The smallest congregation in your country

[blueyellow]

What is the smallest congregation you have heard of in your area? Or one of the smallest?

 

In my country the smallest is made up of 8 publishers (one of them is the elder) and it's got its own Kingdom Hall. 

[Adelin]

I guess this congregation you're talking about has a lot of bible studies attending the meetings ... or it is just a group belonging to a congregation?

 

I don't know of congregations with less than 20 publishers. Recently, the general tendency in our country is to unite the smaller congs with bigger ones if they are close to each other.

Six months ago I was in a congregation with 30 publishers (only around 15-19 attended the meetings regularly) ... we were assigned to other congregations and the kingdom hall is going to be sold. 

[Brother_Bliss]

The smallest I can think of is the local Sign Language congregation. I believe they are just shy of 30 publishers.

[Poly Ester]

For a long while we had 19, then families moved in and we went to 31, now we have 45!! 

However we have a really vast sparsely populated territory

[blueyellow]

1 hour ago, Adelin said:

I guess this congregation you're talking about has a lot of bible studies attending the meetings ... or it is just a group belonging to a congregation?

 

I don't know of congregations with less than 20 publishers. Recently, the general tendency in our country is to unite the smaller congs with bigger ones if they are close to each other.

Six months ago I was in a congregation with 30 p...

 

It's not a group, it's a congregation in an isolated territory.

[sunshine]

I've always lived in the big cities where land is scares and kingdom halls are usually crowded.  Foreign language congregations usually start of around 30 or more.

[Dalbyj]

We have a Filipino congregation that meets in our kingdom hall - they had their assembly in the back room of our hall a couple of months ago. It was lovely to hear them singing!

[jwhess]

Years ago, I visited the congregation at Frank, Alberta (in Canada).  Located near the famous Frank Slide disaster of the early 1900s they had a small congregation of about 15-20 (at that time).  A congregation is still listed on our JW.ORG website for the town but I do not know its current size.

[Fiona]

My husband and I are going to outback Australia. We are joining a congregation of 4. We will make 6.
ST GEORGE QUEENSLAND.


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[hatcheckgirl]

5 minutes ago, Fiona said:

My husband and I are going to outback Australia. We are joining a congregation of 4. We will make 6.
ST GEORGE QUEENSLAND.

Are you visiting, or moving there?  That's really small! (The winner so far )

I was passing through Norseman WA on the edge of the Nullabor Plain.  They had 13 publishers at the time and were desperate for us to stay.  But I was heading for Perth.

[Fiona]

Are you visiting, or moving there?  That's really small! (The winner so far )
I was passing through Norseman WA on the edge of the Nullabor Plain.  They had 13 publishers at the time and were desperate for us to stay.  But I was heading for Perth.

Moving.
It has been a long time planning. 5 yrs ago when my son was on the mend from cancer we had debt up and over our heads. So it has taken us 4 and a bit yrs to work hard and pay it off. We will be debt free in about 2 months. Then our plan is to save for the next 6... pioneer Jan 1 and buy a caravan and live on the road up at St George cong.
We went to visit them last Jan and 1 older brother does EVERYTHING. Its a HUGE territtory. They only do the town as there is only 4 of them and 2 are not well physically.
So if anyone in Australia wants to serve where a little cong needs desperate help please consider there!.
If my husband and i concsntrate just on rurals we will take 18 months to cover the territory once. We have bible studies already waiting for us to come. As noone is there to do them.


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[Pjdriver]

I gave a talk years ago (early 80s) in a small town in the Midwest (Iowa). There was one Elder and one MS and 15 publishers. It was the only time I ever gave a talk without use of a microphone. They designed a Kingdom Hall in the walk-in basement of a brothers home. I almost moved there, but there was no work for me. Last I heard the congregation has at least tripled  and they built a new hall.

Edited April 29, 2018 by Pjdriver

[dove]

4 minutes ago, Pjdriver said:

I gave a talk years ago (early 80s) in a small town in the Midwest (Iowa). There was one Elder and one MS and 15 publishers. It was the only time I ever gave a talk without use of a microphone. They designed a Kingdom Hall in the walk-in basement of a brothers home. I almost moved there, but there was no work for me. Last I heard the congregation has at least tripled  and they built a new hall.

 

You must have given a good talk..

[Ivine]

Some months ago I was supporting a congregation with 18 publishers from about 6 miles away my home. Meetings had an assistance of 15-23 people. At this moment with 2 couples of pioneers moving to there, there are 3 elders and 7 regular pioneers. 

 

This is their shy but cozzie Kingdom Hall in StreetView: https://goo.gl/maps/pWDbeaMN67T2

[Sequoia]

The smallest congregation in my area is our American Sign Language Congregation.  It has about 40 people, some of these publishers can actually hear but are part of that congregation to help out.  But this is not the smallest congregation that I have heard of in the United States.  I heard about Navajo speaking congregations which is as some of you probably know a Native American Language.   These congregations had about 20 or 25 publishers in each congregation in Arizona on the Navajo Reservation.  That was earlier in the 2000's, so I don't know their size at this time.  

 

We have a Tagalog Bible Study Group in my area that is working on becoming a congregation, but right now they are part of an English Congregation.  I believe that they are smaller than the American Sign Language Congregation in this area, although I'm not sure exactly how many publishers they have right now.  Many of you may already know but Tagalog is the primary Language used in the Philippines, although they also have others.    

 

I hope this helps contribute to answering your question.

Edited May 1, 2018 by JW2017

[Sequoia]

This subject reminds me:  I remember much earlier in the 2000's at a convention when it was said that at that time 20% of Jehovah's Witnesses in the United States were part of Spanish speaking congregations which would probably increase.  This of course did not include congregations that were meeting in a number of other languages besides English, including American Sign Language as well as foreign languages. 

 

This was expected to increase as I'm sure it has.  I believe that Spanish is still the largest foreign language group for congregations in the United States.  But of course not the only one.  Then there's American Sign Language that we use for those that are deaf and deaf and blind here in the United States.  

 

I know that in many countries there are foreign language groups as well as different sign language groups among us.  These congregations and Bible Study Groups come in many different sizes.  Some are considered big in comparison to other ones and yet others are much smaller as this post brings out.

 

I just thought that I would share.

Edited May 1, 2018 by JW2017

[Ivine]

On 01/05/2018 at 3:57 AM, JW2017 said:

This subject reminds me:  I remember much earlier in the 2000's at a convention when it was said that at that time 20% of Jehovah's Witnesses in the United States were part of Spanish speaking congregations which would probably increase.  This of course did not include congregations that were meeting in a number of other languages besides English, including American Sign Language as well as foreign languages. 

 

This was expected to increase as I'm sure it has.  I believe that Spanish is still the largest foreign language group for congregations in the United States.  But of course not the only one.  Then there's American Sign Language that we use for those that are deaf and deaf and blind here in the United States.  

 

I know that in many countries there are foreign language groups as well as different sign language groups among us.  These congregations and Bible Study Groups come in many different sizes.  Some are considered big in comparison to other ones and yet others are much smaller as this post brings out.

 

I just thought that I would share.

 

 

Well, I don't remember very well but in our Special Meeting in our country last January, the representantive of the Governing Body said in his talk that there's more than 400,000 publishers  spanish natives in US today. I'm not really sure about the number but it's a huge amount of native spanish JW's there.

Edited May 3, 2018 by Ivine