Hot News-New GB members (page 10)

proplog2

To be one of the "young" annointed you have to be mentally ill.

Think about it. The "old" annointed understood they were annointed because everyone else was. Before 1935 that was the "deal". I have had lots of conversations with old annointed back in the 1950's. As a young kid I would ask them how they knew they were annointed. None of them gave any story of some special "feeling" or sudden insight. They were annointed because they were told they were.

But to go from "other sheep" to annointed you have to have some kind of bizarre feeling. You have to think that God's spirit is telling YOU something SPECIAL. God is telling you that YOU ARE SPECIAL. YOU ARE CHOSEN.

I've talked to a few of these "latter day saints" (mostly women with bad marriages that want to be a special "bride") all of them are wacky. The whole organization expects that if you start partaking at the memorial you are headed for a major emotional crack-up.

So, I trust these young annointed a lot less than the old guard. Their number one qualification is that they have to be crazy.

rebel8

They said "Lets call them the Mini MenThen, but we will spell it backwards. Everyone agreed.
The poor secretary finally found a pen after everybody was gone. He was exausted, but he had to get to the court, to file the documents of the new GB. So he hurriedly wrote out the legal papers and filed them with the Court Clerk. What was supposed to be Minimen, thanks to the lisp of an old man, and the low paying wage, and exhaustion of a poor secretary, they are now called NETHINIM.

That is truly one of the most hilarious things I've ever heard!!

jgnat

We gotta remember the WTBTS is no longer a single organization, and the Governing Body is merely a figurehead. The corporations controlling the money, the congregations, the publications, and the facilities are all legally separate but interdependent. This structure safeguards against lawsuit as well as any hostile takeover. One corporation cannot survive without the other.

I might be off, but it seems that each corporation is variously hard-line or moderate depending on their own self interest. For instance, a strong message against college education is preached at the conventions. Yet seasoned congregation members continue to groom their children for higher education. The head is cut off from the tail. Headquarters is increasingly out of touch with it's people. Here and there I hear rumors of reform by local elder bodies. I think all of these takeover attempts are doomed for failure as the local congregations have no influence over the power structure.

This is what it looks like to me:

Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania (Incorporated 1884)

President Don A. Adams

Holds the copyright. Accepts donations and operates the Kingdom Hall Assistance Fund and the Relief Fund. I figure this is where the money is controlled and where legal sits. They tend towards the middle of the road; don't say anything that can get them sued.

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc. (Incorporated 1909)

President Max H. Larson

The publication arm of the WTBTS. They are trending towards hard-line, but get softened by legal. They are reducing costs.

Christian Congregation of Jehovah's Witnesses (Incorporated 2000)

President William L. Van De Wall

Manage the congregations. Coordinate all service (i.e., proselytic) activities, including door-to-door proselytism, circuit and district conventions, etc. The local congregations are trending towards a more liberal stance.

Religious Order of Jehovah's Witnesses (Incorporated 2000)
President Patrick J. LaFranca

Administers those in full-time volunteer ministry (Bethel). Hard-line. They are reducing manpower.

Kingdom Support Services, Inc. (Incorporated 2000)
President Harold L. Corkern

Kingdom Support Services, Inc. — will control construction of all new Kingdom Halls and other facilities, and will hold the titles to all Society-owned vehicles. They seem fairly neutral, but interested in conserving funds for a declining membership.

Sources:

http://www.freeminds.org/bethel/gbgrowsold.htm

http://www.watchtowernews.org/reorganization.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Congregation_of_Jehovah's_Witnesses

http://www.watchman.org/jw/jwreorg.htm#_edn3

http://quotes.watchtower.ca/religious_order.htm

Other legal corporations, their function is still a mystery to me:

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New Jersey, Inc. (Incorporated 1955)
President Charles V. Molohan

Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of Florida, Inc. (Incorporated 1986)
President Leonard R. Pearson

Valley Farms Corporation (Incorporated 1987)
President Charles J. Rice

willyloman

So, I trust these young annointed a lot less than the old guard. Their number one qualification is that they have to be crazy.

Precisely!

jaffacake

Nominating Jaffa for Man of the Year award from the National Disinformation Society. Nice use of theocratic stategy, dude

Hey Willy, What do you mean. We do have friends inside Bethel don't we? How else would we get such up to date information from that source?

sf

[PDF] State, Society and Governance in Melanesia Project
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
established, eg the Centre for the Book at Monash University (Australia), the
... Jackson, Geoffrey W. 2001. Telephone conversation with Jehovah's Witness. ...
rspas.anu.edu.au/papers/ melanesia/working_papers/Crowl02.pdf - Similar pages

Also inside this item is detailed NGO related material, which I found very informative.

sKally

No Apologies

To be one of the "young" annointed you have to be mentally ill.

Or.....you could be a young JW guy aiming to climb the Watchtower Corporate Ladder, realizing that to go all the way to the top, there is one thing you absolutely need to have...

Just a thought... I'm sure no loyal JW brother could be this cynical.

No Apologies(of the never-even-made-elder class)

OldSoul

98% of the anointed are bogus anyway, but that does not stop the true believers from ignoring facts.

And those who aren't bogus are among those Chosen Ones led astray (Matthew 24; Mark 13; Luke 21)

sir82

Or.....you could be a young JW guy aiming to climb the Watchtower Corporate Ladder, realizing that to go all the way to the top, there is one thing you absolutely need to have...
Just a thought... I'm sure no loyal JW brother could be this cynical.

Not exactly along those same lines, but....

Among the Spanish-language congregations in my area, there are a couple of 30-ish elders who are being groomed for CO-ship. In a rare moment of candor, one of their wives let slip that she would like to get into the circuit work (and leave the drudgery-filled working world behind) because doing that, "the friends take care of you".

Think about it...A 30 year old minority member, no education beyond high school, working as a waiter (his wife is a bank teller), little prospect for climbing economically or socially....but if you can just get into the CO "club", you get:

-- A shiny new upper end Buick every 2-3 years

-- 100% free health care, no deductibles, no co-pays

-- All living expenses paid 100%

-- Half-decent apartments in most circuit assignments

-- Enough "green handshakes" to pay for several vacations per year

-- The feeling of power that comes from being an authority figure among a group (Hispanic JWs) who are far more submissive to authority than their American counterparts

As I once commented to my wife, it is one hell of a career path for someone in that position.

Euphemism

Proplog2 wrote:
To be one of the "young" annointed you have to be mentally ill.

I've known plenty of the 'loony anointed' you refer to, male and female, and Tony is not like that.

FWIW, I've known other sane anointed (my father being one of them). People of all faiths can have transcendent religious experiences; if a JW has one of those, he/she will often interpret it as an 'anointing'. But it doesn't make him/her mentally ill; at least not any worse than the standard JW fanaticism.

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