Saint Mark vs Saint Mark's - A Short Rant from Your Resident Marketer

Joe Miller, Chair Publicity and Promotions Committee

What’s in a name? Better yet, what’s in our name? OK, one more question: What’s NOT in our name?  Let’s take them one at a time. 

What’s in a name? A name, while maybe not the most important element of identity, is the most fundamental component of a brand identity. It’s a simple point of consistency among many possible incarnations of a person’s or an organization’s (or even a church’s) presence. Think of your name. How do you feel when someone misspells or mispronounces it? Especially someone who knows you?  

What’s in our name? Saint Mark United Methodist Church is the agreed upon set of words which comprise our name. Saint Mark for short. Our church hasn’t always been called this, but over the years (about 138 years actually), this is what our church leaders have agreed upon.  You can read more about our history here.

What’s NOT in our name? Despite what many may think, there is no “s” or “ ‘s “ at the end of Saint Mark. On occasion you may have a need to refer to something in the possessive, which could warrant an apostrophe s. Here’s an example of how it works, “Saint Mark’s stained glass windows are an incredible part of Saint Mark’s history. But if you want to see the windows, you need to go to Saint Mark.”

I’m reminded of the old 1-800-MATTRES commercials – leave off the last “s” for savings! Maybe for our purposes, we can leave off the last “s” for Saint Mark. It’s certainly not the most crucial element of our church identity, but it is a small step we can all take to drive even more power and unity to the Saint Mark name through consistency.