Will the JW's become mainstream?

by Save My Soul 28 Replies latest jw friends

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  neverendingjourney

  Neverendingjourney: Here's the option I'd bet on:

  tighten the reigns, have a great purge, and continue as a smaller, cultish religion

  I tend to agree with you, Gopher. Everything I've heard about the new GB members seems to suggest that they are even more hardline that the old schoolers, except maybe Jaracz, the boss, himself. The Bethel culture seems to lead to the advancement of hardcore company men who have given their lives to advance JW dogma. If that's true, I don't see why they would decide to change course, even if membership starts to go down.
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  OUTLAW

  As long as JW`s are associated with the WBT$..They will never be accepted as Christians...OUTLAW
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  R.F.

  They'll never go mainstream. If they did, they'd lose their whole WT empire.
• 

  BizzyBee

  At some point one has to wonder, WHAT SETS THIS PARTICULAR CULT/SECT APART? And, whatever the answers are, these are the things that attract the fringe, disenfranchised, needy, square pegs. Those elements have to be present or the members, individual JWs, might as well be Presbyterians. So, the very precepts that make it so onerous to be a JW, are what make it attractive. Hmmmmmmmmmmm...........it helps to be a masochist to be a successful JW!
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  OUTLAW

  ..No..A cult is special..They are not like anyone else..Mainstream is not for them...OUTLAW
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  OnTheWayOut

  When membership shrinks and donations are not enough to cover expenses, the
  leaders will try everything. Until then, some of the non-mainstream ideas cannot
  be easily abandoned without lawsuits. They would love to go mainstream- the
  Mormons did it, and they are a whacko cult. The Worldwide Church of God did
  it, but they were in a desparate situation. When WTS is desparate, who knows
  what they will do?
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  WTWizard

  Absolutely not. Instead, they are going to use ever-tightening force on members and ex-members, as well as meddling in politics as in the UN scandal, in order to force their will on the masses. And ultimately, they will lead mankind into the Second Dark Ages, which will be infinitely worse than the first one ever got since there will be universal enforcement of their stupid laws, and there will be no Renaissance hope.
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  Save My Soul

  I know it now, if they endorse college, which is a 5 year commitment, they could not say the end of the world is coming tomorrow.

  This would be hard to disguise in a question from readers.
• 

  hybridous

  Some good comments here....

  I see it this way: if they do, they lose. If they don't, they lose. Perhaps more slowly and painfully, but with the same result.

  As has been said: this cult was nothing more than an apocalypse expectation group, was not supposed to be around this long, and has resorted to dysfunction in order to sustain itself.

  They seem to be clamping down, becoming more totalitarian, but this is ultimately shortsighted as modern JWs do what they want when out of sight of church elders and 'Goody-Goodies'. So who remains when it becomes even more oppressive? Just the hardcore believers, and just how much money do these people have to keep things running for the Tower?

  This harsh fact of dimished cashflow might serve as impetus for more moderate (liberal) voices in the leadership to be seriously heard. As much as this cult prides themselves on being something special, their empire runs on DOLLARS, like everything else. Threaten those DOLLARS, and watch this nasty cult morph into something none of us could recognize, because their survival demands it.