fundies in NYC

There's one thing about living in New York, you really don't have to deal with too many fundamentalists - at least not compared to the number I used to deal with in the South.  Most of the ones I come across are either in subway stations or on the subway trains.  Some take it to a whole new level:  they ask for $$ or food, and then have the audacity to spew their words of intolerance.

The other chief "source" of fundamentalists here in NYC are Jehovah's Witnesses, of which there are plenty.  The headquarters of the JW organization, the Watchtower Society, is in Brooklyn.  If you go to South Street Seaport in lower Manhattan and look across the East River, it's easy to see.

My wife's family has several JW's.  They all boycotted our wedding because 1-I'm not a JW, 2-a United Methodist minister officiated.  Ironically, the minister was one of the pastors of the church my wife was attending at the time.  Part of JW hypocrisy is that they want you to attend their church, er, Kingdom Hall; but they are forbidden by the Watchtower Society from attending other church servcies.  I suppose that's why her family boycotted us.  They could have been disfellowshipped (a JW term synonymous to excommunicated) for coming to our wedding.

Anyway, JW's appear to be the majority of fundies in New York.  They stand in or near subway stations with smug expressions, holding up copies of "Watchtower" and "Awake!".  About a month ago, on a Saturday, I was schlepping some laundry down to one of the neighborhood laundromats.  Through the apartment building door, I could see them - six JW's dressed in their finest, satchels of literature ready to be distributed.  When I opened the door to go out, one of them grabbed the door - not to hold it open for me with my laundry - to come into the building.  "The hell with that!" I thought.

"Are you here to visit someone?" I asked.  "Oh, yes," was the reply.  "Okay, well you need to use the intercom to call that person and have him buzz you in," I said.  The woman thanked me and held onto the door.  "Close the door, please," I insisted.  Finally, she let it go and it closed with a heavy click.   One of her accomplices said, "I guess you should just start buzzing.  Someone will let you in."

I had laundry to do, so I toddled on, but I was struck by so many thoughts.  First, our building has a No Tresspassing / No Solicitation policy.  In the name of their religion, they were breaking the law.  But deeper than that, they were willing to use deception to spread their "holy" word.  How can deception ever by the foundation of truth?

Obviously, if you're reading this, you can tell I don't have much respect for fundies in general and JW's in particular.  They follow a belief system of fear and exclusion.  The Watchtower has changed its doctrines so many times, it's mind-boggling, yet JW's keep right on drinking it in.  For one thing, the organization is so tight.  Witnesses are discouraged from associating at all with non-Witnesses.  That in turn creates their social structure.  Witnesses often end up staying with it for fear of having no friends if they were to leave.  To further it, the Watchtower Society also forbids Witnesses from reading any religious material that didn't come from the WS, including its own translation of the Bible.  And Jehovah help the Witness who is caught reading anything written by a Witness who had the courage to leave the organization.  (BTW, the WS  refers to itself as "the organization."  It decries "churchy" terminology, as it teaches that churches are part of Satan the Devil's snares to keep people from the truth.  I may be creative, but I don't have the skills to make that up.)

There are some good books out there about the WS.  Diane Wilson wrote Awakening, Ray Franz wrote Crisis of Conscience.  Both of those are a bit heavy, especially the Franz text.  A lighter, yet still informative, read is Kyria Abraham's I'm Perfect, You're Doomed - Tales of a Jehovah's Witness Upbringing.  =)

Egad!