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Archive 1

Previous Discussion

This is a previous discussion on the subject of church notability

Churches, mosques, synagogues, etc

Every day many articles are started about individual churches and every day there are AFD discussions. I do not want to see all churches included, and I do not want to see all chrch articles deleted. I would appreciate some criteria for the sake of consistency and to reduce repetitious arguing.. The first criterion people cite is size. Megachurches with thousands of members are probably noteworthy but the biggest churches are not necessarily the most encyclopedic, any more than the largest colleges are. I am looking for criteria which would allow other churches to be included, just as smaller colleges have articles Princeton University. A church might be historic Old North Church or have a place in the civil rights struggle, or be the site where gospel music was first sung, or be the place where a President of the U.S. taught Sunday School. But how does one specify how historically important it must be? It could be architecturally or artistically important (designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, or with murals by Chagall). What are the criteria for such cultural importance? It might be religiously important (Here the doctrine of blah blah was first enunciated by Rev xxx in 1815, so it the birthplace of the xyz denomination). It could be a small church but still a noteworthy and notable one. How can this last categroy be delineated? Newspaper and magazine articles? Awards or recognition from the denomination or from nondenominational bodies? Distinguishing the building from the denomination, how large or important does a religious denomination have to be to merit an article?Edison 07:43, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd say that anything out of the ordinary would be interesting. Most churches don't have anything out of the ordinary about them. The key is for it to be reported independently by a reliable source. This means that we don't have to push our own point of view about notability - the independent sources have decided that it is notable. Stephen B Streater 08:19, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

I think any Church with a congregation of a certain size or higher, is notable. Any church that has X number of viewers, subscribers, etc.. is notable. Any church that has spent X dollars on political actions, notable. Any church who's Minister is notable, is notable. I would use similar criteria for any company, but with different numbers. Mathiastck 17:16, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

This is arbitrary, and there's no reasonable way to decide what X should be. —Centrx→talk • 17:47, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Meaningful news coverage as always is the threshold, to determine whether or not we could actually write a useful article. A piece about the history of the church, it's role in the community and so on is a good start. Stuff announcing services or a wedding or whatever isn't. It's actually relatively rare that anything beyond an official church history is written by a member, and a few passing mentions are made in the paper about a new minister, a program the church offers, etc. Nothing that really makes an encyclopedia article. When there are actually real news articles being written about the church, that's a strong sign it's "notable" enough for an article. --W.marsh 20:46, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree with this position. What I look for before putting Churches (or pretty much anything else) up for AfD is two sources that look like they pass WP:RS and are either apparently independent of one another or are about different things. For instance, a newspaper article about the Church history and the inclusion of the Church in a book about Church architecture would be fine if you ask me. Erechtheus 00:25, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Unless there are clear references affirming notability, I'd say to merge churches to their local community article, per WP:LOCAL. --Elonka 02:10, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

These guidelines do seem quite cogent and reasonable. However, perhaps they could be made more concrete, somehow? Erechtheus's 'two sources' threshold is good. However, I would tend to limit things a bit further. For example, a couple of mentions (or even one) in books on architecture/history may definitely warrant inclusion. A 'denomination birthplace' is surely only notable if the denomination itself is notable — in other words, not 'Little Church on the Prairie is where spirit-filled Pastor Joe came up with his Redemptionist Post-Evangelical Reformed Baptist theology'. But if dealing with a modern church where the only claim to notability is size of congregation or presence in a community, then I think a little more than newspaper articles are required, surely? Pretty much every community newspaper will have something on the local church every week, and even large (city-wide) newspapers may have church-related articles that are not truly notable. But what about if the 'newspaper' criterion is extended to nationwide news (in whatever country?). Similarly, size should not be a criterion at all, unless it is verifiably 'the biggest' or 'the smallest' or the 'the tallest' (and even then, I loathe that tendency in modern man to obsess over such things — what about 'the most beautiful' or 'the architecturally most advanced'?).
Edison, why not create a new policy/guideline page (like there are for books, websites, etc.) and put something up there? That way it can start being referred to in AfDs, which in turn will draw more people to the guideline to add their thoughts on the matter. There seems to be enough material, esp. if it has a nice preface and is spaced out with bullet points and things ;-) The Crying Orc 18:05, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree with The Crying Orc. Now that church deletions seem to be a hot topic, I think a policy discussion would be a great idea. I don't want to get into a long discussion here, if we are goign to have a policy page, save to say that I agree with the assertion that size should be irrelevant, except in exceptional cases (being the largest church in a country may confer notability, for example). I'd lean towards national rather than local media coverage being a criterion for notability too. That's all I've got to say, as i do think we need to have a decited page in Wikipedia space to discuss this. church is important to many people, and the tendency to think that "important to me" equals "should be in wikipedia" is widespread. There will alwys be people wishing to add their church to wikipedia, just as there are people who want their school included. Lurker oi! 13:09, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Also worth a look at

WP:ORG, which I stole much of the original content from. And WP:CORP. Also WP:LOCAL Lurker oi! 12:29, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

I feel that the best indicator of notability for churches would probably be within WP:LOCAL. It feels more applicable than Corp or Org. Canadian-Bacon t c 08:46, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
See also WP:SCHOOLS, no reason why churches should be treated much differently to that.--Docg 18:31, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
The one issue I see with WP:SCHOOLS relating to this is that points 2-4 seem inapplicable, I think we'd need to devise a different structure if we wanted to incorporate elements from it. Canadian-Bacon t c 19:28, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
It is also relevant that we keep all schools.--Docg 19:30, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry can you explain that further, I don't quite understand what you mean. Canadian-Bacon t c 19:32, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm a little concerned about treating religious organisations differently from how we might treat other local bodies. I'm not arguing for keeping all churches (merge most!), but if we create set of criteria for churches that is much tighter that that for schools, town halls, or other local bodies, we may be creating (or adding to) a systemic anti-religious bias. I've been concerned at the number of people who have been willing to vote to delete a church, simply because it is a church. I've had to fight to keep some patently obviously notable churches, whilst we keep every little school. Perhaps we need to try to develop criteria for local organisations, which would treat schools, churches, golfclubs and town halls in a similar manner. After all, schools are often a problem: they attract juvenile vandalism, defamations of teachers and other pupils. Churches may be written in a POV manner (so clean them up) but other than that, what harm would it do if we ended up with articles on thousands of churches? WP:NOT PAPER.--Docg 19:49, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I think the question here is independant sources. If the church is mentioned in an independant source than yes, it's obviously notable for some reason or another. Otherwise I do agree with you. Canadian-Bacon t c 20:43, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Hm, perhaps. But if a School had a website, and was, say, listed in a local directory or a education authority page so we could verify its existence, we'd keep it. If a Church has a website, and we can verify its existence from a listing or two, should the same criteria apply? --Docg 21:54, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I think the problem we risk running into their is with hoax churches. I could easily make a website dedicated to "The Church of The Last Pizza Pocket In The Back Of My Freezer". Though it may be a completely over-the-top example I think it still serves the point. I think the outside listing would be the key component of that. Just for verifiabilities sake and to avoid hoaxes. Canadian-Bacon t c 21:58, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
We delete unverifiable articles. There's no need to discuss this concerning religious groups in particular. --Docg 00:55, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Problems

This policy, as with any arbitrary and all-encompassing group of notability criteria, faces huge problems. Consider firstly, that we currently keep every primary school in the universe. That doesn't mean that we should keep every church - but it would indicate that the threshold should be fairly low.

  • "Local churches are usually notable if the scope of activities are national or international in scale." Want to try to apply that to schools? Being very influential in a significant community is probably worth a mention.
  • "Size. Many churches claim thousands of attendees." Perhaps in the US, that is true. Not so everywhere. In fact, a church in the UK with even 500 attending is likely to be fairly remarkable (at least in its locality). In Iran, a church with 50 members would probably be worth a mention. In the UK, a church which employed 20 people would be very remarkable, in the US, not so.
  • Internal documents cannot be used as an assertion of notability Why not? Internal documents (like a website) may well be a good source for the type of factual information: e.g. the age of the building, the number of employees, the history of the congregation. Sure, in some instances, with some churches, one may suspect it may be inflated - but generally simple factual claims will be fairly reliable.
  • If we really must have criteria, and I see little point, then you need to consider things like:
    • Age of the building/architectural merits (again this will be subjective - a 17th century European building is not necessarily significant, but if it was North American that alone would be evidence of extreme notability.
    • Significant people who have pastored/attended (past or present) or been buried in the churchyard. If a School gets kept on the basis of an alumni, then the church the Queen, Bush, etc attends is probably worth a mention.
    • Contributions to local community - many churches have been the focal point, or even the founding point of communities.
    • Significant innovations in worship/doctrine/teaching etc. - these may not readily be appreciated by the theological non-specialist
    • more I can't think of.
Also don't assume religious establishments can only be notable for GOOD things they have done. A church, mosque, synagogue, or coven which has done notably evil things should have an article as well. Edison 05:11, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

I really don't understand the need for this. Churches are easily verifiable, and can be neutrally described. Unlike schools they are not generally targets for vandalism and other libels. WP:NOT paper. Clean up any advertising and go delete pokemon stubs.--Docg 22:59, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Clear criteria are absolutely necessary for churches, as no matter how 'inclusive' we are, we have to draw the line somewhere. Having read the guideline thus far, I would say it is good, but needs a bit of 'tightening' — how much media coverage is necessary for it to be 'significant'? What does 'trivial' mean? I'll come back and try to add more specific guidelines when I get the chance. But thanks to Lurker and anyone else who has been involved in getting this guideline up and running. The Crying Orc 15:22, 26 November 2006 (UTC)
Since churches are not homogeneous, and cultural contexts are varied, clear criteria are absolutely impossible. Some guidelines could be developed - but they'd need to be very flexible, else you'll only import a cultural systemic bias. Do not presume a North American context. (Alternatively, I could suggest that we simply delete all institutions founded recently. Say, since 1492? That, at least, would be clear.)--Docg 17:13, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

I think my problem is this: Why do we allow inclusion of virtually every school from the U.S. high school level and above to be included without hesitation, but not churches? I don't think that every one of the 300,000 or so places of worship in the U.S. merits its own article, but certainly larger, historic or newsworthy ones do. I think pretty much any megachurch — now usually classified as 2,000 worshippers per week or more — is notable enough for an article. For smaller churches and places of worship, newsworthiness or historic significance should govern.Realkyhick 06:24, 27 November 2006 (UTC)


Presently, the policy needs a *lot* of work. The idea that size does not indicate notability is problematic. Many things that would make a church notable (such as media coverage, political influence, substantial charitable work) are directly related to size. Size = influence. I get the impression that megachurches are a dime a dozen in the US and Korea. Not so in much of the rest of the world, where a church of 2,000 is considered huge, and the average is more like 100.

The media coverage criterion is very hard to achieve, as “People worship in church on Sunday” is not exactly a compelling headline. Lack of media coverage means not controversial, which is not the same as not notable.

IMO, the following points could indicate notability, where verified by trustworthy sources:
1. Size. Churches that are considerably larger than most others in the region may well be notable. Churches with larger than 2,000 attendance each week (megachurches) are notable. The size needed to be notable will vary according to location (which country, city or rural) and denomination.
2. Media coverage. Churches that have non-trivial multiple media coverage in major newspapers or equivalent are notable.
3. Denomination. The church is considered a notable or “flagship” church within the denomination. This only applies if the denomination is itself notable. This could be documented by sources external to the church, but internal to the denomination.
4. Notable clergy. Leaders of the church have achieved non-trivial media coverage or are notable under WP:BIO.
5. Notable laity. Members of the church are notable under WP:BIO. This only applies where their chief claim to notability is related to their church membership or religious belief.
6. Church activities. The church runs programs that have been noted for their uniqueness or high success rate. This could include youth programs, charitable work, evangelistic programs, music etc.
7. Institutions. The church runs a notable school or college, or has planted multiple daughter churches, or has started or runs some other enduring institution.
8. History. The church or its building is notable for its history, or has contributed to the history of its region.
9. Theology. The theology or teaching of the church is considered unique or controversial for some reason.
Raffles mk 22:20, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

A few comments. You should also add

10. building - if the building is particularly old (and buildings may be younger or older than their congregations) or has particular architectural importance.

Further, change clergy and laity to 'leaders' and 'worshippers' - that's less denominationally specific.
Under laity, you need to remove 'This only applies where their chief claim to notability is related to their church membership or religious belief.' - that's silly. Queen Elizabeth II is not notable chiefly for her church attendance, yet I suspect the churches she regularly frequents would be notable, if only for that reason. That, of course, will not be true for everyone who meets WP:BIO. Avoid instruction creep. --Docg 23:14, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
The 'building' criterion is a useful one. I think your QEII point is also valid. As is the terminology point, but it is difficult to use non-specific terminology consistently when you are drafting a policy that will cover not only churches but synagogues, mosques, temples etc. For that reason I didn't attempt it. Probably the best way to deal with that would be to specify at the top that the policy applies to all local places of worship, regardless of the terminology used. Raffles mk 00:45, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Folks, don't assume a Christian context either in the text or the discussion. This will apply to mosques, synagogues, monasteries, temples, zagats, and all equivalent local houses of worship for all faiths... The discussion about sizes found in locations has been particularly flagrant at assuming a Christian context. GRBerry 13:39, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Historical significance

This aspect of notability needs some thought. Just proving that a church has been in existence for 100 years or any arbitrary period years does not make it historically significant. It needs to have influenced history in some way, and if its influence extended beyond the local community it is more notable than if it has just been an ordinary local church. What happened at the church should have had widespread notice outside the local community. It could have been a high degree of notability over a short period or a lesser degree over a longer period. A non-exhaustive list of things which could satisfy the historical provision: Paul Revere's associate hung a lantern in the steeple to signal how the British planned to attack; a group of militants based at the church launched a devastating series of attacks in furtherance of their ideology; the pastor gave a series of sermons which led to changes in national policy; it became a focus of controversy, such as mass murders, burning or bombing by extremists or suppression by the government; the pastor and a few followers barracaded themselves inside to prevent some new denominational policy from being implemented; a new and significant denomination was launched; hymns were written which were adopted in a notable denominations hymnal; notable persons such as national leaders or the head of state were members there; the pastor became nationally known from his books or broadcasts. Multiple independent coverage by reliable sources is needed. Edison 05:09, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

I would agree that 100 years of existance does not make a church notable, however I believe there is a number of years that would make a church significant, just based on the fact that it would be a historical landmark. Canadian-Bacon t c 08:49, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
A hundred year old Christian church in China would be extremely notable. Please avoid being culturally specific.--Docg 09:20, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I think you may have missinterpreted that, I'm not listing age as a sole factor, rather a contributing one. If a church has been around for 1000 years, I really don't care where it's from or what culture it is, but I'm willing to hedge my bets on the fact that it's notable as a historical landmark, if for no other reason. Canadian-Bacon t c 09:56, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
I was concerned that people would interpret "historical" to mean "our church has a history" rather than "our church has been noted by independent sources for its special place in history." Everything has a history, but not everything belongs in an encyclopedia. Some churches were touched in one shining moment by history: Lincoln announced some new nation policy from the pulpit, Thomas á Beckett was murdered by the altar, there was a massacre, refugees were sheltered, people were persecuted by those running the church, heretics were burned, 95 theses were nailed to the church door launching the Protestant Reformation, children were sexually molested over a long period, everyone drank the poisoned Koolade. There are many claims to notability other than mere duration, but as noted above, duration can make a church notable if it received widespread independent coverage.
Exactly, that what I'm try to say. Duration is hardly a key reason for notability, but I do think it plays a contributing role. Canadian-Bacon t c 18:10, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
But my point is, that you can't say that. In certain context, duration alone, would make a religious congregation very very significant/unusual/interesting, even if nothing else of note could be said.--Docg 18:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Ah ok, I see what you're getting at. What about something along the lines of "The church is one of the oldest/the oldest of it's type in the region." Canadian-Bacon t c 19:29, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

My rewrite

Here's my rewrite of the notability guidelines. I think this is a step in the right direction, based on people's comments so far. Feel free to add criticism:

General inclusion in a local article:

  • Most churches and places of religious worship are notable enough for a mention on Wikipedia. In the majority of cases, it is enough to have a brief reference in the article on the area in which the church is located, as per WP:LOCAL. Notable and verifiable facts on the church (which are accurately sourced) may be included to improve the information about the local area.
  • Generally, the church must be of a recognised religion or religious denomination, involving a belief in a supernatural Being, Thing or Principle; and the acceptance and observance of canons of conduct in order to give effect to that belief. The church's existence should also be verifiable by third-party materials or websites. A "church" that purportedly does not follow these criteria may not conform to established Wikipedia policy such as Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not for things made up in school one day or Wikipedia:Spam, and generally should not be included on Wikipedia, whether in a local article or its own article.

For a church to have its own article:

  • Some articles on churches may be written in order to solely promote a church. Editors intending to write church articles for this purpose, while they may be acting in good faith and with good motives, should be aware that according to official Wikipedia policy, Wikipedia is not a webspace provider, and Wikipedia articles are not advertisements. Advertising will either be cleaned up to adhere to a neutral point of view or deleted. In the latter case, it is listed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion.
  • The key for a church to have its own article is that the article must establish notability of the church in some way. This is done by including verifiable and reliable sources on the church.
  • Whilst the number of articles on individual churches will be small, editors should also remember that Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia and it should represent a worldwide view. These guidelines should be construed freely enough to allow, ideally, any major city to have a few individual church articles on notable churches.
  • Individual congregations of notable churches should generally not have their own articles, but should be included as part of a church's main article.

Guidelines

Local churches should usually be considered to be notable if they meet one or more of the following criteria:

  1. The church has been the subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the church itself.
    • This can include:
      • Inclusion in third party published materials.
      • Media coverage that is non-trivial and deals specifically with the church as the primary subject of the article.
    • This should not include:
      • Internal documents, including reports, newsletters, press releases, magazines, newspapers and the like published or produced by the church itself, unless those works are notable in themselves (although such may be used as source material within the article itself). Materials not published by the local church itself, but by the denomination, organisation or body of which the church is a part, which establish notability in the same way that a third-party source would in discussing something of relevance to more than the local church community, should be, however, considered as a verifiable source on a case by case basis.
      • A listing of churches and services in local newspapers or community information websites.
      • Other works which would not meet Wikipedia's reliable source standards.
  2. The church plays a significant role in, or has contributed significantly to, the life and affairs of a country or state, and/or its government or ruler(s). This should not be dependent on a country or state having an established church.1
  3. The church plays a significant role in, or has contributed significantly to, its city (in the case of a metropolitan or suburban church), or its regional area (in the case of a rural church).2
  4. The church plays a notable or significant role within its denomination or religion. This only should apply if the denomination is notable in itself, being documented by sources external to the individual church, but internal to the denomination.
  5. The church is notably large for its region, and has achieved notability in non-trivial sources for this.3
  6. The church has, or has had, notable leaders or clergy, for whom the particular church has had a formative impact. For a church to fit into this category, the leader should be notable enough to meet WP:BIO, by non-trivial external coverage, and should have their own article. The involvement of the church in the person's life must not be trivial.4
  7. The church has, or has had, notable members or worshippers, for whom the particular church was formative in their work or their life. These people must also be notable under WP:BIO and should ideally have their own article, and their involvement in the church. The church's involvement in their lives should not be trivial.
  8. The church runs, or has run, a program, or programs, which are notable for their uniqueness, high success rate or high popularity. Such programs may include youth programs, charitable work, evangelistic programs, and music.
  9. The church runs or has run a notable school or college, has established some other notable churches, or runs or has run another notable enduring institution.
  10. The church's teachings or theology is considered unique or notably controversial. The teachings should be of the individual church, not its denomination.
  11. The church building has particular architectural and/or historic significance.

Notes

^1 The Washington National Cathedral and Westminster Abbey would be examples of churches fitting this criteria.
^2 Most cities' main cathedrals of recognised denominations, for example, would fit in this category; churches such as Paradise Community Church in Adelaide, Australia, (from which the Family First Party, a notable political party in Australia with representation in its state Parliament and the Federal Parliament, evolved) would also fit into this category.
^3 The size needed to be notable will be dependent on the area, and discretion should be used in discussions regarding the country and area where the church is situated. Generally, most megachurches should be notable.
^4 All Souls Church, Langham Place would be an example of this, being formative in the ministry of notable theologian John Stott.

JROBBO 12:34, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Comments:

  1. Change 'a mention' to 'mentioning' (better grammatically)
  2. Insisting on verifiability is good (but we do that for all information!) but don't try to define what the church must believe in. It really is better if Wikipedia policies don't do theology. The whole of the point beginning 'Generally' is either unnecessary or confused.
  3. Your point about promotion is wrong. If an article is promotional and not neutral, but the subject merits an article, then we do not delete it. We clean it up. Deletion is only for subjects that don't merit articles, and even then, merging and redirected should be the normal course of action. Very few church articles need outright deletion (merging is a lot quicker anyway).
  4. Don't confuse reliable sources with notability. Something can have very good sources and still not merit its own article. Sourcing is not the 'key' to establishing notability.
  5. "Individual congregations of notable churches should generally not have their own articles, but should be included as part of a church's main article." This is incomprehensible. Do you mean denomination when you say 'church'?
  6. If WP:NOT paper, why should the number of church articles be small? Why should every verifiable church not have its own article?? Answers on a postcard please.
  7. The thing on 'internal documents' is incomprehensible - and clearly 'instruction creep' - let's us common sense.
  8. A significant role in a local community is also important as with schools and town halls.
  9. Denominational sources will be the best evidence that a congregation is notable within the denomination. Excluding them is crazy.
  10. If we fix all of these to cover every case and culture, it will run to pages of ifs and buts, and will be so subjective that we'll end up having to take each case on its merits, just as we do now. In short, this is a waste of time. Just de-pov church articles, and if there is not much verifiable, neutral info left, then merge them to the article on the locality, or denomination. We'd be better with a whole load of composite articles on Presbyterian Churches in Pittsburgh than all this verbosity. --Docg 15:21, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
More Comments:
  1. JROBBO's rewrite is very much a step in the right direction. Clearly we are getting somewhere.
  2. Let's not worry about allowing a lot of church articles. Wikipedia now has 1.5 million + articles, and probably eats 10,000 each day for breakfast. If they are notable, they can all have articles.
  3. The 'General inclusion in a local article' is too verbose. It is enough to simply say "Articles for churches that are not notable enough for their own article should generally be merged as per WP:LOCAL rather than deleted".
  4. I agree with Doc about sources internal to the denomination - they ought to be recognised as valid. Apart from that, the "Guidelines" section can be used as is.
Raffles mk 19:20, 28 November 2006 (UTC)
In a medium sized town, a section which tried to list all the churches with even one or two sentences and a website would run on and on to an extreme degree, and might add 25% to the length of the article for a small town of 400 with a 350 word article and 9 churches. A city of 70,000 is likely to have 100 religious congregations and a 2000 word article, so even a 5 word name of each church would add 25% to the article. 10 words per church would add 50% to the article. Leaving out the less important (or "nonverifiable") storefront churches and having a few sentences about the Catholic, Baptist, Presbyterian and Lutheran congregations would seem arbitrary. Is that the goal? Perhaps "List of churches in Xville" could be doable as a separate article. Wikipedia is apparently happy to have an article for every subway or train stop and every section of expressway or every 2 lane highway, and every character in a videogame, even though the latter have no independent references. Ditto for every 13th Duke of whatever. We also have WP:PORNBIO which sets a easy route to notability for porn actors who lack verifiable independent sources (they have been in a film with their name in the title). (modified Edison 15:40, 28 December 2006 (UTC))Edison 07:31, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
I'd suggest Religion in city X as a more suitable title, since you seem to be indicating that such an article would be more than merely a list. It could also cover the religious history of the city rather than simply the existing houses of worship. MisfitToys 22:27, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
My focus tends to be on the U.S, where an article on a typical town could say "Mudville was settled in 1850 by German Lutherans. Mudville Lutheran Church was established in 1856. The arrival of English settlers in 1880 led to the founding of 1st Baptist in 1880 and Mudville Episcopal in 1885. Today Mudville includes St. Mary's Catholic, the Islamic Foundation, and Congregation Sinai. " The trick is dealing with all the litle storefront unaffiliated churches, which may have only the pastors family as the congregation, but which are included in any Google search for churches in Mudville, and which have an address phone number, name of the worship leader, and service times listed in various online listings and the Yellow Pages. It seems like there would still be some notability criterion. Do we leave out the religions of the aboriginal population and include only presently practiced religions? In the rest of the world how could this approach work? "Xville was settled in the stone age by hunter gatherers who worshipped a rock at the east end of town. Druids arrived in 500 B.C..." etc. through Catholicism , the Reformation, etc. Edison 14:15, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Merge

I really think we should make this a part of WP:LOCAL or maybe WP:ORG; otherwise, we'd be getting an overdose of overly-specific guidelines. (Radiant) 10:31, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

Yup. And I suspect that will also help counter the suspicion of either a pro or anti religious bias.--Docg 10:48, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
While that is not unreasonable, at the moment we have church articles beings deleted despite being obviously notable. WP:ORG is too vague, and WP:LOCAL is not to establish notability. I think a specific guideline is needed for this reason. Raffles mk 18:30, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
I'd frame a guideline like this: "remove POV, keep verifiable information, if that leaves not much info - merge it somewhere, if it is longer leave the article." There ends the story - and we avoid subjective ideas of 'notability'. --Docg 19:22, 29 November 2006 (UTC)
We should NOT merge this— this sort of thing has been needed for a long time; while notability guidelines on individual types of shops, for example, would be ridiculous, churches, schools and shopping centres seem to be the community things that are always targeted for deletion, or are at least controversial. Anything else should fit under WP:ORG, but this should have its own guidelines. JROBBO 02:22, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
It was a bad idea to redirect it to WP:LOCAL. I cannot see any evidence of a merge. The redirect destroyed all the work that had been done. Radiant, please undo the redirect and restore the proposed guideline. There was clearly no consensus to delete the guideline that was emerging. Even after it was removed in the redirect, it was cited several times in the numerous AfDs for churches. Edison 07:26, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Radiant is correct. He/she placed a template on the article Nov 29, 2006 saying "It has been suggested that this page or section be merged with Places of local interest. (Discuss)" Then on Dec 21, Doc glasgow placed a template on the article announcing it had been rejected, then on Dec 23, JYolkowski replaced the article with a redirect to another guideline, WP:LOCAL apparently without placing there any of the guidelines which had been developed here. Edison 20:42, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Comments

I think that a clear distinction needs to be made between church buildings and congregations. Church buildings can be notable for the same reasons that any other building is: a historical event took place there, it is cloesly associated with a notable person, it is architecturally significant, or sheer age. (I, for one, think that ANY building anywhere in the world more than 1000 years old is notable, in North America the age for automatic notability drops to about 200 years.) Please note that a building can be notable, even if the congregation currently meeting in it is not.

A congregation can be notable for many factors, including notable worshipers or clergy (past or present), association with historical events, includng those of a religious nature, lareg size, or age. Given that we keep every school, and are very liberal in what other organizations we keep, to make the bar higher for churches (which the original form of this proposal does), is to insert a very severe sytemic anti-religious POV into wikipedia. Dsmdgold 21:02, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

"Recognized"

Saying a church has to be a recognized denomination smacks of established state churches in Europe, the Orthodox Jewish denominatoin in Israel, Islamic faith in Moslem countries, or the State Church in China. If there is a rogue congregation of Pentecostal or Roman Catholic Christians in China who carry on their worship illegally, and there are reliable sources writing about them, they could deserve articles. If the First Church of Satan or the Wicca Coven opens in a storefront in Birmingham Alabama and the Sheriff arrests the leaders for being contrary to the community norms, it might deserve an article if it receives reliable independent coverage. But if 3 college students start the Church of the Friday Night Giant Bong in their apartment and it gets an article in the campus paper, does it get an article or does it fail the "belief in a supreme entity" requirement? I would delete the latter for lack of multiple independent sources. I would hesitate to delete a church article based on "complete bollocks." In the yellow pages of my town I see several "Independent Bible Churches" and "Independent Community Churches" which might profess no connection to a larger denomination. I suppose we would fall back on the "verifiable but still not notable" reason for deleting an article they created if they could not produce multiple independent sources. On the other hand, is a group of athiests got together every week to profess their philosophy and called themselves a congregation and received widespread attention and mutiple reliable and independent sources, they might make the cut. Edison 16:42, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

I think I tried to make clear that "recognised" did not equate to an established church. I think quite a few independent churches would be notable under what we have as guidelines at the moment, but I don't know how to phrase it. JROBBO 02:25, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
Far too culturally specific. --Docg 21:45, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Places of local interest

Feedback is requested on this (proposed) guideline about articles on "local" places, such as churches, historic buildings, malls, masts, neighbourhoods, parks, schools, stations, and streets. Please respond to its talk page rather than here. Thank you. (Radiant) 16:03, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Churches are different to just local places, as they can encompass so much more. That has already been made clear. Let's have a separate criterion for churches, as there are a lot more things that a church can be notable for (as I have already tried to work out). JROBBO 05:14, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Criteria for local churches

I would like to add to criterium 3 : historical, architectural or artistic significance. JoJan 20:14, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Possible guidelines/factors for consideration

The guidelines for schools are useful, I think, although I recognize there are differences. One thing which I believe needs mentioning is that different denominations have different forms of governance and widely differing sizes of congregations; the average Catholic church in the U.S., for instance, has 3 to 4,000 members, whereas average Baptist, Lutheran and Episcopal churches are about a tenth that size - the same standards can't be applied to all of them. Also, there is likely little doubt that cathedrals qualify for articles. But only the Catholic, Orthodox and Episcopal churches have cathedrals in the U.S. (to my knowledge; perhaps the AME churches do as well), due to their episcopal form of governance; should Baptist, Lutheran, Methodist and Presbyterian churches be penalized for having a congregational or presbyterian system? I think we can agree that they should not, and so there must be some allowance for a sizable number of congregations from each church. I'm not going to propose any set guidelines for notability, but I think that qualification can be based on five questions:

  1. Is the church affiliated with a denomination? I realize this may be controversial to some, but non-denominational churches can be more susceptible to dissolution when a founding minister retires, dies or relocates. Affiliation with a wider body establishes a greater likelihood of permanence. Certainly some non-denominational churches should qualify (see Category:Megachurches for some examples), but they would need more substantial media coverage and likely a larger size.
  2. How old is the church? I think just about any church which has been around for 100 years (perhaps even 75) has a clearly established local presence and a substantial history - particularly if it has remained in the same building; there has probably been reasonable coverage in the local press.
  3. How many members does the church have? Again, I don't think setting a fixed number would be useful to our purposes (for several reasons), but larger congregations will tend to have had a greater influence on the region. As noted above, allowance should be made for the typical size of the denomination's churches.
  4. Has the church had a notable social or cultural impact? This can be established through various media sources, and will probably have resulted in a number of published articles.
  5. Is the church building architecturally significant or a landmark of some sort? Obviously churches on the National Register of Historic Places qualify (though it should be noted that some churches are part of NRHP-designated areas, and are not listed as separate entities), but there are also state and local designations such as California Historical Landmarks [1] or Chicago Landmarks [2]. And an argument could be made that we should also try to recognize places which are reasonable candidates for such designations. (And we should also realize that churches sometimes avoid and resist such designations, even when they are deserved, in order to allow for rebuilding or enlarging their facilities - which can be a problem once landmark status is attached.)

We can agree, I think, that places such as St. Peter's Basilica, St Paul's Cathedral and Notre Dame de Paris represent one end of the spectrum, and that a brand new non-denominational congregation with 20 members, operating out of a storefront, is pretty clearly at the other end (and doesn't merit an article). The difficulty, of course, is finding and managing the middle ground. One way to approach the issue might be to encourage that potential contributors seek out the most deserving church for a new article (at least within its area and denomination). If there's another church in the same area and denomination which is both older and larger, it's probably more deserving. (And I'll add that age probably trumps size; a church that now has 80 members might have had 1500 at some point in the past, but a church that's 40 years old now has obviously never been any older than that.) MisfitToys 02:32, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

Proposal uses "Church" as a synonym for "Congregation".

Many people, seeing "notability for churches", think of a building. The title of the page is reasonably clear, but I think this bears repeating in the first paragraph. Much of the discussion refers to buildings too, so it's clear that I'm not the only one who was confused at first. Not a big deal, since it's a passive proposal. --Alvestrand 06:30, 21 December 2006 (UTC)

The term should be one which is faith and denomination independent. WP:CONG would seem to fit Christian and Jewish local religious bodies. Would that term also fit mosques? I do not want to create Christian-only guideline. Edison 16:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
I changed the article to use "congregation" throughout. Also deleted one reference to architecture (showing that the confusion is persistent) and changed a couple of uses of "organization" that looked as if they had been left over from the cut'n'paste from WP:ORG. Better? --Alvestrand 02:15, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
A congregation may hire a noted architect to build an edifice which is famous for its architectural merit. An article could cite multiple reliable independent sources vouching for the architectural importance of their building, thereby gaining encyclopedic notability. It should be noted that at presentUnity Temple has an article, as a structure designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, but the congregation meeting there does not. On the other hand Crystal Cathedral is about the building (designed by Philip Johnson as well as the congregation meeting there. In many cases, a congregation is regarded as synonimous with the building where it meets. Edison 21:39, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
This (multiple subjects described inside one article) is a phenomenon common to many articles - see for instance the debates on the talk page of Mecca. I'd be happy with allowing an article like Crystal Cathedral to remain if it satisified EITHER of the criteria for the building or its congregation. --Alvestrand 23:02, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
WTF? You think we need a criteria for deciding whether we need to keep things like the Crystal Cathedral? This is ruleslawyering gone mad.--Docg 23:37, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
What are you responding to? You have apparently read something into a comment which was not said. Did you see anyone debating whether we should keep "Crystal 'Cathedral'?" The discussion was about building vs congregation. Edison 00:42, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Where are we going with this?

If anyone is still left here, can we please work out where we are going with this proposal. I haven't been able to edit this page for a while, and in that time someone merged it, despite there being no consensus to do so, nor have we seemed to move on. People were reasonably happy with my suggestions, although there were (rightly) still some changes needed to that. Can we outline the problems with what we haven't yet addressed so we can write a proper proposal rather than the vague one that we have at present, and one which we can present to the WP community to be used or rejected? JROBBO 05:17, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Is there a process for getting it confirmed as an official guideline? Edison 16:51, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
First, the proposal would need to stabilize. Second, it would need to be in widespread use. For a notability proposal, you know you have consensus for a proposal when people are basing their AFD opinions on their assessment of whether the article/topic meets the guideline.
Personally, I don't think we need a guideline for churches, as we are doing just fine without one. GRBerry 20:08, 23 December 2006 (UTC)
Actually, every proposed deletion of a church article was starting from first principles, with some Wikipedians saying that "all churches are boring and non-notable" others saying "all churches are notable" and others in the middle. In ths proposed guideline we seek to thrash out some principles of why a church might be notable, and what sources are appropriate for showing notability, which do not generally apply to other article subjects.In the beginning of the collaborative editing of this guidelne, I notified on their talk pages everyone who was arguing for keeping or for deleting church articles, to ensure a balanced viewpoint. Now it gets mentioned in deletion debates, so thise monitoring such things should be aware of it. It makes every bit as much sense to havea church specific guideline as to have a school specific guideline (or porn actor guidelines, or professor guidelines.) There are about as many churches as schools, and members will be constantly creating articles.Right before this proposal was redirected to WP:LOCAL it was being cited in most of the AfDs for chrches and seemed to be a help to getting a sensible deletion debate. A guide could alos help to advise as to what should and what should not go into an article, although a Project:congregation might do the latter job better. Edison 19:47, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
Comments
We definitely need a WP:CHURCH guideline in order to provide consistency in AfD debates and the like. I say copy JROBBO's rewrite to the main project page and present that to the WP community, but with the following changes:
General inclusion in a local article:
The first point can be included as is.
The second point is unnecessary and can be deleted.
For a church to have its own article:
The second point should be rewritten as follows: To have its own article, a church must be notable. All statements made in the article must be verifiable according Wikipedia’s Verifiability guidelines.
The other points are unnecessary and can be deleted.
Guidelines:
Point (1) “Should not include” – sentence beginning with “Materials not published by the local church itself, but by the denomination” should be deleted.
Everything else can be included as is.
Raffles mk 23:54, 25 December 2006 (UTC)
Instead of simply deleting the second point under "general inclusion in a local article", I'd recommend revising to something which indicates that formal organization is necessary; U.S. congregations are generally incorporated under state laws, I think (generally as non-profits), but I believe we want to avoid mentions of every religious group that happens to meet informally. MisfitToys 22:30, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Whilst there maybe a consensus that a guideline would be advantageous here (although I have my doubts), it is quite evident that there will never me a consensus for any particular wording. This deletionists' charter is dead. --Docg 21:44, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

  • See, the point is, the page refers mostly to "local congregations"; indeed I think we can all agree that churches known all across the country (Westminster Abbey, anyone?) do not need merging or deletion. But if it focuses on local churches, how would this page be different from WP:LOCAL, which is already pretty much stable? There's no need to reinvent the wheel; adding a line or two to WP:LOCAL would suffice. It would get rather messy if we started to make WP:RESTAURANT, WP:GAS_STATION and WP:SUPERMARKET as well, wouldn't it? >Radiant< 09:06, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
There are so many churches (one for every couple of hundred people) that comprehensive listing would seem to overwhelm articles about a city. A breakout article ("Religion in Xville) might work. Do we have a few sentences about the more notable churches (First Pres was founded in 1892 by xx and the present structure was built in 19xx. Brother Z was a notable pastor from 1890 to 1920 who created the doctrine of GG which was widely discussed in the 1920's The congregation had a max of 900 members in 1960, but membership has fallen to 600)? Such an article based on the church's internal documents would likely fail AfD. Or just the name and a link to their website? What about when a less notable storefront ministry wants an equal mention? Edison 15:52, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
I don't know about the world. I am more familiar with the U.S., and we have long done census of religion, which I do not find for most countries. And note that I surveyed the number of churches versus the population in a half dozen tiny to mid sized cities. 1 religious congregation per 200 of population was the average. The tiny towns had relatively lots more churches than the larger cities because they also serve the surrounding rural areas, and rural population was not included in my tabulation. Your expansion to the whole population is not supported by my calculation. WP:LOCAL would appear to call for listing a church in the article for the city which is its mailing address. The ratio I stated is reasonable. Considering tne rural and urban population, [3] gives the following stats for the U.S. as a whole in 2000: Including Christian, Buddhist, Bahá'í, Hindu, Jain, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, Tao, and Zoroastrian, they list 268,240 congregations compared to a 2000 U.S population of 281,421,839, working out to 1 congregation per 1049 persons in the U.S. This includes 188 defined religious denominations, and does not include lesser known unaffiliated storefront congregations. They estimate 176 million adherents to these religious congregations. The article Religion in the United States does not give totals, but I copied the numbers to a spreadsheet and found a total of 324,566 congregations from the denominations listed, with 163,673,000 members. This same ratio of 1 congregation per 1049 persons would imply 6.2 million religious congregations in the world. The Wikipedia article would imply more. Please take a look a the Google listing for churches (name of large city of your choice) and see if the number isn't so large that even a mere listing would add materially to the length of the article for the city. Having separate articles about notable churches (that notability being established per this guideline) and omitting the mass inclusion of all congregations in a city might be more economical of server space. Edison 17:53, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
Los Angeles has 3.7 million people and over 20,000 churches. I can't see any merit in listing them all or even 1% of them in the article. It summarizes religion in the city with a 600 word section discussing the religious history and the prevalent religions. Only 6 congregations/churches are mentioned: 1 Catholic cathedral, 1 LDS church, 1 Foursquare Gospel temple, 1 Kabbalah center, 1 Scientology center, and 1 guru center. The less mainstream thus get more coverage than the predominant religions. Of these 6 which are mentioned and which have their own articles, most lack any independent sources at all.There is no List of churches in Los Angeles to compare to List of churches in London. A similar treatment under WP:LOCAL for say Sidney, Montana would not mention most of the 20 or so churches in the town of 4774, but would probably identify the first few churches in the town(sourced to some local history book) and list the denominations present and how many churches there were in total. A link to [4] as an external source would provide the reader with all the current addresses, without posting stale data in the article itself. Or should there be something like List of churches in Sidney, Montana for every city? How would this approach stack up compared to the simple listing of all churches done for Mesick, Michigan? Edison 18:54, 28 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Interesting. Do you have similar figures about how many restaurants, supermarkets or gas stations the USA has? For comparison. If we suppose that there are roughly as many churches as restaurants, we could arguably use the same principle for both (I'm sure someone will say that a church is more important than a restaurant, or vice versa, but that's a matter of opinion). >Radiant< 09:11, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
This discussion is pointless - no one is suggesting that we're about to mention 20,000 churches in the Los Angeles article - presumably there would be a mention at each suburb, which would have no more than a handful of churches. And to suggest that a link to websites would be commonplace, I would suggest that that sort of thing would be deleted as advertising, and that the mentions should be written to encyclopaedic standard, with any relevant information about the church. And I still disagree on the merging to WP:LOCAL - sure, churches known across a country might not be deleted, but churches known across Sydney, where I come from, have been deleted before because they are apparently "not notable". We need something more substantial than just an expansion of WP:LOCAL, as there are a lot more criteria that could easily apply to churches than just notable sources; and I think it's been agreed upon that there's been too much "all churches are not notable" going around, too. No one is suggesting that every restaraunt, service station and supermarket have their own policy - some of them (eg. service stations) clearly have no notability outside a local community, with possibly a minute number of exceptions to that. Supermarkets more so but still are mostly local entities. Churches, on the other hand, can have notability far wider than just a local community; a lot are just that, but there are so many outside of that so as to justify a separate policy. JROBBO 12:01, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
Just listing the names of the churches in any suburb of Los Angeles or any other large city would be a huge addition to the length of the article, since suburbs or neighborhoods generally have shorter articles than the article for the city. There should probably be some selection of the more notable churches for any mention in Wikipedia. I always hate to see stale databases imported into Wikipedia, so it is best to link to a maintained online database rather than importing the data and making it a bare Wikipedia list of what will always be more current elsewhere. On the other hand if there are sources (history book about the town, history of the church, newspaper stories about the church) it would seem to be borderline notable enough for its own article, or for a few sentences in the article about the town/suburb/neighborhood. I do not see a problem with linking to the church's own website, since it is regarded as a verifiable source about itself and will have up-to-date information beyond what we would care to include in Wikipedia. If a religious center is controversial, then the critical info would have to be well sourced but would be appropriate in Wikipedia and unlikely to be mentioned on the church's own website (sexual abuse of minors, embezzling, links to terrorism, factional infighting, cults). Edison 14:57, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

The biggest reason I don't believe that we need a separate notability guideline for churches is that the primary notability criterion is quite adequate. Are there multiple, independent, reliable sources primarily about the church? I see nothing wrong with having an essay at this title pointing out that this is what it takes, and also that a church is far more than a building (since some editors don't understand that) but I don't see a need for a guideline. We do get some church spam which can be handled as any other spam is. GRBerry 15:07, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Censureship

Reject. This proposal is ridiculous. Why do we need a double standard if we are not trying to keep churches off of Wikipedia. What is worse? Risking that Wikipedia has a liberal tilt or taking up more space on the Wikipedia servers. I don't know about you but I choose the latter. The chance that a persistent left-winged side of Wikipedia will be able to control the site under the use of a new notability guidline at the expense of every other Wikipedian is deeply disturbing. Their is much more at stake with this issue than with any other notability guidline as it cuts to the heart of our deepest beliefs. It seems like recently there have been many attacks on churchs with Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bayside Community Church and sequential nominations and deletions, some deserving and some not. It is already being used in these nominations as justification. Do the benefits of a new guidline outway the cons? Not in a million years. It is ammuntion for those who want churches off of Wikipedia to attack them. Technology will make servers more and more cheap and there is more than enough Dark fiber in America to take care of future bandwith problems. The future of Wikipedia is at a turning point. Do we risk all the problems that come with a huge database and deal with it when we come to it or do we protect churches on Wikipedia. I don't know about you, but the latter choice seems like a no-brainer.--Jorfer 16:20, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I can't parse this diatribe. If there is no special guideline for congregations, the general guidelines for notability apply. All the congregation deletion proposals I've seen would be equally valid under the general guidelines. In my opinion. --Alvestrand 20:22, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

In some ways, Jorfer, I agree with you - there have been some AfDs on churches that haven't been fair in the past, and should have been kept due to the size or influence of the church within its city or area. WP:NOT#PAPER is an important point that needs consideration in the church AfDs. That's why I'm in support of a policy like this, so that the "all churches are not notable" crowd can't keep saying that, but they have a policy that they must refer to in AfDs on churches. I think most, if not just about all congregations deserve a mention somewhere in an area article; however, as genuine and as sincere as the creators might be in establishing the articles on the individual churches, they can't all have their own articles, in practical terms, simply because a lot of them just don't have the information available to sustain one. JROBBO 07:57, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

    • Comment: I agree that some churches should be included on their respective cities page instead of having their own article, but that is already clearly described in the Places of Local Interest guideline so there is no use for this guideline. This just makes the requirements more stringent and complex instead of less stringent and more simple. I especially disagree with size not being an indication of notability. Size does matter. A church with more members usually has more influence even though there are churches that have wealthier individuals and claim influence through finances, but it is still a good general measure to use size. The places of local interest guideline creates a level playing field and encourages judging articles on whether it deserve its own article rather than whether it follows the guideline. I think this guideline just creates a double standard on Places of Local Interest. If a church like New Testament Baptist Church can muster up third party sources it should be able to get the same consideration as Florida State Road 922 (which does not even have a third party source).--Jorfer 22:31, 8 January 2007 (UTC)
Note: New Testament Baptist Church is a redirect to Dade Christian School, which has a section on the church. The school is linked from Hialeah, Florida; the only religious group mentioned in the place article is Santeria. Choose your examples wisely. --Alvestrand 06:52, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
    • Yes, it does have a section under Dade Christian School but it was turned down for its own article. My point was that if a road with no sources can have its own article then why not a church that does have third sources.--Jorfer 22:20, 9 January 2007 (UTC)
      • And note that 493 separate Pokemon characters have their own Wikipedia articles, even though they are referenced only to books from the vendor of the videogame/computer game or blogs. A comparable thing would be referencing a church article to the church's own publications or blogs. Edison 07:42, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Proposed replacement

Here's what I suggest we replace the existing proposal with (after some comments, of course). I've taken on board comments from before and deleted what people had asked for. JROBBO 08:08, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

General inclusion in a local article:

  • Most congregations and places of religious worship are notable enough for mentioning on Wikipedia. In the majority of cases, it is enough to have a brief reference in the article on the area in which the church is located, as per WP:LOCAL. Notable and verifiable facts on the church/congregation (which are accurately sourced) may be included to improve the information about the local area.

For a church/congregation to have its own article:

  • To have its own article, a congregation must be notable. Statements made in the article must be verifiable according Wikipedia’s Verifiability guidelines.
  • Branches of a particular congregation or church, or on individual services, meetings or gatherings of a church/congregation should generally not have their own article, but should be included in the main church/congregation's article.

Guidelines

Local churches and congregations should usually be considered to be notable if they meet one or more of the following criteria:

  1. The congregation has been the subject of multiple non-trivial published works whose source is independent of the church itself.
    • This can include:
      • Inclusion in third party published materials.
      • Media coverage that is non-trivial and deals specifically with the church as the primary subject of the article.
    • This should not include:
      • Internal documents, including reports, newsletters, press releases, magazines, newspapers and the like published or produced by the church itself, unless those works are notable in themselves (although such may be used as source material within the article itself). Materials not published by the local church itself, however, should be considered on a case by case basis.
      • A listing of churches and services in local newspapers or community information websites.
      • Other works which would not meet Wikipedia's reliable source standards.
  2. The church plays a significant role in, or has contributed significantly to, the life and affairs of a country or state, and/or its government or ruler(s). This should not be dependent on a country or state having an established church.1
  3. The church plays a significant role in, or has contributed significantly to, its city (in the case of a metropolitan or suburban church), or its regional area (in the case of a rural church).2
  4. The church plays a notable or significant role within its denomination or religion. This only should apply if the denomination is notable in itself, being documented by sources external to the individual church, but internal to the denomination.
  5. The church is notably large for its region, and has achieved notability in non-trivial sources for this.3
  6. The church has, or has had, notable leaders or clergy, for whom the particular church has had a formative impact. For a church to fit into this category, the leader should be notable enough to meet WP:BIO, by non-trivial external coverage, and should have their own article. The involvement of the church in the person's life must not be trivial.4
  7. The church has, or has had, notable members or worshippers, for whom the particular church was formative in their work or their life. These people must also be notable under WP:BIO and should ideally have their own article, and their involvement in the church. The church's involvement in their lives should not be trivial.
  8. The church runs, or has run, a program, or programs, which are notable for their uniqueness, high success rate or high popularity. Such programs may include youth programs, charitable work, evangelistic programs, and music.
  9. The church runs or has run a notable school or college, has established some other notable churches, or runs or has run another notable enduring institution.
  10. The church's teachings or theology is considered unique or notably controversial. The teachings should be of the individual church, not its denomination.
  11. The church building has particular architectural and/or historic significance.

Notes

^1 The Washington National Cathedral and Westminster Abbey would be examples of churches fitting this criteria.
^2 Most cities' main cathedrals of recognised denominations, for example, would fit in this category; churches such as Paradise Community Church in Adelaide, Australia, (from which the Family First Party, a notable political party in Australia with representation in its state Parliament and the Federal Parliament, evolved) would also fit into this category.
^3 The size needed to be notable will be dependent on the area, and discretion should be used in discussions regarding the country and area where the church is situated. Generally, most megachurches should be notable.
^4 All Souls Church, Langham Place would be an example of this, being formative in the ministry of notable theologian John Stott.


Comments

I am still very unhappy that the replacement goes back and forth between places of worship (church buildings) and groups of people that worship together (congregations). I think we'd be much better off if we split these 2 issues completely apart. Having them in the same document probably does no harm, but the criteria for the buildings should be distinct from the criteria for the groups of people. Many buildings - Hagia Sofia, Nidarosdomen - have had multiple groups of people worshipping in them over the centuries; similarly, many congregations have worshipped in many different buildings. Otherwise, I like this better than the old one. --Alvestrand 22:07, 14 January 2007 (UTC)

In my opinion, good enough to bottle and present to the Wikipedia community to gain consensus. I don't think we need to worry too much about congregation vs. building; historic buildings, whatever their type, are considered notable already. Raffles mk 08:50, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

Seems good to me. 99of9 03:01, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Case Study: Pilgrim Baptist Church

Here's an interesting case study for applying the criteria. Pilgrim Baptist Church. First, are we talking about the congregation or the building? Sometimes it just doesn't seem to be a meaningful difference. The building was designed as a Jewish synagogue by distinguished architects and arguably has a place in Wikipedia based on that. Chicago designated it a "landmark" in 1981, which would be a claim to notability. In the 1920's it became a Baptist church, and deserves an article as the birthplace of gospel music, and for having notable composer Thomas A. Dorsey as choir director and noted singer Mahalia Jackson as a singer in the choir. Then it has arguable notability as a site where Martin Luther King Jr. preached sermons as part of the U.S. civil rights struggle. It has a weaker claim to notability as "the pulse center of the Chicago Bronzeville black comunity." Its weakest claim to notability would be that it was in the news because the structure was largely destroyed by a fire, and they are trying to raise money to restore it, but this is the subject of the news articles cited in the article. It would benefit from better references. Edison 15:23, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Unless the congregations which have occupied the building have relocated elsewhere, I don't see any need to distinguish the congregations from the building in this instance. Even if they have relocated, the rest of their history (and perhaps any other buildings) might be covered here as well. The only question would seem to be if multiple congregations here had more than one notable building each in their history. MisfitToys 01:14, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
In my opinion, this article is solely about its building and what has happened there. It's hard to distinguish the congregation as such - and all of the references seem to talk about the building. --Alvestrand 06:18, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
There was the Jewish congregation, which had notable architects build the structure, then the African-American Baptist congregation, which had the notable musicians and civil rights speaker. The building seems notable, but the Baptist congregation also seems notable, and the effects are synergistic with respect to an article for it. Edison 07:35, 17 January 2007 (UTC)
I have no problem with the notability of that church whatsoever - however I think two articles on the congregation itself and the church building itself is unnecessary, unless there was so much information in the article that it was forced to split. The article could easily become a good or featured article with an expansion of what is there. However, sections in the article on the building and the congregation would be fine. JROBBO 08:57, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Cleaning up discussion of draft 1

Is there any way we can archvie / clean up the discussion here and focus on discussing JROBBO's new draft? 99of9 03:31, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page. I'd leave the instruction creep section on the page, as I am sure we have no consensus over that issue. GRBerry 04:07, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
Ok thanks, I'm happy to leave the currently active instruction creep section. Does anyone mind if we do this? 99of9 23:51, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
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