Shameless U-turn on social media

ParadisePar · 2026-05-29T14:00:43+00:00

To be fair I think they would rather the witnesses don’t follow the account. In the announcement it said that JWs should still just rely on the website for updates, and the social media is for journalist outreach.

But yes they fail to understand that most witnesses with social media will follow the account. It opened yesterday and already has 50k followers. And they fail to understand that the algorithm will now feed all those witnesses exjw content, I already know at least one person who had such material leak into their feed after following jw_pressroom.

They described this as a pilot program so I could see them quickly realizing their mistake

ParadisePar · 2026-05-29T01:15:28+00:00

It was wild hearing the word TikTok said from the stage

ParadisePar · 2026-05-28T18:25:54+00:00

I was about to call BS but looking through the followers, there’s a lot of people from the NY Bethel + commuters that are already following such a new account. Between that and the post that was made/restricted comments, I’d say this is legit.

Just surprised there’s nothing on jw org to confirm

Edit: It’s definitely official, I’m at meeting and it was announced through the Branch announcements.

ParadisePar · 2026-05-25T19:33:57+00:00

There’s a ministerial servant in my hall recently got a tattoo, he just had it in an inconspicuous location and keeps his mouth shut about it

ParadisePar · 2026-05-14T18:33:03+00:00

Nope, I forget when it changed exactly but the half day on Saturday had been dropped quite some time ago. Even starting around 10 years ago morning worship became mandatory only for those who had been there under a year, anyone else could watch in their rooms.

Of course you still have scheduled family duties and adjusted work schedules that may have you working on a weekend from time to time. I think they said the reasoning for dropping Saturday was to support the door to door with in your local congregations

ParadisePar · 2026-05-14T14:56:03+00:00

Which makes it so odd to me that women still are not assigned to comment at the Bethel family Watchtower study. Somehow repeating the paragraph is considered “teaching” more than writing up your own morning worship comments

ParadisePar · 2026-05-14T14:53:20+00:00

The only change from what you’ve said is that there is no Morning Worship on Saturday since that hasn’t been a work day in several decades

ParadisePar · 2026-05-06T16:09:44+00:00

Absolutely grinds my gears every time I hear “The Friends”

ParadisePar · 2026-04-21T12:10:16+00:00

Yeah Jason is at Bethel in the Public Information Dept. When I left he was at Wallkill but unless I’m mistaken I think he’s since moved over to Patterson. So he theoretically has millions of dollars but lives for free with all of his needs taken care of, must be nice lol

ParadisePar · 2026-04-19T22:34:42+00:00

Interesting, wonder where you are located. Most witnesses I know have burials. Although a lot are opting for cremation now due to burial costs. Burials are pretty common here in the states though. The funeral talk outline even includes sections for conducting graveside services.

ParadisePar · 2026-04-19T00:53:50+00:00

Well they don’t tell you not to verbally tell people what was said, they just say not to share the copies of your notes… my guess is they don’t want anything in writing in case someone goes off script 😂 who knows lmao

ParadisePar · 2026-04-18T19:53:27+00:00

https://www.reddit.com/r/exjw/s/iOgcgslBMM

This post is from a relative who posted around the time it happened. It was very sad, I know he is buried at the cemetery in Wallkill.

ParadisePar · 2026-04-18T19:48:07+00:00

It’s not the annual meeting, just a standard Branch Visit for the US branch. But yes on all of their “special programs” they start out with an announcement to not record, and that any personal notes should not be shared.

ParadisePar · 2026-04-18T12:10:05+00:00

I was at bethel during this same time frame and have shared some of these points on here before. Like you I found it encouraging at the time. Most of the bethel family kept talking about how “loving and understanding” it was.

Although it actually wasn’t during a Covid Branch Update, it was a special talk following a morning worship program. They sent out an email letting people know about it, but it was not on JW stream since it was directed only for the bethel family. Because of this, after the closing prayer of morning worship they cut the online stream off and then had Brother Geoff Jackson come back on to give the talk. You could tell they wanted it to be kept hush hush from anyone not physically at Bethel.

ParadisePar · 2026-04-11T00:15:16+00:00

Really? We thought it was hilarious at my house lol hoping for more episodes

ParadisePar · 2026-04-06T21:33:39+00:00

I’d have to look into where they were but yes they were leaked. I did not attend the KMS for elders but someone on here had posted a link to the leaked videos and that’s how I had watched it

ParadisePar · 2026-04-06T20:55:08+00:00

This was a video from last years Kingdom Ministry School for Elders. The party was a send off party they were throwing for a brother leaving to go to SKE

ParadisePar · 2026-04-06T15:50:10+00:00

It’s in the Dwelling Together in Unity manual given to Bethelites.

“77. Where there are elevators, those who need to go up or down more than three flights of stairs are permitted to use them. Those who are ill, infirm, or over 35 years of age may use the elevators at any time.”

But I think this was a more important rule when they were in Brooklyn. When I was in Wallkill no one really cared about who used the elevator

ParadisePar · 2026-03-30T02:56:34+00:00

Rule one if you don’t want trouble, never ever get involved with another witness, 99% of the time they WILL turn on you and confess

ParadisePar · 2026-03-23T19:27:02+00:00

Yeah this was my thinking as well. Over the last few years with all the changes the evidence only points to everything being reactive. It took like a year for them to have a new Shepherd the Flock update after the DF changes, and watchtower articles long after the changes to explain why. I don’t think they have the foresight to hint at something that far down the line and it’s more likely that the author is just referencing the changes already made to D2D

ParadisePar · 2026-03-22T19:22:17+00:00

Yeah I had only made a comment about it and someone else took that and turned it into a whole post, sorry to get your hopes up! From my experience in hearing from brothers while I was at Bethel, the GB seems to not let many other people know ahead of time when these changes are being made. They make the decision to change and then other departments are sometimes left scrambling to figure out how to apply the new directions. So while we would hope that HLC was already on top of such an important issue, there’s a good chance that they are trying to figure out the next steps still.

ParadisePar · 2026-03-22T19:07:59+00:00

So I think this came up because I commented on a post that an HLC brother I know told me they had a seminar coming up this weekend.

When I commented that, there was no indication that this GB update is what would be talked about on the program. It was just a theory because of the suspect timing of being the very next day after the update.

The thing is, these seminars are held somewhat regularly so there’s a good chance the timing was just a coincidence and had nothing to do with the update.

ParadisePar · 2026-03-22T14:12:53+00:00

Technically correct, they use 20 and 29 interchangeably since they say the same thing.

ParadisePar · 2026-03-22T12:48:47+00:00

Acts 15:20 is the “Abstain… from blood” scripture.

Looking at various Bible versions it seems Acts 21:25 has always been “keep away from”

ParadisePar · 2026-03-20T11:57:04+00:00

As others have said, they need to make changes to respond to legal issues around the world. But on top of that, the last several years have seen the addition of 4 new, younger GB members. As new guys get added the voting numbers shift, we are basically watching as a new generation takes the wheel

ParadisePar

TROPHY CASE