One Person Baptized at Circuit Assembly

by Simon Templar 29 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  Simon Templar

  I went to the Circuit Assembly with my wife yesterday. I have to keep peace in the family. There were less than 1,000 people for both the morning and the afternoon sessions. I remember 12-1300 people for this assembly just 5-7 years ago. The attendance is down by a third. Anyway, the last talk for the morning session is always the baptism. When the Brother gave the talk there was only one person there to be baptized! He mentioned that and called her by name (I didn't get the name because my mind was wandering-as usual). He spoke there, to her, calling her by her name several times. The 900 or so other people just sat there and listened. He asked her two questions which she answered aloud, there was a prayer and off to the pool she went. We all had lunch. That's it. Only one person! I remember baptisms at the Circuit Assembly of 30-40-50 people. It has been dwindling down for years. Now it is only one.

  I said to my Wife, with all these witnesses here, almost a thousand. They all go door-to-door (almost all), they all preach, they spend thousands of hours in the FS, and there is only one convert? Not even a child of believers being baptized. What's going on? My Wife didn't know what to say. I said, honey, this is the end of something. Either it's the end of the world as these people have been saying for over 100 years, or it's the beginning of the end of the religion at least in the developed, English-speaking world. The growth in the English speaking world has really ended. It's freaky! I don't know what to think.

  Note: We live in a suburb of an American east coast City. The Circuit mixes in congregations from inside the City also. In these poorer urban neighborhoods (I won't use the word "ghetto"), the FS was amazing. There was always growth. That's where most of the growth was. Now there is none. The WTB&TS is moving out of Brooklyn, this growth thing is now really manifesting, the attendance is off by hundreds of people at the Circuit Assembly, I honestly don't know what to say. Something's going on. I was amazed to see this happening.
• 

  ToesUp

  Thanks for the report.

  Did they read the accounts report? You know how much this assembly cost us. We have a deficit?
• 

  dropoffyourkeylee

  The ratio of baptized to attendees has been running about 0.4-0.6%, so only one out of 1000 is indeed low
• 

  Darkknight757

  Wow how strange that must have been to only see one sucker getting baptized. I know at the last assimilation we were down a little from normal. Attendance was down a bit as well even know we had a rock star GB member at our 1 day.

  Interested to see how many people get baptized at this next one and accounts report. I'll try to record it this time. 😬
• 

  Wild_Thing

  You would think it would be a wake up call to her when she looked around and realized she was the only one.

  I would have gone to the bathroom to "put on my swimsuit" and slipped out the backdoor!
• 

  freddo

  I can report from the UK one circuit split over two days.

  Yesterday - Saturday assembly 4 baptized 1005 present (used to get 1100 a few years back)

  Today - Sunday assembly 4 baptized 897 present (used to get 1000 a few years back.)

  And of course there was a "deficit."

  A few years back 6 per side was the norm. But it's been lower since the 2014 hoopla died down - one assembly day in 2015 had zero baptisms and another had 3.

  So a bit of a bounce back in baptisms, but not to pre 2014 levels. And a bit of a drop in attendance - the lowest I can recall.
• 

  MarkofCane

  No word on my ass yet! Last year there were 5, one was elderly around 80 and 4 were born in's. I think people are not so easily scammed unless your a lonely elderly or coerced born in, brainwashed from birth. The growth really is in third world countries but as the internet reaches more and more people so will their decline.
  
• 

  DATA-DOG

  The WTBTS does not really care about the baptism figures. They care about splitting up the congregations into enough circuits. Then they schedule multiple conventions that all have "deficits."

  The "Regional Conventions" are a joke as well. "What?? Growth is down in the USA?? Let's combine are less populated and numerous "Districts" into more highly concentrated "Regions." Then, when the sheeple unite, the groups seems huge and we ramble on about growth as never before! Of course there is still a deficit! LOL!!!", say the WTBTS rulers.

  Dont even get me started about "International Conventions." The "blessing from Jeehooplah" that YOU pay for! By the way, don't forget that the WTBTS now has credit card readers for donations! 😇

  DD
• 

  stillin

  Proof! That Jehovah doesn't want any to be destroyed but wants all to attain to eternal life.

  Oh, yeah. The baptism rate is nowhere near the birth rate. So lots more are headed to eternal destruction than are being baptized.
• 

  paladin1

  My wife and I attended the morning session yesterday and one old man had to helped out of his chair by two brothers to reply to the two questions. This was one person out of 529 in attendance. Last weekend we attended the afternoon session and found out only one born in teen was dunked out of our circuit at over 529 in attendance. We did not watch the old man getting dunked. I hope he survived. lol Our region is southern Saskatchewan, Canada.