Massive increase in baptisms

Zico

I had my Special Assembly Day last Saturday, I missed this part as I was on a walk, but my family told me about it, and I've confirmed it with 2 other Witnesses. In one of his talks, our 'special' speaker, who is also a DO, said: 'Baptisms this Service year have already exceeded baptisms for the whole of last year, and that's before the Conventions!' Obviously this can't be verified until the figures are released next year, and it wasn't clear whether he meant worldwide or just Britain, but either way it's concerning, and I would guess that the 'Bible teach' book has been very effective. With the likelihood of many inactive returning due to the ease of the tract campaigns as well, maybe they'll reach 7 million this year?

dobbie

that about sums up how it makes me feel!

Clam

Maybe the baptism of children is becoming more common and acceptable?

needproof

Yeh, it's all about getting younger and younger kids interested, and you can never underestimate the power of human stupidity.

jwfacts

I have expected that there will be a rise in growth rates this service year. There has been a big push over the last 12 months that the end is about to come "very very soon" and a lot of JWs seem to think 2007 could be the year. Many ex JWs have been getting calls from family about how urgent it is for them to come back. However it is inevitable that yet another failure for the end to come will result in baptisms plummeting again in a couple of years time, and active JWs become more disillusioned and inactive.

One thing to realise is that a big spike in baptisms still will be a small rate of increase in comparision to pre 1995 growth rates. There are a lot of stats on the growth at http://jwfacts.com/index_files/statistics.htm Even if baptisms double this year, it will still be only 2 or 3%, a far cry from the 15% of the 1970's and the 8% growth rates of the 1980s.

Pubsinger

Its true they've had a 500% increase in Britain.

From 2 baptisms every 3 assemblies, to 10 baptisms every 3 assemblies.

See. An ENORMOUS increase.

You can do anything with figures.

Gill

I should imagine, that world over a lot of 'Apocalyptic Cults' such as the JWs are having a magnetic effect of drawing in lots of people who are rather anxious about the middle east and are not very prone to putting their critical thinking caps on. Cults DO attract misfits and malcontents after all!

Everybody always wants the 'easy way out' to lots of problems in life and so they may well take a gamble, in the same way they might buy too many lottery tickets than they can afford, and join a cult that says : 'All you have to do is......blah de blah and you'll survive the prophesised coming apolcalypse'.

HIstory shows that basically there are a lot of very stupid people in the world who will believe absolutely anything that grabs their fancy! To many fools living forever on a paradise earth may seem more like reality than a fantasy and they are easily persuaded to believe it just because they see it in writing in a Wacktower!

With the JWs I should imagine that a lot of very young people are being forced into baptism simply because their parents are absolutely convinced that their kids will die otherwise. The end result in a few years? A massive rise in disfellowshippings!

needproof

Good knowledge Pubsinger

Zico

The bible teach book is very effective in that it puts across their simple points and makes the religion seem very appealing and 'bible-based' It saves all the more complicated wacky stuff for the appendix, and never mentions the faithful and discreet slave or disfellowshipping.

Chameleon

Hmm.

It makes me wonder what's the baptized to DF/inactive ratio?

Massive increase in baptisms

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