JWs are in need of more Kingdom Halls in many major U.S. cities.
At this years’ AGM where it is expected that most of the faithful will be able to listen to the meeting (being tied in by video), don’t be surprised if the WT’s 8 GB members take part in a symposium delivering some long winded appeal, petition, plea, proposal, proposition, solicitation or otherwise hit-on the masses for $$$ in order to lighten the burden and overuse that many kingdom halls are experiencing.
An acquaintance from the West Coast mentioned to me that in late August thru early September of this year that a number of pow-wows involving close to 5,000 Elders from numerous areas (Riverside, Los Angeles, Ventura and Orange Counties) took place to drum up financial support from the 800+ (not sure) congregations in those areas. It was stated at these pow-wows that right now, today, if not sooner roughly between $150 million and $200 million, if not more, is needed to build more places of worship. That is one hell of a lot of money from the sheep of 4 counties! He further said that WT would like the money now! cause their goal is to build up-words of 70 kingdom halls within a 2 to 3 year period. It was further stated at this pow-wow that JWs in other heavily populated U.S. areas as well as in Europe were experiencing similar problems and that WT is majorly worried!
So WT may use this AGM as an opportunity to yet, again, remind JWs to dig deeper; perhaps eat out less, take less vacations, hang onto your old LG or Razor flip phones, forego buying your kid’s new shoes and instead help ‘Mother’ out with your tithe generous contributions!
Wow! Between $150 million and $200+ million! And this from sheep who are told not to get a higher education, not to seek higher paying jobs, not to put in for overtime or work weekends. In fact look for a part-time job so you can pioneer!
Do the math; it was said that the average kingdom hall will cost between $2.5 mil to $3.0 mil. With a kingdom hall of 4 congregations, each congregation could be saddled with a $750,000 mortgage, where the sheep are already soo tired that they are missing meetings 30% of the time.