THE WATCHTOWER - 1 January, 2002. (REPORT)

bj

Can somebody here scan the report please? (Or fax it to Kent)I'm interested in all of it but the most is FRANCE.

Joe

Fredhall

Bj,

When a JW comes to your door, ask for the magazine.

bj

Fredhall,

I don't appreciate at all your usual nonesense comments. If you have time to waste, do it somewere else.

Joe

Satanus

Fred

I was able to keep one elder, who didn't know me, but i knew him, visiting me for a few months, trying to answer my questions. They have stopped coming to my door. Can you send them around?

Thanks
SS

fred's answer makes perfect sense. unfortunately youll have to wait till at least january for the magazine to be featured and probably several months more for a visit depending on where you live. thanks fred, but i think bj was hoping for something quicker.

mox

Stephanus

When a JW comes to your door, ask for the magazine.

And when exactly is that likely to be, Fred? I haven't had a Dub come to my door (without me begging one I knew to deliver that month's magazine once) for over a year! Some time before that, on one of their visits, I asked an old Dub why the number of visits by his congregation had dropped so markedly in the few short years since we'd been here. He told me how there was a lot of depression and divorce in the congregation, and the young people were trying to get educations and good jobs rather than pioneering (he was a very honest Dub - a rare breed!). When I was in New Zealand in 1999, I stayed with a friend overnight in Auckland the night before I flew back to Sydney. About 15 minutes before we were due to leave for the airport, there was a knock at the door. Guess who? My friend was amazed - in the 18 months of living there, there'd never been a JW at the door, and yet the day a known Dub opposer like me stays there, here they are! One of the posters on this board mentioned that it'd been 3.5 years between the last two visits by Dubs.

So, when is this "next visit" going to be, Fred? It seems to me that the "love" of many in the congregations is growing cold...

"You've got the brain of a four-year-old boy, and I'll bet he was glad to get rid of it."
- Groucho Marx

ozziepost

I had a visit! I had a visit!

Yes, folks, I actually had a door-to-door style visit a coupla weeks ago. Oh joy! It was the FIRST for about 3 years. I guess some places are just too difficult to find. The avge dub can't start their time at my place.

It does seem that the coverage of territory has dropped since the "generation" fiasco.

Cheers,
Ozzie

"It's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness."
Anonymous

Osarsif

2001 Service Year Report:

http://observer.org/apps/pbcs.dll/article?Date=20011119&Category=JWANDSOCIETY3&ArtNo=111200001

bj

Osarif,

Thanks for the link.

Joe

fodeja

Thanks for the scans (though they're missing some parts, unfortunately).

Glancing over the avg. publisher counts now...wow, France is _still_ reporting decrease...Scandinavia as well...Eastern Europe partly stagnating, partly growing...Western Europe partly stagnating, partly decreasing...stagnation in the USA, slight decrease in Australia. It's somewhat surprising that Russia is down to 4% growth. Substantial growth in the so-called Third World, but it seems the list of countries with 2-digit growth rates is shrinking.

All in all, it looks pretty much like last year's report. To be honest, I had expected a slowdown of the decrease in Europe, but so far that doesn't seem to happen. Now it would be interesting to see if anything has changed in the baptism statistics.

f.