Just marking for future reference.
Have a nice evening, everyone!
The dirty little secret of Watchtower PREACHING WORK you may not know
by Terry 47 Replies latest jw friends
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hoser
I think you're on to something Terry.
The preaching activity is Sooo urgent we are always told at the Service Meetings, but when it comes to the actual preaching work it is done in the most ineffective manner.
Typical Saturday morning preaching.
1. Service arrangement for 9:30- elder taking lead shows up 5 to 10 minutes late with a coffee in hand.
2. As few groups as possible are assigned to make for larger groups in each vehicle so less territory is covered than if 2 per car group.
3. 10 am to 10:15 am out the door.
4. sister incompetent/forgetful pioneer realizes she forgot her bible at home. Go to her place to get it.
5. 10:30 first call in the territory
6.11:15 coffee break
7. 11:45 back in the territory
8. 12:00 noon done the field service for the day
this is a typical Saturday morning of preaching. If a person is honest in reporting their "Time" only 1 hour can be counted as field service for over 3 hours put in the morning. I've complained about it but the elders/pioneers like it that way. I think it's set up this way to keep people busy a social control to make publishers waste 30 hours a month to keep up with the 10 hour requirement.
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Terry
I remember when I was a regular Pioneer listening to some of the brothers and sisters rationalize the amount of time they counted which really didn't amount to doodly squat as far as being effective was concerned.
One friend of mine would go off by himself and stand at doors and pretend to ring the doorbell and never talk to anybody all day. He'd leave the magazines in the doorhandle and count them as placements, too!
What a load.
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thetrueone
Jehovah Witness field service corruption
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Quentin
Doing "door to door" has been ingrained in the jw's for so long it would take a lot of work to change it. Not to mention the loss of "control" over the r&f. Cults "must" have "busy work" for the followers. It is simply a matter of time and the wt will make the changes needed to keep the r&f "busy". They have allready made a number of changes as it is. Till they make this major change we'll sit back and continue to tsk, tsk and wonder why.
Somewhere in the mass of the current wt there is a rising star who will emerge as a "leader", one who will bring about a "new and improved" wtb&ts. They are in a time of transition. Will be interesting to observe.
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Terry
Somewhere in the mass of the current wt there is a rising star who will emerge as a "leader", one who will bring about a "new and improved" wtb&ts. They are in a time of transition. Will be interesting to observe.
Isn't it odd that, unlike most religious denominations, Jehovah's Witnesses were most pleasant to be around under the Presidency of the least charismatic man, Nathan Knorr.
I think Knorr's secret weapon was Fred Franz. I use the word "weapon" selectively. Franz goes back to Russell's time. He is the single thread that ran through each of the presidential reigns.
I don't think another creative thinker like Franz could/would ever be allowed in to the select inner circle. He was a crackpot with a good education and a mystical sense of self-importance on behalf of the religion.
I think the dolts who run the Governing body have only one thought in their head: Consolidating Power.
If I were currently a JW I would be bored out of my freakin' mind!
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Bangalore
Excellent essay.
Bangalore
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notjustyet
Great info.
I have a addional thought about "why" going out in service is useful to the Wtbts.
The more "sever" the initiation, ie; field service, telling teachers, school mates your beliefs and not being able to be involved in holidays and other embarrassing moments that the Jw are subjected to creates dissonance. The way to reduce this dissonance that these embarrassing moments create is by "exaggerating the desirability of the goal" in this case, being a JW.
Here is the paste of the idea behind this.
The Effort-Justification Paradigm
Further information: Effort justification
Dissonance is aroused whenever individuals voluntarily engage in an unpleasant activity to achieve some desired goal. Dissonance can be reduced by exaggerating the desirability of the goal. Aronson & Mills [ 21 ] had individuals undergo a severe or mild "initiation" in order to become a member of a group. In the "mild-initiation" condition, the individuals engaged in an embarrassing activity. The group they joined turned out to be very dull and boring. The individuals in the severe-initiation condition evaluated the group as more interesting than the individuals in the mild-initiation condition.
All of the above paradigms continue to be used in fruitful research.
Washing one's hands has been shown to eliminate post-decisional dissonance, presumably because the dissonance is often caused by moral disgust (with oneself) which is related to disgust from unsanitary conditions. [ 22 ] [ 23 ]
(I had to edit one spot in this wiki poste as they used "severe-initiation" in both examples. I quoted this instance where I changed one of the to " mild- initiation")
Here is the link to the main page of Cognitive Dissonance where the effort justification is located.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance#The_Effort-Justification_Paradigm
I have never seen this thought brought out that service can be used in this regard. Ay thoughts on this?
NJY