Rejection. Dismissal. Heckling. Cajoling. Persecution. Ahhh. Those were the days!
The rejection facing Mormon missionaries is easily overcome. In fact, the more severe it is the bigger the badge of honor it becomes for the typical Mormon missionary. In Spain, I was given the finger, thrown rocks at, had doors slammed in my face, physically threatened, told to "Fuck Off Yankee", screamed at, had kids hide behind mother's skirts as I approached them, openly mocked, called a homosexual or the Spanish equivalent of "Faggot". I endured raw eggs thrown at me, cars driving by me splashing mud from the gutters onto me and I was one of few missionaries who could brag about being spit upon.
Mostly though, truth be told, the rejection that affects most missionaries the worst shows up in the overall accumulation of people just saying "NO" to them. Day after day, it is always the same.
NO!
GO Away!
I am too busy!
Get out of here you Brain Washer!
Leave me and my family ALONE!
I don't want anything to do with your weird American religion!
or just that ever dexterous and dismissive wave of the Spaniards hand as if I am not worth expending any words on.
Rejection hurts. It is overcome in the apartment on one's knees. In humble supplication to his God.
After awhile, the thicker calloused skin grows and we missionaries become impervious to anything negative. We develop a superiority complex as to who is really right about God. We spend every waking hour devoted to the cause of finding people who will join this church. We had better be convinced ourselves!
The rejection makes us genuinely sad. I can recall hundreds of times feeling these pangs of sadness. I have journal entries replete with accounts of how I believed that I will be called up at the last day of judgement to testify against this or that Spaniard that I indeed presented him with God's Truth but, sadly, this or that person rejected it. It truly grew a terrible burden to bear after awhile. I did eventually quit thinking about that. I developed a much kinder approach. I began to formulate a new doctrine or "perspective" of my own that outlined that right now was not the time for the individual to accept the gospel. I was merely a prepatory instrument in God's hand. I was a seed planter. Perhaps the Book of Mormon I left with that person will get read at a later date again and they will then have experienced more of life and perhaps would then accept the Mormon gospel. I soon found that most other missionaries compartmentalized the rejection this way as well.
I would say that out of every one hundred people I talked to, 90 of them rejected me flat out of hand. I talked to about 50 people every day. Probably 3 or 4 of those 50 allowed me to come into their home and discuss the Mormon Gospel. Usually the discussion was taught in the street on the spot. But of those 3 or 4 "contacts", maybe one would continue to the next discussion, agree to read a passage of the book of Mormon, or pray or attend a Mormon meeting. That was rare. It was more like maybe 1 out of 100 people would continue. That meant that if I spoke to 50 people a day or 350 people a week (7 day work week for missionaries), I would have about 3.5 people continue onto the next or 2nd discussion. Yep, that was about right.
So a good month had 5 to 10 people continuing to the 2nd discussion. Out of that bracket, maybe 2 would continue to the 3rd discussion.
The 3rd discussion was a complete mixed bag. Usually, a different family member came, a friend, a pastor... to make sure that the investigator was not going to end up being hoodwinked into this American Religion. Our chances for continuation were very much increased if the investigator met with us alone.
Most Spaniards smoke and drink. Usually the Word of Wisdom sank their ship. I recall Javier that got baptized even though he was a chain smoker. He eventually quit Mormonism though I suspect it wasn't his smoking that did it. But that is another story. That Spanish branch had many intolerant members, Javier was all but berated for not wearing a tie.
It truly was amazing that any Spaniard would ever join Mormonism. Out of 30 or so people that I baptized 4 were expatriates from other countries. Most had social issues. Still, there were a few normal people who joined because they clicked with the missionaries and felt the sincerity of the Mormon message.
Reflecting back, the "spirit" that was supposed to testify to the thousands of people hearing my Mormon Missionary Message of God's only True Church, was very weak and unconvincing. Either that or Spain is just a hard hearted place steeped in tradition. I spoke with about 9,000 people. I testified boldly to at least half of them (4,500) in a well rehearsed sit down presentation in their doorway, living room, park bench, bus station, supermarket aisle, what have you. Maybe 200 of them actually made it to the second or third discussions. Only 30 of them entered a commitment to Mormonism.
That is a lot of rejection.
So you can see the breeding grounds of a superiority complex. Significant time in the Mormon missionary mindset is spent anguishing over those who reject God's True Gospel message. The superiority complex is a bold and as black and white as they come. I shudder to think that I actually got the point where I would evangelize on the spot something to this bold nature:
If God told you that The Book of Mormon was true, would you get baptized into the church that contained that book?
Most Spaniards said that they would... if God himself told them it was True.
The problem then became trying to get them to see that a good feeling while reading the book or praying was actually God. That was the trick.
