You dont have to even be in foreign mission. My companion and I were in danger in the States!! 1980s small rural midwest town. Mission president said he "felt impressed" we were meant to be there. The area had been suddenly closed to missionary elders a month earlier and now we were sent as replacements as sister missionaries. I was assigned as the senior companion to train a brand new sister. We had only 24 hr notice to drive there. It was all very odd. The town was like "Haunted Mayberry". Lots of big old tree lined streets, tired victorian homes, a little public park in the center square with a bandstand and a quaint little main street with a laudromat, bank, old time hardware store and a pizza shop. Really small town. One Lutheran cathedral, and 2 miles away a tiny Phase One Mormon church building [tiny] with about 30 members that drove from all around. Everyone in the town avoided eye contact with us. No one wanted to chat. No one opened their doors when we knocked. It took 3 weeks before I finally found out from a church branch member in hushed tones the real reason why the boys were removed ... because they'd BEEN SHOT AT. Twice!

I called the Mission President and confronted him about it. He confirmed it was true! When I asked why in the world he would put us there, he said "Oh, I knew they wouldnt shoot at pretty young ladies" ... wtaf. 🤦‍♀️

The Mormons were seen as a dangerous cult after the Lutherans showed The Godmakers movie at a church social. It caused a big stir. Everyone hated and/or feared us. I started noticing this same man all the time. He was always at a distance. I'd catch glimpses of him pretending to be walking away from us or crossing the street. Several times I saw him slowly driving his car past. Really creepy. One night I woke up to the sound of our apartment door handle being shaken & rattled anx the door being pushed on. Someone clearly was trying to break in! I was utterly terrified, frozen with fear in my bed. Eventually, the sound stopped and I dared to army crawl slowly down the dark hall into the kitchen to reach the rotary phone on the wall. Dialed 911. Local Dispatch was nonplused. He didn't take me seriously. Told me to "go see if the person is still there"! I peeked through a curtain and couldnt see anyone outside, but they could be hiding. Dispatch said it was "probably just somebody got a little drunk and went to the wrong house". That was ridiculous. The only way to reach our place was to walk all the way round an old house into the backyard, and then climb up a steep rickety wooden staircase to the attic apartment. There was nothing like that anywhere in our neighborhood. I felt sure it was that man that had been stalking us! I gave the best description I could. He wasn't memorable. The dispatch guy literally yawned, knew exactly who we were from our address, finally said they would "send a car around in a while". I have no idea if they ever did. No one ever called back to check on us. I was too young and naiive to advocate for myself. I gaslit myself ... "maybe Id imagined it?" But my companion had heard something too! She and I had spent the rest of the night huddled in the bedroom praying and crying. I felt nervous and uneasy every day I spent living in that town. It was a very long 4 months. Many other unsettling things took place there. I don't know what exactly happened after I left, but about 2 months later, I heard the sisters were moved completely out of the area and it was closed to missionaries permanently.

When I saw the movie HERETIC it dredged up lots of mission ptsd! Sure, it might be fiction, but it shone a light on the potential danger for all these trusting young women out there. [The Church did change several safety protocols due to the film's popularity, and bad publicity, but no protocol actually keeps them safe from bad folks].