I had a victim call me after they had called Bethel this morning. They were informed Bethe was offically closed till 1:30 PM for a special meeting with the Bethel Family. Would anyone care to speculate or verify the purpose of the meeting? This is a very unsual occurence at Bethel as I have never heard of Bethel being closed down for a 4 hour meeting with the Bethel Family. What do you think or know it to be about? I am all ears.
Bethel Closed Today!
by silentlambs 64 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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ballistic
I phoned God the other day, and got the engaged tone. The same I suppose.
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Farkel
: This is a very unsual occurence at Bethel as I have never heard of Bethel being closed down for a 4 hour meeting with the Bethel Family. What do you think or know it to be about? I am all ears.
Ummmm, the toilets were clogged? Oh, I forget, the whole place is a clogged toilet! Sorry, Silentlambs.
Nevermind.
Farkel
"When in doubt, duck!"
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ARoarer
Maybe the GB was giving instructions on handing out the Kool-Ade at the Oct. Meeting.
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blondie
There usually is a Gilead graduation about this time of the year and there are no tours given at any of the Bethel facilities in NY. But I don't know how much time that takes. Everybody is usually tied in by circuit TV.
*** km 6/99 3 Announcements ***
Since the Gilead graduation will be held on Saturday, September 11, 1999, no tours will be conducted that day at the Society’s facilities at Brooklyn, Patterson, and Wallkill, New York. -
ozziepost
Gilead graduation is next weekend.
Cheers,
Ozzie"A lie which is half a truth is ever the blackest of lies"
ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON, The Grandmother -
anewperson
They want to prepare Bethelites for the fact that Dateline NBC is investigating Bethel and will be airing a documentary concerning the Watchtower's policies on sensitive issues. That the media representations are slanted, unfair and untrue. That Bethelites need to say NOTHING to anybody, even friends back home and eventually the whole matter will have blown over and away.
Do I have someone inside telling me this? No, not right now but it's the simplest most logical guess, and I bet that Randy, Kent or Alan or Charles will be finding out real soon. :)
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anewperson
From Immediate Messaging, this is Charles' interpretation based not on what he's overheard so much as things he's "actually seen going on" he says. He does believe the meeting we're speaking of here has been planned for some time now for damage control, and that word finally went out about 24 hours ago to some Bethel and field-based operatives to discourage the most vocal persons in the JW/exJW community from effectively venting to the media and public. Also that last ditch efforts began yesterday and today and continue to this second to try to muzzle or get opposition websites such as this one and our own shut down as quickly as possible. For example you can expect WTS attorneys pressuring ISPs to dump websites, increased flaming on the discussion boards, that sort of thing. They are upset they haven't been able to dissuade and discourage us, "us" being the whole Free Christians opposition movement across the internet. He also believes there may be some immediate additional widespread belt-tightening measures such as a decrease in personell at Bethel etc in anticipation of possible lost lawsuits. The governing body is not saying it openly but is now extremely fearful that organizing efforts for a new non-Watchtower group will begin in earnest. Their fears are directed against us, yes, but also towards the CO's with whom the DO's have lately been consulting. Some ranks may begin to break.
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Skimmer
Hello anewperson and thank you for your interesting postings.
I think that a large scale schism is unlikely. The big splits endured by the WTBTS in the 1917-1925 timeframe were possible in part because of the relative autonomy enjoyed by the congregations ("ecclesia", back then). Also, today's JWs are much more programmed and isolated (via enforced shunning) from those most likely to tolerate or support a split.
Also, a few years ago the WTBTS was burned badly, albeit on a small scale, with the Bonham, Texas congregation declaring independence and siezing their own Kingdom Hall in the process. Since then, the WTBTS has taken the appropriate legal steps to make sure that if any congregation splits, the assets will still belong to those faithful to the WTBTS. An exception might occur if nearly an entire circuit splits and all the JWs whose names are on the circuit holding corporation band together in opposition to the WTBTS. Even then, there still might be legal hurdles in taking the property away from control of the WTBTS.
I am somewhat surprised at any cutting of the Bethel staff, at least the productive members, as the WTBTS makes money on all of them as long as the contributions keep rolling in for the literature. However, there might very well be reductions in staffing for positions not directly relating to printing or its support. More probable are reductions in the travel budget and a slowing or cessation of new real estate investments.
In regard to pressuring ISPs to censor ex-JW sites, I doubt if there will be more then a few half-hearted attempts at best. The WTBTS was rather scorched in the public image area when they tried going after those posting the secret elder's manua; and so Brooklyn wisely gave up.
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lisaBObeesa
"Also, a few years ago the WTBTS was burned badly, albeit on a small scale, with the Bonham, Texas congregation declaring independence and siezing their own Kingdom Hall in the process"
Please, please tell me where I can read more about this!
--LisaBObeesa