the sifting work is occuring
WTBTS Elder & Ministerial Servant Problems
by JW GoneBad 113 Replies latest watchtower child-abuse
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Soldier77
what is the quality of those average 7 elders?
metatron, you bring up a good point. Of the 5 elders in my hall, only 2 should actually be elders. The other 3 are idiots, dissorganized, selfish, power hungry, hypocritcal asshats.
Let's see, CoBOE was just replaced with a slackass dissorganized passive guy. Should never have been appointed as an elder, according to his former hall and some friends that knew him.
Secretary was just replaced with a holier than thou hitler. Former secretary is now the current CoBOE mentioned above.
Service Overseeris a freeloader. He's never at the hall, hell, he isn't even in the area half the year. He's off galavanting all over the world doing some stupid shit trying to get himself killed checking off his bucket list. Arrogant SoB.
Backup Elder #1 is a happy go lucky, tree hugging eccentric, but over all nice guy, he's the guy that showed up on my door one morning on accident (I posted about it).
Backup Elder #2 was the former CoBOE. Got demoted since his wife has cancer. This guy is a total tool. Rich prick. Uses his money to influence the CO/DO/Branch and proudly tells people that he has clout.
On average, only 2 elders are at the meetings at any given time. NONE of their wives are regular. One is a regular pioneer and misses more meetings than I do and I am irregular! Oh wait, Hitlers' wife is regular.
Don't even get me started on the 2 MS's we have too...
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Mad Sweeney
Metatron makes a great point. In a typical body of 7 elders, you have at least two who are elders in name only but are far too geriatric to serve in any active capacity. That leaves 3 to 5 actual elders to do the grunt work. That same congregation probably has around 3 MS. That's a lot of work for just a half-dozen undereducated guys.
On the issue of why more guys aren't reaching out, I think the problem perpetuates itself to a great extent. Non-MS brothers see the heavy load of crap-work the MSs have to do and don't want any part of it. MS brothers see the heavy load the elders have and they don't want any part of that. Nobody wants any more of a load than they're currently carrying, especially in light of the fact that they were promised a light load by Jesus and are getting no such thing, even as a rank and file Borg member.
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aniron
Putting the view from this area of Britain.
In my old congregation there were eight Elders when I left 9 years ago.
and six Min Servants.
Today there are five Elders and four MS.The lower number of Elders has been due to Elders resigning.
A couple over the "two witness" policy on child abuse and cover-ups.
One because his son was disfellowshipped for smoking, but another Elders son was not.
Then in odd twist the Elder, whose son wasn't DF'd, he himself a couple months later resigned because he was caught smoking.
He recently I heard got into a fight with other Elders when they visited him on another matter.
I recall him as being a self-righteous bully.From what I have heard , no other brother in the congregation wants to be either a MS or an Elder.
As one brother said "Who wants that job, if something goes wrong, you get blamed,
when you were only carrying out Watchtower instructions." -
DagothUr
The JWs worldwide are not lacking just MS or Elders. They are lacking MEN alltogether. The pool of males in the Wanktower Organization is at an all time low. The CO came in 2009 and one of his speeches, directly inspired by the Filthful and Decrepid Slave, had one central idea: field service should be mainly directed towards recruiting men. There was even a demonstration in which a pair of dubs had to pick from one man and one woman who passed on the sidewalk near them. The instructions were to speak to the man first, then to the woman. And the final encouragment was to never miss the oportunity to preach to men while in field service and leave women on the second place. I heard it with my own ears!
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Soldier77
"Who wants that job, if something goes wrong, you get blamed, when you were only carrying out Watchtower instructions."
That is, imo, the concensus amoung the brothers. They are seeing more and more of the work load that is being put on them or others and it's not appealing.
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freydo
Any of this sound familiar?
3. Only Elbert Spriggs is allowed to give original teaching, and his writings are the final authority within the communities. Elbert Eugene Spriggs has no real accountability. All men must wear their hair in short ponytails with a long, trimmed beard. All women wear long dresses, skirts or “Sus” pants. Women also have long hair. Unity with the “church” is heavily stressed, usually to the point where it becomes the chief doctrine. Unity is considered to be more important than “Doctrine”. (Behavior Control)
8 Emotion control is also practiced within the communities, narrowing a person’s emotional responses. The gray areas of life are slowly eliminated, and everything progressively becomes black and white. This manipulation and narrowing of emotions occurs in three ways. –Bob. Pardon NEIRR 9. The Twelve Tribes Community practices brutal information control. Community members are not permitted to read newspapers, books or listen to the radio. This causes the individual member to become highly dependent on the group. 10. The community claims a special exalted status for itself. “We are the light and the hope of the world. We are the only ones who can reclaim this earth for its Maker. We are the only ones whose lives of love and pure devotion, like a bride for her groom, can bring heaven to earth all other attempts to do so are not merely futile, they are evil..” 11. Members are encouraged (strongly) to break ties with family and friends and society. The Community becomes a replacement family and society.
Restricts the ability to leave the group.4. Community members must obey the teachings of Spriggs or risk shunning or excommunication. “Everything we hear in the teachings we are required to obey.” (Repentance 4/2/91). “If an elder questioned Spriggs’ teachings he could lose his place of authority. Dissenting elders were also talked about in the apostolic workers Meetings.” Michael Painter, Former Member
5. Every person must submit to the elders who are in submission to the leader (Spriggs). Demand absolute obedience.
6. Inhibits critical thinking so that a “group think” predominates. Followers give up the right to make value judgments of their own. (They cannot reason). Behavior Control
7. There is intense control over community members in the areas of dress, and the regulation of where one lives. “When we are in the Body we have no independent action or movement. AWM 6/12/88) “When God commands us, if we stop to consider the matter to see if there is sufficient reason for us to do it, then we are still living according to the flesh. If the elders say, you need to move to…’ and you say, ‘what is the reason for that? I’m doing fine here, etc., no matter how good you may do in the flesh, you cannot go past that rebellion”
Reasoning 11/I 8/90
http://www.twelvetribes-ex.com/blog/ -
besty
I think the next changes to meetings/FS procedure will give the clue whats going on with elder/MS numbers.
If the WTS make it 'easier' or less work or easier to qualify then they are still bleeding qualified men. They will prolly give the CBS/shorter public talk/elder school/new elder book changes time to have an effect and then go from there. Look for changes around 2013 or 2014 - oh speaking of which....theres that pesky 100 year mark again. The pressure on them to mark the year somehow must be intense.
The other point someone mentioned was if you wanted to know what the GB was like to look at your local elder body. Well it seems 7 is the magic number :-)
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Mad Sweeney
A cult is a cult is a cult, freydo.
DagothUr makes a good point, too. If you go into a KH on a Thursday night, and count the male-to-female ratio (especially if you just count adults), you're looking at what, 40% male or less? When you don't have many men to start with, your pool of potential leaders is small.
Misogyny: yet another failed Borg policy.
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blondie
The real problem is there are few men in the congregation.
Who goes door to door, women!
Who answers the door, women!
If a man does answer the door, he defers to his wife when he realizes it is about religion.
And cultivate non-jw husbands of sisters!? I had to beg an elder to study with mine. Didn't want to tie themselves down to an hour a week, might interfere with their golf game or picking up their drying cleaning on Saturday.
How many male children stay in the congregation....out of 7 boys this last ten years, only one has stayed, and he is no ball of fire.
Congregations in this area have appointed 2 known alcoholics and a known wife beater............
Young men in the org grow up hearing about the "challenges" of being an MS or elder...those that come in from outside might if they have a close "friend" in the loop. Even then they realize how bad it is until they actually become an elder and attend their first elder's meeting.
When we left there were 5 elders but only 1 MS; that meant that elders had to do much of the MS work including the accounts. None of the elders wanted to be tied down (or could do it because they were already do all the "real" work). So they had an elder's wife do them but had her husband sign off the report and make the announcement at the KH.
Or the MS wife who used software and updated all the territories; or the elder's wife that posted the time on the cards and did the report for the WTS; or the MS wife who counted the magazines and sorted them out to the publisher's slots (during non-meeting time), or the elder's wife who did the literature inventory....
It has been so bad that the elders asked if sisters could "do the mikes" and were told flatly NO by the CO; that the elders would have to do it.