In about 2013, I renewed my acquaintance with the US by travelling there on summer holiday, and my flight plan took me to Frankfurt, Germany, where the airport was equipped with "bus shelter"-style smoking cabins. Being a smoker at the time, I availed and was therefore one of the last to be boarded, which I did just behind a besuited gentleman who stood out with his businesslike elegance, among what were more casually dressed fellow-passengers. We greeted each other with smiles. Imagine the coincidence, then, when it was found we were seated next to each other and, as is my wont, I engaged him in conversation. He was a Mormon missionary, who had spent some time in France and Belgium and was returning to his home in the US. He was visibly young: 23 or 24. I asked him about the book of Mormon, and, of course, he had a copy in his baggage, which he lent to me for a few hours, that I might peruse it. He answered my questions with grace, but I felt that, for a missionary, he was not "pleading the cause". Perhaps he was tired; perhaps he feared sitting next to a vitriolic enemy for the long flight to America.
I had been the guest of a Mormon in Ogden, Utah, who'd invited me to stay after she had herself travelled with me in a tour group I led in the 90s. I am fascinated by other cultures and even other versions of my own religious culture. Whether Episcopalian, Mennonite, African Anglican, Russian Orthodox, Judaism, Islam, Voo-doo or, here, Mormon. My Roman Catholic companion in Ogden was more dismissive of the Book of Mormon ("Brigham Young took the Bible and rewrote the bits he didn't like"), but, in my quest to appreciate better other faiths, three conclusions tend to emerge:
i) in response to the aggressive, other faiths tend to be belligerent; in response to the inquisitive, other faiths tend to be defensive; it's hard to engage in level-playing-field discussion;
ii) I believe that discussion of the core belief, aside from the cultural trappings of a faith, would lead us to a single conclusion: that our beliefs are all the same; this, however, I have yet to test;
iii) and, as a result, my enquiries have distanced me from the specifics of my own traditional faith, and that is not per se a good thing, in the sense of removing me from something nefarious, but is a good thing in the sense of my ability to place what was handed to me as tradition within the context of the traditions of other faiths.
It'll not surprise you to know I chat to fellow shoppers in supermarket queues.
He may be right about him being tired. Post war Europe is known for being unreceptive to missionaries. Either antagonistic to religion, or closely defending a particular faith tradition and hostile to any organized religion other than their own.
On the other hand, in my experience as a missionary the Book of Mormon was either a soft sell or people didn't buy it all. As a missionary I was tending towards the attitude that anything beyond explaining what it was and telling people I knew it to be the Word of God was a waste of time. Maybe it's as simple as "My sheep [recognize] my voice" or 'seek and ye shall find" and if you are not seeking the particular thing God intended by the Book of Mormon at that time, you won't find anything important in it.
You can engage with the Book of Mormon on an intellectual level, out of curiosity - perhaps that was your intention and disappointment? Our missionaries are usually around 19 yrs of age and haven't studied the Book of Mormon with much depth or have had much chance to cultivate their intellects in general.
Anyways, if your point ii is correct, it doesn't matter much if you engage with the Book of Mormon or not. You can always find something interesting to learn and talk about.
In about 2013, I renewed my acquaintance with the US by travelling there on summer holiday, and my flight plan took me to Frankfurt, Germany, where the airport was equipped with "bus shelter"-style smoking cabins. Being a smoker at the time, I availed and was therefore one of the last to be boarded, which I did just behind a besuited gentleman who stood out with his businesslike elegance, among what were more casually dressed fellow-passengers. We greeted each other with smiles. Imagine the coincidence, then, when it was found we were seated next to each other and, as is my wont, I engaged him in conversation. He was a Mormon missionary, who had spent some time in France and Belgium and was returning to his home in the US. He was visibly young: 23 or 24. I asked him about the book of Mormon, and, of course, he had a copy in his baggage, which he lent to me for a few hours, that I might peruse it. He answered my questions with grace, but I felt that, for a missionary, he was not "pleading the cause". Perhaps he was tired; perhaps he feared sitting next to a vitriolic enemy for the long flight to America.
I had been the guest of a Mormon in Ogden, Utah, who'd invited me to stay after she had herself travelled with me in a tour group I led in the 90s. I am fascinated by other cultures and even other versions of my own religious culture. Whether Episcopalian, Mennonite, African Anglican, Russian Orthodox, Judaism, Islam, Voo-doo or, here, Mormon. My Roman Catholic companion in Ogden was more dismissive of the Book of Mormon ("Brigham Young took the Bible and rewrote the bits he didn't like"), but, in my quest to appreciate better other faiths, three conclusions tend to emerge:
i) in response to the aggressive, other faiths tend to be belligerent; in response to the inquisitive, other faiths tend to be defensive; it's hard to engage in level-playing-field discussion;
ii) I believe that discussion of the core belief, aside from the cultural trappings of a faith, would lead us to a single conclusion: that our beliefs are all the same; this, however, I have yet to test;
iii) and, as a result, my enquiries have distanced me from the specifics of my own traditional faith, and that is not per se a good thing, in the sense of removing me from something nefarious, but is a good thing in the sense of my ability to place what was handed to me as tradition within the context of the traditions of other faiths.
It'll not surprise you to know I chat to fellow shoppers in supermarket queues.
He may be right about him being tired. Post war Europe is known for being unreceptive to missionaries. Either antagonistic to religion, or closely defending a particular faith tradition and hostile to any organized religion other than their own.
On the other hand, in my experience as a missionary the Book of Mormon was either a soft sell or people didn't buy it all. As a missionary I was tending towards the attitude that anything beyond explaining what it was and telling people I knew it to be the Word of God was a waste of time. Maybe it's as simple as "My sheep [recognize] my voice" or 'seek and ye shall find" and if you are not seeking the particular thing God intended by the Book of Mormon at that time, you won't find anything important in it.
You can engage with the Book of Mormon on an intellectual level, out of curiosity - perhaps that was your intention and disappointment? Our missionaries are usually around 19 yrs of age and haven't studied the Book of Mormon with much depth or have had much chance to cultivate their intellects in general.
Anyways, if your point ii is correct, it doesn't matter much if you engage with the Book of Mormon or not. You can always find something interesting to learn and talk about.