1976–present

== 1976–present ==
Timeline—1976–2024
1976	Governing Body takes control
1980	Purge of senior Brooklyn headquarters staff
1995	Teaching that generation of 1914 will see Armageddon is abandoned
2008	Definition of generation changed to 'remnant of anointed'
2010	Definition of generation changed to 'living anointed whose lives overlap 1914 anointed'
=== Organizational developments ===
The leadership structure of Jehovah's Witnesses was reorganized from January 1, 1976, with the power of the presidency passed to the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses and the establishment of six committees to oversee tasks such as writing, teaching, publishing and evangelizing work. At this time, Watch Tower Society publications began using the capitalized name, Jehovah's Witnesses. Following Knorr's death in 1977, Frederick William Franz became president of the Watch Tower Society of Pennsylvania.
A purge of senior Brooklyn headquarters staff was carried out in April and May 1980 after it was discovered some at the highest ranks of the hierarchy dissented with core Watch Tower Society doctrines, particularly surrounding the significance of 1914, and wished to propose adjustments as "new understandings" to continue the century-long tradition of changes in doctrines. Unease at the chronology doctrines had surfaced within the Governing Body earlier in 1980. In February, three Governing Body members – aware that those who had been alive in 1914 were rapidly dwindling in number, despite the teaching that their generation would be alive to see Armageddon—had proposed a radical change in Watch Tower doctrines to require that the "generation" that would see the arrival of Armageddon had been alive only since 1957, the year of the launch of the Soviet space satellite Sputnik. The proposal, which would have extended the deadline for Armageddon by 43 years, failed to gain a majority vote.
Internal dissatisfaction with official doctrines continued to grow, leading to a series of secret investigations and judicial hearings. Among those expelled from the Witnesses was former Governing Body member Raymond Franz. Many of those expelled were labelled by Governing Body members as "spiritual fornicators", "mentally diseased" and "insane". The purge resulted in a number of schisms in the movement in Canada, Britain, and northern Europe, and prompted the formation of loose groups of disaffected former Witnesses. The Watch Tower Society responded to the crisis with a new, hardened attitude towards the treatment of defectors and expelled Witnesses.
In 1992, Milton George Henschel, then a member of the Governing Body, succeeded Franz as president of the Watch Tower Society of Pennsylvania. In 2000, members of the Governing Body resigned from positions on the boards of the Watch Tower Society and its subsidiary corporations in order to focus on doctrinal matters. Don Alden Adams then replaced Henschel as president. Following Adams' death in 2014, Robert Ciranko became president of the Watch Tower Society.
Beginning in 2004, various Watch Tower Society properties in Brooklyn were sold in preparation for the establishment of a new world headquarters in Warwick, New York, completed in 2016.
=== Doctrinal changes ===
In 1995, changes regarding their understanding of Jesus' comments regarding "this generation" (from Matthew 24:34) were published. Throughout the previous four decades, Jehovah's Witnesses had taught that the generation that saw the events of 1914 would not die out before Armageddon came. The understanding of the "generation" was again adjusted in 2008, to refer to the remnant of the anointed. In 2010, the definition of the generation was changed again, wherein the lives of anointed individuals living in 1914 overlap with a second group alive in the present day, some of whom will see Armageddon. Jehovah's Witnesses continue to teach that Armageddon is imminent.
Category:1976–present