I weary of trying to figure out a churches parent denomination because the church has chosen to hide it. Is Upreach Overcoming Church Baptist, Methodist, Assemblies, or some other?
The name changes that remove affiliations from frontage signs do the same thing. Why? What is the point of this?
Can you give us more information?
I googled “Upreach” and found an equestrian organization and some kind of k-12 program. “upreach church” and it seems like a buzzword someone made up as a substitute for “worship”
Are you talking about Mission Upreach maybe?
I agree with your instincts that there’s something sketchy about concealing denominational affiliations and doctrinal statements.
That is a made up name I used as an example. Sorry for any confusion.
Oh, I see what you mean. It probably has to do with churches hiring marketing teams to create what for companies and non-profits is good branding.
Adopting managerial solutions to problems will bend an organization toward managerial ideology.
You might find this podcast episode insightful if you’re interested in this kind of thing.
I think sometimes it is because people tend to judge a church by the denominational name instead of giving the people inside a chance to love and serve them as Christ intended.
In the case of my church, we never visited it for years because of a preconceived notion we had about it based on the denominational name.
We were soooo wrong.
When looking for a church in a new town, clear notification concerning theological positions is very helpful. Particularly if theological positions are important to you. Of course, this is no predictor of a churches adherence to doctrine. or if those folks are mean and nasty.
Oftentimes, a church name change is unfortunately due to a split, meaning a difference in beliefs regarding some teachings. Such splits have increased the number denominations, and has of course led to there being non-denominational churches and inter-denominational churches. When breaking away from a particular denomination what you are citing is quite common.