There are more Jehovah's Witnesses in Portugal than there are Scientologists in the whole world

by cedars 83 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Jeffro

  slimboyfat:

  Nonsense as long as they compare like with like how strict the measure is has no effect on the growth rate.

  Wrong. Most JW growth comes from children of JWs (also a source of inflated Bible Study stats). If they were counted as members, actual growth by conversion would be extremely reduced.

  For example, let's say a JW congregation has 50 'active' members, 20 non-publishers (usually children) and 10 inactive. During the year, 5 of the children become publishers, and they also make 3 converts. There are 83 people in total, but the initial number of publishers is 50 and the final number is 58. Growth rate is 16%. And if 5 of the inactive people get roped into a 'special campaign' (e.g. Kingdom News), the growth rate goes up to 26%.

  In a congregation of XYZ church, there are 50 regular adult members, 20 children and 10 lapsed members. During the year, they make 3 converts. There are 83 people in total. The initial members count is 80, and the final count is 83. Growth rate is 3.75%.

  But both groups have the same number and distribution of adherents.
• 

  Gayle

  WTS counts a lot of the children (15% ???, what would you say?), not baptized, but as publishers. And how these children pay a burdensome price! Throughout their youth, they give forced labor, of door to door, unrealistic meetings for children, horrible persecution complexes in school, abusive guilt complexes, and denial of normal children's interests.
• 

  slimboyfat

  Jeffro that is so wrong headed I hardly know where to start.

  Members reactivating happens every year. You can't assume it is a one off phenomenon and calculate ridiculous growth like 26%. Not to mention ones that die or become inactive in the same period.
• 

  EdenOne

  In this last DC (2013) it was said by a GB helper that 40% of all the new Jehovah's Witnesses nowadays came to the "truth" by means of informal witnessing. So, my take is that this is the largest form of recruitment of new members, superior to born-ins and formal, door-to-door witnessing.

  Eden
• 

  cedars

  EdenOne

  In this last DC (2013) it was said by a GB helper that 40% of all the new Jehovah's Witnesses nowadays came to the "truth" by means of informal witnessing.

  How could they know this?

  Cedars
• 

  Tylinbrando

  Observations:

  The large majority getting baptized in my areas are children of active JWs. I would estimate those from "the field ministry" at less than 10%

  Also in three large counties of California: Los Angeles, Ventura, and Santa Barbara- the Mormons are far more active and visible. Within school districts they out number JW kids 10 to 1 and can be seen walking to "morning worship" at 6am every day before school starts. Considering how few Mormons are required to go door to door compared to the JWs, it is remarkable that they can be seen doing so far more regularly than the JWs.

  Not refuting what Slimboy says, but thought the observations might be similar to what others have seen.
• 

  EdenOne

  Cedars

  How could they know this?

  No idea how, but I was intrigued by the number so much that I took note of it in the program.

  Eden
• 

  steve2

  Jeffro, your reasoning seems unreasonable to me. I'm with SBF on this one.

  On the subject of the Mormons and Scientologists: Their claims are invariably overly-inflated. I also hear that, of those who "sign up" to courses by Scientologists, the follow-up interest is incredibly low....yet, those signed up to do courses are "counted' as adherents.

  By contrast, love 'em or hate 'em, the Watchtower's operationalized definition of who witnesses are (i.e., some form of preaching whether door-knocking, incidental witnessing, Bible Studies etc) is as good a brake on membership count as you can get (the issue of witnesses fudging reports is an entirely separate matter - akin to employees messing with time-on-the-job figures).
• 

  GoodGuyGreg

  Cedars:

  In this last DC (2013) it was said by a GB helper that 40% of all the new Jehovah's Witnesses nowadays came to the "truth" by means of informal witnessing.

  How could they know this?

  I heard the same on the DC that I (sort of) attended. If you think about it, it actually makes a lot of sense. I don't have the source material available right now, but a Swedish study claimed that it's rare to find convertees in other groups than a) children of members and b) friends or acquaintances of members. Even if they pulled the actual number 40% out of their asses, I definitely find it plausible that the ratio of convertees from informal witnessing to children of witnesses being in the vicinity of 60/40, with a (very) small share of new members being caught by their doors.
• 

  Jeffro

  slimboyfat:

  Members reactivating happens every year. You can't assume it is a one off phenomenon and calculate ridiculous growth like 26%. Not to mention ones that die or become inactive in the same period.

  The example was simplified, but the comparison to other groups counting all as members is completely legitimate.

  But okay... I'll change the example for you...

  For example, let's say a JW congregation has 50 'active' members, 20 non-publishers (usually children) and 10 inactive. During the year, 5 of the children become publishers, and they also make 3 converts. 2 publishers die, 3 babies are born, and 5 of the inactive publishers reactivate. 2 publishers becomes inactive, 1 is disfellowshipped, and another disassociates. At the end of the year, there are 82 associated with the congregation, but the initial number of publishers is 50 and the final number is 57. Growth rate is 14%.

  In a congregation of XYZ church, there are 50 regular adult members, 20 children and 10 lapsed members. During the year, they make 3 converts. 2 members die, 3 babies are born, 5 of the lapsed members return, 2 of the members lapse, 1 is excommunicated*, and another formally resigns from the church. At the end of the year, there are 83 associated with the congregation. The initial count is 80, and the final count is 83. Growth rate is 3.75%.
  *Excommunicated members do not receive communion but are not shunned and are still members. If the excommunicated member is not considered an adherent, growth is 2.5%.

  Feel free to stipulate other values for the variables of the fictional JW and XYZ congregations. At best, all you will establish is that comparison of JW 'growth' rates is not directly comparable with growth of other groups.