Due to the efforts and spin around 2014, this year and next will turn in some impressive increases.
Unless they can maintain this level of hyped up activity, I would expect a noticable downturn in the 2015-2016 report.
Splash
2014 MEMORIAL ATTENDANCES FOR REST OF THE WORLD
by steve2 42 Replies latest watchtower medical
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alanv
ozbrad, there are always going to be ups and downs of average publishers over a number of years. Their service report for those years you mention agree with the census. But since then it has gone up slightly, but overall it is less than 1% per year over the last 20 years. You can see the figures in the link
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Designer Stubble
Steve2 / Problemaddict:
The population in the Netherlands grew 4% in the period 2003-2014, around 640000 additional persons (16.225M ti 16.865M).
So there is certainly a decline in memorial attendees (not to confuse with the growing number of partakers)...and over 640K persons extrato destroy at Armageddon.
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steve2
Alanv you are of course correct about the average number of publishers going up and down. The difference now compared to earlier decades is that the average numbers in the past invariably "caught" up with the peak numbers within one to two years, by which time, of course, even the peak numbers kept increasing. Now there is a lag between average and peaks of often several years. Increasingly, the organization "dines out" on peak publishers and is quiet about the lagging averages. It suggests an organization that is not as proficient as it once was in motivating more frequent participation by many in the congregations of its signal door-to-door activity.
As with Australia, New Zealand population census figures show plateauing, if not decline of those who idenify as JWs sustained over a 15-year period (in sharp contrast to previous census figures which showed consistent increase):
1996: 19,527
2001: 17,826
2006: 17,910
2013: 17,931.
Over those 15 years, immigrant populations have grown significantly in New Zealand, and from among their number has come "new growth". This suggests that participation in the religion by "kiwi-born" Witnesses is in decline.
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punkofnice
Over those 15 years, immigrant populations have grown significantly in New Zealand, and from among their number has come "new growth". This suggests that participation in the religion by "kiwi-born" Witnesses is in decline.
I've wondered about the immigrant thing too in other lands.
Here in the UK we have a lot of Eastern Europeans (even my grand daughter is half Polish bless her lil cotton socks).
I wonder if coming to a new land some of the immigrants will speak to the JWs in a bid to assimilate into the culture? Make new friends? Try the meetings? I dunno.
I do think that globalisation is playing a part in making the figures seem like growth in some countries whereas it isn't really. As you say probably the indigenous people are falling away from the WBT$ cult and being replaced by immigrants.
Just a thought.
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alanv
I think it is certainly true that many immigrants are more vulnerable to conversion by JWs. Of course this only makes a difference to the countries they emigrate to in their end of year service reports. The overall worldwide report would still give the correct worldwide percentage increase figure. So yes it may be that many of the more developed countries would show less publishers if it were not for the immigrants that accept the JW religion.
Certainly over the years the UK have had more than their fair share of immigrants, so it would be interesting to hear from JWs if the 1% increase most years is made up of many immigrants joining the faith.
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OneEyedJoe
Immigrants are typically more susceptible to cult indoctrination. They're a fish out of water, looking for something stable and along comes a couple "well dressed" (in cheap suits) folks who are nice to them. Of course they're going to talk to them and go to a meeting, why wouldn't they? What else do they have going on? They don't know anyone here, and this is a way to make friends.
Immigrants also tend to be a little more family oriented from what I've observed, and it makes sense that they would be. This means that when one becomes a JW, they're more likely to pull in their entire family.
I know in my area, the only congregations that I can remember having any significant growth in the last 15 years where foreign language congregations. Even those seem to have dropped off lately though. It's probably been about 20 years since an english congregation has split in my area, but the number of foreign language congregations approximately doubled (maybe more) over that time.
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tunnistaja.ee
Why did the Estonia/Latvia/Lithuania/Finland specifically enter the conversation? Anyone from around there here? I'm in Tallinn :)
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alanv
The thread is about the attendance figures for the 2014 memorial. Nostromo gave us the figures for Estonia/Latvia/Lithuania/Finland. So it would be good if there are any others that have the attendance for their own country.
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steve2
Alanv you are a master of the call for re-focusing on the topic thread. On the other hand, attempts to bring in related issues and to make sense of them contributes to the discussion. Both are good. But in general your call is a helpful one.