Expression and Worship
Meeting together for worship is central to Jehovah’s Witnesses’ religious practice. Much worship is focused on Bible study and weekend services include a Bible talk and Watchtower study. Worship does include songs (the preferred term over hymns). In the UK, the musical accompaniment is usually pre-recorded and played on a CD player or computer, rather than live music. This differs by country however, and in Germany, for instance, live music is more common in Kingdom Halls (Chryssides 2016: 206).The Jehovah’s Witnesses website lists the following activities as worship:
- • Praying to God
- • Reading and studying the Bible
- • Meditating on what we learn from the Bible
- • Meeting together to pray, study the Bible and sing
- • Preaching the “good news of the Kingdom”
- • Helping those in need
- • Constructing and maintaining Kingdom Halls
- • Sharing in disaster relief