From time to time, the Apostolic Churches forum is confused with the Pentecostal churches that have the word "Apostolic" in their name. Is there another name for our forum--perhaps "Apostolic Succession"--that would avoid this confusion?
If a new name is a good idea, what should it be?
Michael
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Maybe just add (non-pentecostal) to the forum name?
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From time to time, the Apostolic Churches forum is confused with the Pentecostal churches that have the word "Apostolic" in their name. Is there another name for our forum--perhaps "Apostolic Succession"--that would avoid this confusion?
If a new name is a good idea, what should it be?
I think the idea is a good one. It's just that an alternative that is both airtight as to its meaning and not cumbersome in its wording is hard to come by.
"Apostolic Succession Churches" seems to me to fail on both accounts. It might be better, but if the effort is made to have a change and then we still get Pentecostals from churches called "Apostolic" posting in the belief that this forum is for them, we will be worse off than if the change were not made. After all, if they read the stickys before posting now, they'd already know that it is not about them. And I think a few may post here in order to assert that we are not entitled to decide the meaning of the word "Apostolic" by
ourselves and exclude their use of the term.
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How about "Old School Christians"?
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Any term that emphasizes Old or Traditional or Historic, etc. would seem to offer the same problems we are concerned about now. It's commonplace for members of even rather new churches to say that their beliefs, if not their organization, go back to the Apostles.
Traditional Churches might be okay, though there would be those who might object.
Counciliar Churches could work. We could define Counciliar in terms of the Ecumenical Councils, which form the basis of all orthodox, traditional, and Apostolic Christianity. And each of our churches do root our doctrine to these Great Councils. It is, admittedly, a strange title, one that I simply thought, though I think it could fit.
How about adding a "title" to this forum? Just like the Vatican Catholics call their forum OBOB and we Anglicans and Old Catholics call ours STR, we can give this forum its own title. It would have to be something common, though of course that shouldn't be terribly difficult:
Communion of Saints
Predenominationalists (I know the EOs will like that one a lot!)
Sacramental Churches
One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church (a stretch, I admit)
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But in each of those cases, we'd have to be aware of who would be excluded. At present, there is a problem only with the members of those Pentecostal churches that call themselves "Apostolic." lf we are not careful, we'd be taking on a name that seemed right, but which could allow more people to think they are included than was intended AND ALSO exclude some who are here now.
I like the (non-Pentecostal) idea. It is clear, concise, to the point and it plainly states what is not Apostolic while at the same time responding to the actual problem.
Or maybe we could all give the mods a five cent raise so they'd remember to move the Pentecostal threads to their appropriate forums
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I like the (non-Pentecostal) idea. It is clear, concise, to the point and it plainly states what is not Apostolic while at the same time responding to the actual problem.
Or maybe we could all give the mods a five cent raise so they'd remember to move the Pentecostal threads to their appropriate forums
It's the shortest and most direct way to go, although my hesitation about it is that it still doesn't define what we mean by "Apostolic." This might sound as though we are intending to have the forum be for some "Apostolic" Christians but not for others--a purely arbitrary decision. IOW, it doesn't really say what is NOT Apostolic, not any more than what IS Apostolic. It just says that Pentecostals whose churches bear the name "Apostolic" (which most of ours do not) are excluded.
And BTW, haven't we had a few folks who weren't known to be members of a Pentecostal church bearing the name "Apostolic" but who nevertheless thought they belonged here because their churches teach them that their beliefs are "Apostolic?" Some have leaders they call "Apostle Smith," or the like.
You and Jason may be right about this. At least you have two votes for the same name there. FWIW, I've been thinking of the most obvious approach--"Churches in Apostolic Succession," which seemed to me at first to be too long a name, but it's been correctly mentioned that other forums have longer and more cumbersome titles, particularly those which use some slogan ("Scripture, Tradition, Reason--Anglican/Old Catholic," for instance).
Last edited by Albion; 26th August 2009 at 12:54 PM.
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