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I had a truly horrible interview last night to get my endowment. I’m still reeling from it. While I had a good rapport with the old bishop (see here->
http://forum.staylds.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=2149 He started making comments about my personality and saying I wasn’t enthusiastic enough, and that I was too shy. These are all things that I feel I can’t change, and I don’t walk around with a painted smile on my face all the time. He wasn’t rude to me, but I felt he was insensitive.
He asked me to give the closing prayer but I refused because I was so stunned. He also said that he didn’t tend to feel the spirit?!
😯 I was so upset about it I ended up driving down the coast, and walking on the beach in the dark for a couple of hours. (It was a bit strange, because there were one or two couples about in cars doing God knows what,
😳 I should have expected that, but that wasn’t why I was there, I just needed to get out.) It took me several hours to get to sleep last night.We only ended up doing two questions off the TR interview, and he says he wants to meet me in a couple of weeks. At that rate, I’ll end up having six months of interviews. (i.e. two questions every two weeks, and there’s twelve of them, so that’s the math) I really can’t face meeting him in a fortnight.
I’m gutted, because I spent three days fasting, praying and reading scriptures, preparing etc for this, and it went like this. I can’t do it again.
God knows what I’ll do if I meet him on Sunday.
Sambee, this is a blow. I’m sorry to hear about it. What a rough night. Bless his heart. Thanks Tom, I don’t know how to handle it from here really. I feel if it had been the old bishop, he may have flunked me, but at least he’d know what makes me tick, and what I’ve been up to. I repeated some stuff I told the old bishop, and I feel he’s maybe laying down the law on that. The old bishop at least knew what point I’d started back from, whereas this guy is getting all the dirt in one go. I found it very difficult to voice my opinions and feelings about God etc, because they’re mainly my internal experience. I just wonder why i chose a religion full of interviews and testimonies from the stand.
My temporary TR expires now, and I don’t know whether I’m going to pass an interview for that, let alone a full blown one.
As if this isn’t enough, I’ve had other (non-church) issues this week, but that’s not for here.
FWIW I use some bad language, get bad tempered etc, but I am not committing major sins these days, or breaking the WoW.
I’m really sorry to hear what happened SamBee. I don’t know what else to say, just feel for you. What a blow to the gut. I am sorry for your experience. My bishop has been fairly understanding, even acknowledging that some of our expectations in the church are not realistic (his comment, “you will never here this from the pulpit but…” meant so much to me just to acknowledge that I wasn’t insane). But Bishop has not been called to philosophize with me, he is there to administrate the ward and under this capacity he asked me to surrender my TR due to not being a full tithe payer. I am thankful he didn’t belittle me or make me feel unworthy. I don’t have any advice, I just feel for you. I assume that your bishop is trying to put you through a program, and that if you jump through enough hoops and say the right things, he will understand that as sincere repentance (or compliance, or whatever). If you refuse to participate in his visits, he may take that as beligerance/obsinance and who knows how he will react to that. FWIW, I wish to extend you hugs and support.
Yeah, it’s horrible, I’ll have to roll with the punches for now I pay tithes, live the WoW (well one violation over New Year), do my home teaching, read scriptures daily and pray, now have a couple of callings (one pending, the other going fine, and quite easy thankfully), haven’t fallen out with anyone (yet!), did my first baptism, recently have been to the temple etc. On the other hand, I make sure I don’t stand out, am still stuck in Gospel Principles class (maybe able to leave soon), have friends who are probably not “suitable” and make fun of the church, know the people in the first gay marriage in this area (about to get divorced no less), don’t have a family home evening and watch R films. Some of my beliefs are not mainstream, or maybe liberal, but this hasn’t really been an issue so far.
I was also upset by one of his other questions, “What if someone has a baptism, but the person doing it doesn’t believe?” – I didn’t know if this was coincidental or not. I hope not, but it did make me paranoid. I said something about authority, but also that it was probably unfair on the person being baptised.
I don’t know what to say, my honeymoon period feels like it’s over. Maybe he wants to put me through the mill, or mincer, or something. My old bishop knew what I’d been through, the new one clearly doesn’t. I’ve been back for a year now, and feel I’ve progressed and had a generally good experience (bar one or two things and queries on here), but I don’t want to do that again.
SamBee wrote:I don’t know what to say, my honeymoon period feels like it’s over. Maybe he wants to put me through the mill, or mincer, or something. My old bishop knew what I’d been through, the new one clearly doesn’t. I’ve been back for a year now, and feel I’ve progressed and had a generally good experience (bar one or two things and queries on here), but I don’t want to do that again.
If he’s new to being a bishop, that could also explain a lot. It’s not like they get much training. I have a sense that older (age) and more experienced Bishops (being in the position longer) often humbles them a lot in the process. You may be somewhat the victim of the newness of him being a Bishop.
That’s probably true… although to be fair the last bishop was also young, but he really won me over. That said, I encountered the previous bishop towards the end of his time. Sounds rough, Sambee. Sorry to hear it … especially when you put so much preparation into it. As you thought about it, what was the thing that upset you the most?
Was it his comments about your personality?
Was it that he doesn’t understand you?
Was it that he didn’t complete the interview and you didn’t get a TR?
Just wondering, since I want to support you and understand the situation.
Ugh. In this case I’d say less is more. I’d tell him much less. He’s got a lot of learning to do. SamBee wrote:I had a truly horrible interview last night to get my endowment. I’m still reeling from it…While I had a good rapport with the old bishop…I don’t know the new one at all, he’s not on my wavelength and barely knows me…
He started making comments about my personality and saying I wasn’t enthusiastic enough, and that I was too shy. These are all things that I feel I can’t change, and I don’t walk around with a painted smile on my face all the time. He wasn’t rude to me, but I felt he was insensitive…I’m gutted, because I spent three days fasting, praying and reading scriptures, preparing etc for this, and it went like this. I can’t do it again… It is sad to hear about Church leaders acting like this. It reminds me of my mission president I didn’t get along with at all. He acted like my personality was completely wrong as if I was a no good lazy slacker and problem child in addition to being too shy. Even if there was some truth to this assessment some of the things he said didn’t help the situation at all, it mostly just made me mad and bitter toward him to the point that I didn’t believe most of what he said after that because I thought he was a self-righteous hypocrite that didn’t know what he was talking about.
Since then, my experiences especially at school and work make me think that he was the one with a problem (arrogance and ignorance) more than me because even though I don’t claim to be perfect I really doubt that I am half as bad as he thought I was. Maybe they should give bishops and other Church leaders better training about dealing with people and different personality types because too many of them just don’t understand this kind of thing very well but they often try to go ahead and offer advice anyway because they start to think it’s their job to tell people what to do.
Yeah, one would think a bishop would react different to a guy who was excited and truly working to make it to the temple for the first time. Perhaps my only advise, which you have heard a thousand times i’m sure, is just answer Yes, or No. I don’t think you’re obligated to give information, and the Bishop is obligated to stick to the questions. Leave the cat in the bag, and just answer the questions as you understand them. Be vague.
Good luck Sambee.
What you described wasn’t a temple recommend interview; it was a personal interview, at “best”. If you’ve been to the temple fairly recently, you don’t have to have a temple recommend interview with the Bishop. Obviously, you probably shouldn’t ask explicitly for a counselor, but there is NO reason for a recommend holder to have to wait for a full recommend interview. I simply would ask for an actual recommend interview, answer the questions with yes or no and walk out with a recommend – hopefully.
From one shy person to another, I’m very sorry to hear about your experience. There was no need for any of that. It sounds like your bishop has issues. Assuming that you want to continue with the process, I wonder if it would be possible for you to prepare yourself for the remaining interview(s) so that you have the upper hand, at least from your perspective. I have come to the conclusion that if you want to have a recommend then you just need to answer the question with a yes or no. Say what you need to to get the recommend and be done with it and move on. To often we want to try and explain ourselves in the interview. We want the bishop or others to understand our position and feel our pain. But unless you know your bishop well it is not worth it. You will just be opening a can of worms. Others may disagree but if you want to remain active do not expose yourself to openly to the leaders it will come back to bite you. If this bothers you to keep silent then you are probably best to just be the person you are and not worry about a recommend or other perks of being a faithful member.
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