by breakfast of champions 20 Replies latest watchtower bible
This is an unofficial survey.
Was curious as to the number of currently serving elders who were born-in and/or raised as JW versus those who were "recruited"( i.e, not born in or raised as JW.)
For instance, right now in the hall I am assigned to:
2 elders were born-in and/or raised as JWs.
5 were not (recruited as adults)
What is the makeup of the elder body in the cong. you are assigned to right now? How many born-in/raised? How many "recruited"?
I am pretty sure even one of the GB was "worldly."
I was exposed to the religion at the age of 6, when the end of the world would arrive by 1975. My mother got DF'ed in 1976 when it didn't come and went back in the 1980's without me. I grew up, joined the military, had some bad times with alcohol and thought God wanted me to do his will. The only God I knew was from the JW's, so when they called, I went. SO I WAS RECRUITED.
We had mostly born-in elders in various congregations, but always a few recruited ones.
I think our hall is bout 50%
they are almost all old though
80% (born-in) in one hall, 90% in another, 15% in another (the average age of the eder body was 65+), and maybe 60% in mine right now. As Ignoranceisbliss mentioned though, the elder bodies are mostly old in most of the congs I've been in, like average age is 65 or 70. The youngest elder I've met was 33, the oldest in his 90's. Average age of the elder body in some other congregations is mid 40s to late 50s.
In my old Hall it was about one third converts and two thirds born-in.
One thing I noticed was that the "convert" Elders seemed less hard line than many born-in ones, but that may just be the very small sample that I came in contact with.
I wonder if there is still a hole in the age breakdown of the elders. There were very few elders of the age where they may have teenage children, obvisouly as kids from 14 yo to 20 yo would be rebelling and hence their fathers would be stripped of their elderhood; they would be back as elders once 'enough' time had elapsed and the kids had flown the coup.
at my old hall, there was one recruit and the rest were born-in
Not an elder here, but just my experience from having attended at least six halls over the years -- the elder bodies in the native language halls averaged 75-80% born-in. In the foreign language halls, the elder bodies were 50% born-in and included some very young elders. And the foreign language congs seemed to attract those who were not widely accepted in the native language congs...but they could fast-track to elder and run the show in a different language.
BOC, another interesting thing I have observed is that a lot of born in elders have (had) unbelieving fathers
Does it matter?
