Europe De-converts Missionaries!

I went off on this weird tangent (partly) because of my recent trip to Prague.

I was amazed to discover quite a few American Xian missionaries infesting the Czech Republic. These come from various sects, often Fundie or (of course) Mormon.

What on earth do they have to offer the Czechs? Certainly not the usual Third World missionary lure of medical care in exchange for a good Jesus-brainwash. The Czech Republic is on the evil, anti-Jesus Socialized Medicine conspiracy, just like the rest of the EU.

Obviously they can offer the usual hokey proselytizing, but I heard one idea clearly expressed during my brief stay in Prague: "Our country was run by the Nazis for 7 years and the Communists for 40 years. We've had quite enough of being forced to submit to a Higher Authority, thank you very much."

In a google followup, I found one newspaper article with a missionary family whining about how the low dollar had increased their cost of living in The Czech Republic nowadays. TS, I say. Quit annoying the Czechs and go back to Jesus-Land. And if you really want to live there, pay your own damn way just like the rest of us would have to do.

The Ex-Mormon website had a bunch of inspiring stories about how people came back from their missions in Europe and turned into apostates:

I am beginning to believe that European missionary service predisposes one to later apostasy. My own family provides a clear-cut example this speculation. I served in Germany while my brother served in Mexico. I am a complete non-believing apostate, while my brother in a dyed in the wool TBM...

...Finland in 1975 had the unique distinction of being the lowest baptizing mission in Europe. There were 40 convert baptisms for the whole country in that year. I wished I had many fond memories of mission. The days just blurred together with endless tracting in apartment buildings and slammed doors. We thought it a treat if someone actually let us in a door. It was rare...I dropped out of graduate school in engineering to go on a mission. What a waste of time...

http://www.exmormon.org/euromiss.htm?FACTNet

Speaking of Prague and the Nazis, the city contains the site of my Favorite Nazi Death, that of Reinhard Heydrich. Heydrich was a literal architect of the Final Solution, presiding over the infamous Wansee Conference in January 1942. Even Hitler called him "the man without a heart."

As part of his natural arrogance, Heydrich liked to tool around Prague in a Mercedes convertible with the top down. Two Czech underground agents threw a bomb into his car during one of these jaunts. His body was riddled with fragments of seat-springs, upholstery, etc. It took him a long time to finish a slow, agonizing death, which is exactly why it's my favorite.

My second-favorite Nazi death? Easy. Erich Kube, Reichskommissar of the Ukraine. Kube was amazed to find the Ukraine largely populated by people he called "blondies." Good Aryan-looking folks, instead of the dark Slavs he feared might be living there. He hired one of the "blondies" as a maid. One night when she brought the Reichskommissar his nightly hot-water bottle, it was very hot indeed. She replaced the water with a kilogram of explosives.

Have you seen the BBC/HBO film 'Conspiracy'? It's a dramatisation of the conference, starring Kenneth Branagh as Heydrich and Stanley Tucci as Eichmann. Excellent performances all round, particularly from Branagh, who is astonishing. As 90 minutes of talking around a table, it could easily have dragged, but the concentrated evil makes it compelling. Belongs on the shelf next to '12 Angry Men'. Two thumbs up.

As you note, it could be be summed up (unfairly) as "90 minutes of talking around a table."

I haven't seen it in a while, but some of the chilling parts that stuck in my mind:

--the carefully collected data on Jewish populations world-wide--including the USA. Then hearing all these eminently civilized men (many with advanced degrees) sit there and calmly discuss exterminating them.

--the SS field officer warning the desk-bound bureaucrats that his soldiers are committing suicide, after mass killings of women and children.

HBO also financed the filming of Robert Harris' Fatherland, one of my favorite fictional Nazi stories. Set in 1964, during the Cold War between the U.S. and a Nazi Germany that won WWII and successfully covered up the Holocaust.

I just finished Harris' novel The Ghost. That's the preposterously far-fetched, outlandish tale of a former British Prime Minister who is accused of war crimes and threatened with trial in The Hague. Wow! Where do they come up with these crazy ideas?

It's a good film for my history classes - they get sucked in so quickly that they want to stay and watch the whole thing, but even if you cut off the opening and closing credits it's a little too long for an hour and twenty minute class, so I usually divide it up halfway.

My summer classes get to watch the whole thing at once, since they're a captive (and captivated) audience for two and a half hours every day!

Brilliant film; fantastic for stimulating good discussion.

where the Jeebus-brainwashers were most heavily infested.

It is really bad in places where the nutters go and tell people blatant lies about contraceptives and force them to convert for medical care.

For someone else, cause there's no way I'm going to deepest Alabama to challenge people on the existence of their already bad tempered god. Not alone anyway :evilgrin:

(if my Alabama reference offends feel free to insert a crazy state of your own choosing)

Hey, I'm hijacking my own thread! :rofl:

Thanks for the link. That "tract" was a fascinating read. Everybody should keep copies of it handy, for any LDS missionaries who come to the door.

Here's one of the most poignant things I found on that site, a woman describing her miserable marriage in the "wedding factory" of the big Temple in Salt Lake City:

A Mormon wedding in the Mormon temple
http://www.exmormon.org/whylft45.htm

I didn't know this:

The LDS church has spent millions of dollars over many years trying to prove through archaeological research that the Book of Mormon is an accurate historical record, but they have failed to produce any convincing pre-columbian archeological evidence supporting the Book of Mormon story.

That reminds me of another very conservative, family-oriented organization that did exactly the same thing in European archeology, back in the 1930s. They were trying to find evidence of Aryan civilizations.

The Book of Abraham, from Egyptian papyrus scrolls which came into (Joseph Smith's) possession in 1835. He stated that the scrolls were written by the biblical Abraham "by his own hand." Smith's translation is now accepted as scripture by the LDS church, as part of its Pearl of Great Price.

Smith also produced an "Egyptian Grammar" based on his translation. Modern scholars of ancient Egyptian agree that the scrolls are common Egyptian funeral scrolls, entirely pagan in nature, having nothing to do with Abraham, and from a period 2000 years later than Abraham. The "Grammar" has been said by Egyptologists to prove that Smith had no notion of the Egyptian language. It is pure fantasy: he made it up.

Historical context, based on my admittedly limited reading: this part of the 19th century saw a huge explosion of interest in Egyptology, so it's not surprising that Smith was able to buy gen-u-wine Egyptian papyrus scrolls (probably stolen). This interest was fueled by the publication in France of the massive Description Of Egypt, based on research from Napoleon's Egyptian expedition of 1798.

Egyptian Grammar? Bwah! And more historical cross-connections: Champollion deciphered part of the Rosetta Stone in 1822. Champollion, of course, really was an expert in ancient languages and literally spent his whole life studying them. Unlike the con-man from Upstate New York.

Many Mormons find much of their spare time taken up with church work, trying to fulfill the numerous assignments that have been given them.

Yep. Many $cientologists, Moonies and Hare Krishnas find the same thing. Amazing!

...than the beliefs based on a select group of ancient writings that stayed in the inbox long enough to be called "scripture". After reading that site, I felt rather sad for those Utahans who have such a high rate of depression. No sarcasm here. I have barely scratched the surface of LDS. I am exploring it because a lot of my neighbors are LDS, though.

Their "laity" seems to be kept to quite high standards that makes some of them depressed. How can anybody keep up with those demands on their time? I would think that those demands would drive people out of LDS at a high enough rate to make the belief "unsustainable". Maybe they make up for it with the high birth rate. har har