Can anyone confirm this? New congregation consolidation 'unofficial' policy

by truthseeker 25 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  truthseeker

  I recently was told by an elder in Queens, that there are so many young people being df'd, marriage problems and divorce, that some congregations in the Queens, Bronx and Manhattan areas are very small as a result of the above problems. He said that there is an unofficial policy of the GB, that they don't like congregations with less than 75 publishers.

  As a result, some Kingdom Halls are being sold and congregations with few publishers are being consoloidated with bigger congregations. Does anyone know anything about this?
• 

  Euphemism

  I know of that occurring with the congregation I used to attend in NYC. Three congs are being consolidated into two.

  As far as a policy... no idea.
• 

  simplesally

  Policy, I don't think so. "Encouragement" would be the idea behind consolidating. It depends on the need of the area. One hall went to 50 and it was still considered "needed" because of the huge "potential".
• 

  jws

  I know my father (who would deny any dropping off) does say that they're not building a lot of new halls. And they're consolidating circuits. Of course it's all for "better use of resources" or some such BS.

  The attendance is obviously dropping. They must consolidate to survive. Not enough publishers = not enough to pay the bills. Big halls (even if shared) = less expense than 2 halls and more people to pay the bills = more left over for the society.
• 

  DJ

  I have heard of cong.'s being joined for two different reasons...one is size and the other is the inability of the cong to pay the mortgage for the hall to the wt. I have firsthand knowledge of it from an elder in a poor Hispanic cong. Their doors were closed because they were unable to meet the mortgage. I suppose that the less than 75 publishers thing....would possibly effect the ability to pay the mortgage and therefore it would be joined to another in hopes that the wt would get their $$$$$. Then, after the halls are paid for by the cong., the hall is then dedicated back to the wt corp.
• 

  blondie

  I confirm the 75 publisher rule. When a congregation splits or divides, the WTS likes there to be at least 75 publishers for each side. Also, if there is more than one congregation in an area and publisher counts drop in one but not another, they will send publishers to the smaller one from the larger one. If both are experiencing drops in publishers, they will combine them. This is for as stated previously, economic reasons as well as keeping the elders around 3 to 5; 3 for the service committee which really makes all the elder decisions, PO, secretary, and service overseer; and ideally also a separate school overseer and WT Study overseer.

  In my area they are several congregations, so mostly there has been an assigned shift in publishers. But as the numbers drop lower...circuits are being combined too because of this as well as the difficulty in finding new COs. That explains the recent drop in quality...they did used to be more loving.

  Blondie
• 

  ozziepost

  It's the same downunder too.
• 

  rocketman

  Yes, I'll aslo confirm what Blondie mentioned - they like to have 75 or so pubs to start a congregation. They also like having a 'balance' of elders, pioneers, ms's, etc.
• 

  czarofmischief

  I was once in a congregation with 150 publishers. It was huge. We didn't split, though, which I was naive enough then to wonder about. The GB must have known that something was going to happen, because within two years almost ALL the young people had been DFed.

  Hm... maybe changing the religion would solve the problem? Maybe if we quit excluding people, quit predicting the end of the world, and focused on the real message of the Kingdom, which is Love God and Your Neighbor - maybe include charitable works under "Service Time" and arrange for people to work helping the poor, the sick, the orphaned? The organization has so many good people who could do so much good if someone would just show them how!

  Whatever...

  CZAR
• 

  metatron

  This is an excellent post because it exposes the reality behind the Society's claimed statistics.

  They do an excellent job of hiding their decline. Originally, the 75 publisher figure was used to avoid having

  a large lump of publishers in a congregation who did nothing but attend. In dealing with C.O.'s , they were

  almost fanatical about things like this - forcing congregations to have book studies that were too small,

  to compel people to attend and go out in service.

  The slump in attendance and zeal is hitting them hard in some areas.

  metatron