I chuckled about it probably for the whole hour home though to him I just said "sounds wonderful".

By the time he got home he was a much wiser young man and was able to recognise spirituality outside of the typical behaviour.

I look on missionaries as cute little puppies that like to jump all over you and may nip you in excitement from time to time, mostly out of love and in total cluelessness as to the sharpness of their tiny teeth. I treat them much the same, make sure they are well fed and clean with a good bed to sleep in and frequent pats on the head and "good boy"s/"good girl"s

Eh, I've been on a plane full of returning missionaries and they were still puppies. The poor guy sitting in the seat next to me was proselytized all the way home. No escape, so I loaned him my earphones. Edited April 25, 2014 by saemo

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

After I posted, I went home and guess who showed up? Sister missionaries

Yes, they can be spooky like that...as far as stopping by when the house is messy, they go through years of training for that. !