Bashan Davidians enter into the Seventh-day Adventist Trademark Wars: Who is next?

We will be using this post to document an emerging situation where the Bashan Association has recently decided to trademark the name “The Davidian Seventh-day Adventist Association” with the United States Trademark Office on October 26, 2021. Almost predictably the The Seventh-day Adventist Corporation and its legal team submitted challenge to this action on December 2, 2021 for using their trademarked names “Seventh-day Adventist” and “Adventist“. This is a huge development that requires us to examine the history and background behind the decision by the leaders of the Seventh-day Adventist Church to trademark their name back in 1981 and the subsequent use of this trademark to attack and harass small independent Adventist churches and groups who the Conference men want to silence. Please refer back to this post for updates as this situation develops.

For an essential backdrop to understand the significance of this situation to the future fate of all incorporated Davidian Associations (Bashan, Salem, Mt. Dale, and Waco) we will be listing below a number of very important documents and links related to this case which you can download and examine carefully for yourself.

PDF Documents for download:

Bashan Registration Certificate: Posted Oct. 26, 2021

Notice of Institution: Posted Dec. 2, 2021 General Conference Corporation of Seventh-day Adventists vs. The Davidian Seventh-day Association, Exeter MO

Petition for Cancellation: Posted Dec. 2, 2021 General Conference Corporation of Seventh-day Adventists vs. The Davidian Seventh-day Adventist Association, Exeter MO

SDA Trademark Wars-Adair Report: (some important history behind the SDA use of its trademark to attack small groups of SDA’s including the past involvement of three Davidian Associations (Bashan, Salem, and Mt. Dale) who filed an Amicus Curie brief to support the claim that the name Seventh-day Adventist is generic.)

Websites to visit for more background on the SDA Trademark Wars:

Creation Seventh-day Adventist Church-Pastor Walt McGill case: (many links and updates from this case that transpired from 2005-2015 are no longer active or are missing from the wayback machine. We will be posting important documents as we are able to locate them in relation to this and other SDA trademark cases.)  

News and Reports on the Arrest and imprisonment of Pastor Walt McGill 

Prior posts from our sister website shepherds-rod-speaks.org on the McGill case:

SDA Corporate Church Roars Like a Lion

SDA Trademark Abuse of Small Tennessee Church Goes to the 6th Appeals Court

SDA Church Leaders Have Independent Pastor Arrested

Does Religious Liberty Apply to All Seventh-day Adventists?

Analysis and Insight on the SDA Trademark War

These recent developments raise some probing questions.

1. What are the reasons for Bashan to issue for a trademark at this late hour?
2. Are there consequences that both the GC Corporation of SDA’s and the Bashan Association are incorporated with the state and registered as IRS 501c3 corporations?
3. What is the probability that the Bashan Association could have its operation shut down and liquidated with their leaders imprisoned?
4. How might this case effect other Davidian Associations (Salem, Mt. Dale, Waco) that are also 501c3 corporations?
5. If any, or all the incorporated Davidian Associations are paralyzed and prevented to carrying forth their missionary activities, then how will the Shepherd’s Rod message accomplish its God ordained mission to reach 22+ S.D.A.’s around the world?
6. Does the Bashan group have a legal right to trademark the name “The Davidian Seventh-day Adventist Association“? What about other Davidian groups who also use this or similar name(s)/titles for their organizations? Who is right and who is wrong and on what basis do we judge?