Going door to door to recruit members doesn't work

by JH 44 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  SirNose586

  A few bookstudies ago we were talking about the d2d work. One sister believed it was "this new movement that people have, to say that their religious beliefs were a personal thing. They were just trying to get out of a conversation."

  "This is nothing new," I started. "People have always kept religion and politics close to their chest. Remember, you're going on their turf and their time. You already have the cards stacked against you when you knock on doors. That's why talking to people when they don't feel pressured is the only real way to get new people to join."

  They all nodded as if somehow I had dropped this gem from heaven.
• 

  Mary

  While not very efficient it does work as there are new people joining to replace the the droves leaving.

  Nowhere near enough members are being recruited to replace those that are leaving. The majority of those getting baptized are children who were born in to the religion, not converts. In my old Hall, there have been 3 people who have come to the religion from recruitment in the past 20 years. That's it. When you consider that it took on average, 178,000 hours to recruit 3 people----well, that's not considered "effective" by any stretch of the imagination.

  If they didn't go door to door, they would eventually recede, stagnate and splinter off into small groups when the WTS could no longer afford to be profitable.

  Not true at all. No other religion goes door to door like the Dubs (except Mormons for a 3 year stint) and most of them have far more members than what the Witnesses do. It's because the WTS insists on the door to door work that have become stagnat, not the other way round.
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  zack

  The ones that leave are doing what the scripture says: GET OUT OF HER!
• 

  Warlock

  When you consider that it took on average, 178,000 hours to recruit 3 people----well, that's not considered "effective" by any stretch of the imagination.

  Mary,

  Don't you know? The reason it's not "effective" is because 'satan has blinded the eyes of the unbelievers'.

  Warlock

  
  
• 

  avidbiblereader

  I agree with you totally

  When you look at all the hours they do going door to door world wide and then you look at how many hours preaching it takes to bring just 1 person to their Organization, it's not efficient.

  Yes but how many cheeseburgers, french fries and donuts are consumed in that same hour of FS? That is the real question.

  abr
• 

  Leolaia

  The organization has become really set in its ways. In the halcyon days of ol' Rutherford, they tried to use almost any newfangled technology to "spread the word"....radio, portable phonograph records, newspaper advertising, sound cars, early celluloid, etc. Had Knorr followed in his predecessor's footsteps, he would've branched out into TV (think of Fred Franz as the first televangelist), and now there would've been podcasts, talk radio shows, a JW cable network, etc. But Knorr got rid of WBBR and all the other avenues of "advertising" the King and the Kingdom and stuck to just one thing, door-to-door preaching and its become (not counting "street witnessing," which is not too different) the single rigid routine modus operandi, despite its obvious failings. In his day, Judge Rutherford was a national figure, subject to frequent articles in Time magazine, and whose presence on the radio was comparable to modern talk radio personalities like Rush Limbaugh. Today, the average person knows very little about who the JWs are....
• 

  Seeker4

  I remember very well the moment, as an active Witness, when it dawned on me that the HtoH work was just incredibly ineffective, if we REALLY believed that this was a life-saving work and the lives of billions depended on them getting the message.
  
  I was driving home from a bible study I had with a guy in prison.
  
  No, the door to door work is totally counterproductive in that it pisses off way more people than it converts.
  
  It's JW feel good "busy work," making them think they are doing something important while they are essentially wasting time.
  
  S4
• 

  OnTheWayOut

  If they didn't go door to door, they would eventually recede, stagnate and splinter off into small groups when the WTS could no longer afford to be profitable.

  Not true at all. No other religion goes door to door like the Dubs (except Mormons for a 3 year stint) and most of them have far more members than what the Witnesses do. It's because the WTS insists on the door to door work that have become stagnat, not the other way round.

  IMO, if the rank and file are not kept busy and feeling guilty for not doing more field service, they will start spending time enjoying
  their weekends, actually examining the doctrine also. This would cause droves to leave.

  A mind-control cult must control your free time to keep you from leaving. Many would stay, but the bucket would leak way too
  fast to fill it with new members without the preaching work. Maybe they will abandon the door-to-door aspect of the work and
  find another way to keep everyone busy, but they need the work.

  The only thing WTS considers ineffective about their free labor force is this- the possibility that the literature donations are not
  large enough. Even a penny profit is good enough. Remember, the labor to produce the literature is almost free, also. Even at
  that low a margin for profit, they are having trouble.
• 

  evetteto

  hey mary,

  I love Charles Stanley, he is an awesome teacher!!!
• 

  LongHairGal

  I agree with you that it is mostly a waste of time and not efficient. I also feel it is probably a control mechanism.

  But, I suspect one of the reasons they will not get rid of this is because going door to door is their "claim to fame". They are noted for doing this and don't want to let it go. Maybe they are afraid if they stop going door to door people will say they're quitters or something. Maybe they are afraid of falling further into obscurity.

  LHG