by minimus 26 Replies latest jw friends
i noted with interest that my city has only one DC in 2010.
There were enough sheep that for the last 25 years or so there have been two. I remember the announcement that there would be two, we were all very excited at the growth!
now back to one...
oz
on another subject...
i reckon a schism over 'generation' would rock!
there has been increased media interest in religions like scientology and smaller groups here in aust, exposing cults etc. I wonder if the focus will come on the Watchtower too... that'll liven up the ol persecution complex!
oz
I don't see how there cannot be some huge sexual molestation cases in the future. We know what the rules were that allowed predators free reign for decades. The 2007 settlements were the first wave, I think.
Of course, if they settle them under the table, the publicity may be quite limited.
-mentallyfree31-
A wave of lawsuits directed at apostates, no so much for the money, but to make people think long and hard about attacking them
WTS will peak some time after 2014 and will start to actually decline in numbers. Now that new generation teaching is going around 1914 will have to be on the chopping list sometime in the near future. Less and less they print 1914 in their pubs the more likely they scrap the bs teaching in the future
I think they are just going to lump along for some time. They may be forced into a more mainstream mode, not doctrinally, but just because most people will get jobs, go to school etc no matter what they say.
I can't see lawsuits against apostates. Discovery would be a nightmare for them. After one of us gets all their literature on, say 1975, read into a court record under oath, they're screwed when they try to blame it on somebody else.
Most of these changes mentioned by others have to do with the short-term and wouldn't really affect the doctrine. Long-term, serious doctrinal changes are perhaps much harder to predict or to speculate about. I see that some of those short-term changes tend to be cosmetic, or mere adjustments to particular issues.
In the long term, the Watchtower organization will have to change dramatically. Those guys who think that the Catholic Church changed just because it failed to enforce Bible principles delude themselves. Organizations have to change if they are to survive, and those guys have been able to dodge the bullets for 2,000 years.
Under its present circumstances, I don't think the Watchtower would remain a viable religion for most people. Maybe we won't be there to see the change, but I am sure that, just as the Watchtower changed so dramatically that Charles Taze Russell wouldn't recognize the organization he founded, in the future the organization will be such that a witness today wouldn't recognize it, either.
I think the "overlapping generation" teaching is one of the long-term changes. They just couldn't keep that. They will simply continue to change whatever needs changing if the organization is to exist.
