Seventh-day Adventists object to use of name

SILVER SPRINGS, Md. — Leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church have asked a federal judge to block a Florida “breakaway church” from using the church’s name after the West Palm Beach, Fla., congregation launched radio and newspaper ads denouncing Protestants and Catholics.

According to the Associated Press, leaders of the Maryland-head-quartered denomination say the Florida congregation, the Eternal Gospel Church of Seventh-day Adventists, has violated a 1980 trademark agreement on the name “Seventh-day Adventist.”

Seventh-day Adventists, with 10 million members around the world and 839,000 in the United States, worship on Saturdays. The Florida church has disparaged Catholics and Protestants for worshipping on Sunday, likening them to Satanists and pagans.

Jeffrey Tew, an attorney for the national church, said the case is a “classic case of a breakaway church trying to use the mother church’s name.” Lawyers for the Florida church, however, say “Seventh-day Adventist” is a generic term, and no group should have a “monopoly” on it.