I need to change congregation but stay living in the same place. Any experience with this.
How hard is it to attend a congregation outside of the territory where you live? Consequences for doing so.
by hoser 28 Replies latest jw friends
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Oubliette
Just go. Or better yet, just stop going. -
hoser
So I just go up to an elder in a different hall and say I am moving to your hall? Or do they ask the address? I could give them some bullshit address in their territory and see how long it takes them to figure it out -
The Searcher
Dead easy - just go!
I've known several Elders who lived outside of their "assigned" territory.
A couple in my congregation "prefer" not to go to a nearer KH.
Your choice where to go!
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hoser
Just show up and wait til they ask or go through the proper channels? -
Oubliette
Hoser, you are obviously under the impression that you need to obey the elders and the WTBTS. You don't.
The only have authority over you if you give it to them.
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Oubliette
Why do you want to change congregations? -
label licker
That's exactly what we did and with the co's blessing. He had told the elders of the new hall to use us to the fullest. Then the next pompous co came along, Birnie Geraux, and he told these elders to do what ever it takes to get us back to the old hall. Yet, my husband was being used as literature/book counter as well as territory for the last twelve years before we left. They still allowed us to pioneer and work at the bethel farm.
It will depend on your circuit overseer and how much you dump into their money pits. Why in the world would you want to put yourself through the agony of the gossip that will follow????
And yet the old hall had two elders who were living outside of their territory. And forty minutes away from us there were a congregation of Italians who had a few elders living outside of their territory as well as quite a few families. They had felt comfortable with one another since they were all Italians.
Rules are different in each hall, it seems. A bethel elder told us that they prefer you go to the hall your assigned to but there is no written in stone rule on that. I do know there is an article on it for I had dug it up years ago to give the co if we were given a hard time about it, which we were not.
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StephaneLaliberte
I remember a time in my life where the congregation I was attending was discouraging me more than anything else. I was coming back from there less happy then I was before going.
In the end, I believe it was simply a matter of compatibility as some of my friends told me very good thing about that congregation. Anyways, I moved to another congregation without changing territory and I remember the elders were not happy about it, but I did tell them the truth.
Anyways, I was than very happy in the other hall for quite a while before I had my kids and my crisis of conscience.
You should not leave the JW because you don't get along with people in your hall. You should stop however if, in the end, it violates your personal beliefs and conscience. So until you reach that state, if you ever reach it... you should definately change congregation.
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sowhatnow
where i came from if someone asks why your going to their cong now, all one has to do is say 'we were assigned here to help'. quickly change the subject.
no one questions it, at least the general people.
lots of people in my moms cong are from a nearby territory, because her hall is very rural, small and has all old people and needed some ms and elders they had one of each. if those ones were to leave that hall would have to close. there are barely 70 that go there. in fact within 5 years or less,
it wouldn't surprise me if 8 elderly people pass away.
in my past we attended many different congs, looking for association.
sociable people who liked to do things, but that never happened. I always understood one can go where they wish. we always did. we usually went where it was closest, not where we were assigned.