Talk:Seventh-day Adventist independent ministries

AFM; David Koresh
Shouldn't AFM (Adventist Frontier Missions; see their website) be listed here? I'm not sure where, as I don't know the exact relationship between it and the Adventist church, but it should certainly be mentioned.

Since David Koresh was a person, not an organization or ministry, I don't think he should be listed here, whether or not he was "non-supportive." Since this is "Independent ministries of the Seventh-day Adventist Church," I don't think he would belong here anyway, because he was ex-Adventist when he became notable. Additionally, I would not consider the Branch Davidians (if they are still an organization) an independent ministry of the Adventist church either, since they were in no way affiliated (at least not organizationally). Something closer to a "non-supportive" independent ministry would be Our Firm Foundation, though it is/was (I'm not sure) an organization within the church and has/had its own share of problems. --Cromwellt|Talk 02:59, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Good News Unlimited?
I think there needs to be more thought on what constitutes an independant ministry. GoodNews Unlimited is actually a separate denomination that arose out of the Des Ford/ Glacier View situation in the early-eighties. JCrocombe 13:34, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
 * Good point, further clarity is needed when defining an independent ministry. My rationale for including it originally was that GNU is attended (and are members of) by many full-fledged Seventh-day Adventists and GNU traces its lineage through the Adventist church.  I don't know, would para-church be a better description?  I might add (some what tongue in cheek) that Hartland could be classified as an separate denomination, but few would.  Cheers, -Fermion 04:33, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

"HopeTV"
Is HopeTV the same as The Hope Channel? If so, please create a redirect between the two. -Colin MacLaurin 10:41, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
 * It looks like they are the same. What I don't understand is why it is on this page.  I thought that Hope was an official channel. -Fermion 08:24, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Hmmmm...valid point. I guess it can be deleted. --Maniwar (talk) 17:33, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I am deleting Hope Channel from this page. If it actually is an independent ministry, then someone please replace it. Colin MacLaurin 05:44, 20 February 2007 (UTC)


 * HopeTV/The Hope Channel is an official TV channel of the Seventh-Day Adventist church. (http://new.hopetv.org/about-us/our-history-and-future/) However, Hope International is an independant organisation that is not officially connected to the S.D.A. church, holding viewpoints questionable in the minds of Seventh-Day Adventists. (http://www.adventistreview.org/2000-1538/hope-international.html). The similarity of these two names, The Hope Channel and Hope International, is sometimes a source of confusion.202.127.9.235 (talk) 10:42, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Title
The title of this article could just as well be "Seventh-day Adventist independent ministries" or "Independent Seventh-day Adventist ministries". In in-house speak, "independent ministries" is the abbreviation most used. The currently title makes it sound like the ministries belong to "the Seventh-day Adventist Church". Rather, it is ministries run by Seventh-day Adventists. The difference is in the emphasis. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 10:41, 14 July 2009 (UTC)
 * I've moved the page per your reasoning. --TorriTorri(talk/contribs) 17:26, 27 May 2010 (UTC)

A bit confusing
I'm finding this article a bit confusing although I appreciate the past efforts to clarify it. Its just too much mixing of apples and oranges. Can we just define what independent means in this article and then stick to it.

The opening statement is where the problem begins. "organisations that work adjunct to the official church" is the historical definition of independent supporting ministries. In this sense independent means complimentary but not operated by the church itself. There are very clear examples of these - Amazing Facts, Maranatha, 3ABN, etc.

Then two sentences later the article says "Differing independent ministries may be perceived as either supportive of the church, or as critical of it." Now as soon as you mention critical, that changes the subject completely. In this sense they are indeed independent - independent as in off-shoot, separate denomination, unrelated, disruptive, disgruntled, antagonistic or seeking reform. Calling some of these Seventh-day Adventist independent ministries is the equivalent of calling the Taliban a United States independent organization.

So this article mixes apples and oranges and I'll give an example of each:
 * 1) Independent supportive ministries (Amazing Facts)
 * 2) Publishing houses owned by the Seventh-day Adventist church - not independent (Review and Herald Publishing)
 * 3) Organizations that pretend to be Adventist but are just critics (Hope International)
 * 4) Off-shoots, completely not related to the Adventists except by something in the historical past.  These may be critical of Adventists or not.  (Mid-America Sisterhood of churches)
 * 5) Organizations which have nothing to do with Adventists and should be removed.  (SafeTV)

So what to do? Editors, can we come to some consensus? My first shot at the above 5 categories:
 * 1) The title of the article is very suggestive of the supportive category which I say obviously belongs here. Keep.
 * 2) Publishing houses owned by Adventists. Its not even a complete list and that list is maintained elsewhere anyway.  Nuke.
 * 3) The critical list, of which some organizations are not even Seventh-day Adventist is a bit more difficult. Should this "critical" list be a different article?  Should it be kept but there be one major category without the shades of gray the article now has (e.g. strained)?  If we keep it here this will always be a can of worms as to whether an org is an independent critical or off-shoot.
 * 4) I'd say off-shoots are just off-shoots, not Adventist independents. Nuke.
 * 5) Unrelated organizations? Nuke.

Comments? And if this is sorted out, then someone could start on the Category:Independent_ministries_of_the_Seventh-day_Adventist_Church and harmonize it to the same criteria.Sdenny123 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 17:52, 29 May 2010 (UTC).


 * A productive comment. The problem is that the editors themselves have been unclear on the precise meaning of "independent ministries". So it is expected that the article is not entirely consistent. The comment about some being supportive, some critical, was originally added by myself. I now understand that the majority are [reasonably] supportive, so the article should reflect this. As for organisations like Hope International, I note that the church publication Issues: The Seventh-day Adventist Church and Certain Private Ministries calls Hope International, Hartland College etc. "private ministries". This is surely the best independent source on this topic, and needs to be integrated. Most of it consists of reprints from Adventist periodicals, and also primary sources, but the material to page 84 is a fresh discussion. We need to review secondary sources to see how they use the term, and then simply follow along with their definitions/descriptions. Colin MacLaurin (talk) 01:26, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Where is this article going?
I'm afraid this article is drifting onto the rocks. It was already confusing to me (see earlier comments above.) Now the new family and criticism sections arrive which are both completely unreferenced and POV. Its getting a bit bizarre. I'll give it another day to see if anything good can be made of it and listen to some justification to keep it. Otherwise I'm going to be bold and delete the new stuff.

Can we just figure out what is the basic purpose of the article. Many of these ministries have their own articles so other than being a list, what is the value of this article? What are we expecting readers to learn about upon reading it? Sdenny123 (talk) 03:05, 11 December 2010 (UTC)


 * Seems logical to me that it is a directory of the independent ministries who do not believe in coming "out" of the church but instead are providing niche support to the SDA community. Commentary on the views of the SDA Church organization towards these ministries should be clearly cited by the General Conference, otherwise no speculation should be made IMHO. @Rob talk 21:02, 28 August 2019 (UTC)

“Offshoot” section
I changed the section name from Offshoot to Related. There’s likely a much better category title, but Offshoot doesn’t fit the article theme. If the article is edited so it does fit, one example doesn't justify its usefulness and accuracy. Encyclopedic content should define ‘offshoot’ and identify the criteria for inclusion. Some groups exit denominations, some groups/organizations are formed by former members. (Is the SdA Church an “offshoot” of Methodists or Christian Connexion?) Many groups have recent or distant former connections to Seventh-day Adventism, and a reliable resource about them would be valuable. Bluepenciltime (talk) 20:20, 28 August 2019 (UTC) -- I do not think that related is an appropriate title, however I hear your logic. I would say either remove it or revert it to offshoot, as it is not related it was an offshoot, or a forking or diversion. 64.194.68.126 (talk) 20:56, 28 August 2019 (UTC)