by WildeLover 19 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Hi all,
this is my first post and I suppose something like this has been posted before but I would love to get your thoughts on it.
really do you ever think that the society will fall apart? or will it always be propped up by die hard members?will it see 2020 i wonder with the growth it has seen?
WildeLover
Hi
The "society" doesnt exist. It only exists in the false thinking of people.
Yes the "Society" Will always survive, untill the rivers all run dry, and people are extint.
Acolytes
Well first off the WTS formally known as the 'society' pulling a 'Prince' now wishes to be called 'the Organization'.
It is a corporation like any other, its main goal is to continue.
I believe unless there is a drastic 'Rutherford-like' shift we will continue to see it decline with high turn overs and low retention.
Ultimately I assume there is an exit strategy when the coffers hit a certain low but I think it won't happen until after 2020.
The WTS has always reinvented itself.
In 1908 a group of Bible Students left and the WTS survived.
In 1918, the WTS board of directors were imprisoned but the WTS survived.
In 1925, after Rutherford's prophecy that the end would come then, that the ancient worthies would be resurrected to rule on earth (Abraham, David, etc.) failed and 3/4 of the membership left, the WTS survived.
In 1975, after the prophecy connecting the end to that date failed, there was a decrease of 2% for the years of 1978 and 1979, the WTS still survived.
Those alive in each of those periods eventually die off and what is left is people who were too young to understand and new people who came in afterwards. The WTS bets on this. When the boomer generation of jws dies and the new doctrines that shape the remainder's view of the end take root, the WTS will still survive.
Hi Blondie
You said what I said. But you explained it so much better.
Acolytes
I suppose we could spin this question another way and ask whether there have been any other substantial (in size) christian sects in the past that have declined to the point of not existing in any real sense. I am not a historian so could not say but think the Shakers may be an example. I agree with Blondie though - there will always be some members, at least for the forseeable future. However, I think that they will change to become more mainstream and think that pragmatically they will also drop the shunning of former JWs - taking a line that members are free to question the religion with a few core, soft doctrines remaining. I think looking at what has happened with policy on blood transfusions, getting rid of Thursday meetings and reducing length of assembly and public talks it is already happening. They will just turn into a.n.other conservative american church where being a JW will not mean what it does today - just as what it means today does not mean what it meant 30 years ago. Change will be gradual but will happen because it will have to for them to survive. And for those think that it will not - how many people 30 years ago would have seen the ordination of women and gay priests into the anglican church?
It will survive but in a reduced and weakened form. The old magazine/donation formula doesn't work and they are losing effective leadership.
metatron
Hi jamesmahon,
I am not a historian so could not say but think the Shakers may be an example.
The Shakers were celibate and only increased by making converts and in a limited way, adopting children. I looked them up last week and as of 2009, there were only 3 surviving members in Maine, I think.
If the WTS forbids marriage and childbearing as the Shakers did, the WTS numbers will drop considerably; I don't see that as anything in the future.
Very true Blondie - I suppose a vow of celibacy for all members is never a particularly positive way to increase membership, on so many levels. I think someone here posted that they are currently at 5600 hours of witnessing for each baptism. Even if all of these baptisms were new converts and not born ins (which of course they are not) then the maths says that a publisher doing ten hours a month can expect to convert one person over a 40 year sales career. I know that pioneers will convert more given higher monthly hours but suspect that for some time the witnesses have been hugely dependent on born ins for growth in publishers in developed countries. I suspect that over the coming years the numbers will start to decline in developed countries and they will have a choice - lighten up and become more mainstream or tighten up and go for the 'little flock' and 'sifting' arguments. I suspect they will go with whichever one they think will wash best with developing countries where they may be having substantial growth.
the WTS will enjoy growth in developing/third world countries for at least another 50 years, long enough to take it into the next century, that's the kind of folks that they are only interested now, a high turn over of new blood that are poor and uneducated and stupid enough to blindly accept even the most stupid doctrine,sad but true.
