Meeting attendance

by DATA-DOG 60 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  blondie

  Does the CO still check the meeting attendance, noting decreases and increases and talk to the elders at their meeting? In my earlier days, there was a meeting at the congregation on Saturday night where he would discuss that with the congregation.

  He said the book study and WT study should be 100% and that the public talk should be over 100% because of the non-jws that should be coming.

  The 2 worst attended meetings were the school, many came only if they had an assignment and disappeared right after skipping the service meeting.

  I used to say, they should have an attendance sheet so the elders knew who to call and "encourage."

  Inactive = really means not turning in time for 6 consecutive months

  Not attending meetings for 6 consecutive months = is there a term for that?
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  00DAD

  blondie: Not attending meetings for 6 consecutive months = is there a term for that?

  Yes, fading or faded!

  I know, I know. You were looking for a "Theocratic Term".
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  never a jw

  I noticed the Hispanic congregations in the north west part of Los Angeles area had a significant increase during the 90's and early 2000's, but lately they are stagnant, even shrinking in many cases. Young people are no longer attracted to their parents religion, and many are disfellowshipped and never come back. In the congregation that I attended until recently there are 7 or 8 elders, most of them had been raised in the truth or have been JW's for 30 or more years. The trend recently is that there's never enough good prospects for the MS positions because there is not enough converts to fill those positions and the young who have been raised in the "truth" have little interest, or even aversion to the job. I think, based on my observations, the WTS's downward trend among Hispanic JW's living in the U.S. started few years ago.
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  konceptual99

  Just for clarification purposes as far as I have ever known meeting attendance *should* be above 100% all the time. This is because of the way the congregation size is calculated. The base figure is the number of publishers. This includes all the members with record cards and includes inactive ones and unbaptised publishers. As a minimum the ideal attendance is 100% of this number. You the have children and others who are not yet publishers. In a congregation of, say, 120 publishers (to use my cong as an example) you would expect to get around 140-150 if everyone of the publishers plus the extras attend. When I was on the hall attendants team we were instructed to count everyone above around the age of 4.

  The reality is that with illness, holidays, skiving etc. you are never going to have 100% of the publishers at the meeting but this should be made up for by the extras. This means that a mid week attendance of, say, 90 and 115 on a Sunday in our cong is pretty poor. I would also add that this has been commented on every visit by the CO in his meeting to the elders and servants for ages.

  I would also note that our memorial attendance has been dropping and we had around 170 last time. Bearing in mind we probably should be around 150 at full strength it ain't exactly mind blowing. What is more, our congregation is by no means unique. It's a very similar picture throughout the UK, especially outside of the largest cities.
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  stillstuckcruz

  I havent been to our hall in about a month but overall there is definite increase on our end. Mostly it comes from born in baptisms and people moving into the area. They just split the congro and it looks like they may have to do another split soon with all the increase :(
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  blondie

  Move-ins may constitute an increase in that area but signifies a decrease where they came from

  8-8 = 0

  Just clarifying that not attending meetings for 6 months is not being "inactive" but not turning in time for 6 months is. That means that turning in time is more important. I have know jws who had not been to meetings for over 6 months but turned in their time each month, and the service overseer gladly counted it.

  We ran into an ex-elder and he said he looked around at the people at the meeting and realized that 40 out of 100 were from other congregations. Some times even 50. So if 50 from other congregations are there, it means a negative in the other congregations.

  That doesn't count the ones there in body only and their minds are far away. Growing up, babies were not counted (under 1) as being there, had to be able to think and reason, I know quite a few over 15 that don't qualify. Now as long as they are out of the womb...and if people come in the last 60 seconds of the meeting, they are counted in the total.

  Japan

  2001 221,000

  2003 217,508
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  finally awake

  there were enough little kids who weren't publishers yet in our hall that the attendance percentage should have always been at or above 100%, but there were lots of times when that target was missed. if just one of us was sick, we all tended to stay home, so instead of 3 extra non-publisher warm bodies, they ended up down 2 publishers.
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  HelpMeBelieve

  Donations are down, meeting attendance varies (fair weather christians) if it's cold, too hot or snows.

  Theocratic Ministry school is a Reverse-AA of Christianity, each part is used to provide a message to the Kingdom Hall's young and restless children. Watchtower Study's quickie comments provide angry ancients a forum to voice their grievances, (long hair, facial hair, tardy to meetings, I need help, my yard's lawn is long, sister so-and-so had hemorroid surgrey and needs a meal, brother Lou's girls dresses are too short. Skateboarding is evil, blah, blah, blah!"

  Nothing has changed, you could walk in and find nothing is new.
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  steve2

  Watchtower Study's quickie comments provide angry ancients a forum to voice their grievances, (long hair, facial hair, tardy to meetings, I need help, my yard's lawn is long, sister so-and-so had hemorroid surgrey and needs a meal, brother Lou's girls dresses are too short.

  Astute and nicely irreverent descriptions of why meetings continue to be a vital part of Christian worship. I swear ya talkin' 'bout my local congregation, bro!
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  Clambake

  The last two C ongregations I have been in have merged with other ones.

  The first one I was in claimed to have two congregations each with about 70 publishers. Funny thing is I have never seen more than 45 people at a meeting. I think they finally just merged because too many people were playing " They must be at the other meeting " game. I swear 80% are 50 years and older.

  Second one is a small rural one where all the elders have moved in, do there six months and leave. Finally had to close the other hall 50 kms away to make one decent congregations. Funny thing is they have included 3 and 4 year olds as publishers.