The individual who posts the thread can designate it devotional, caucus, or denominational. I so designated this thread. That unique provision in the Religion Forum has to do with the nature of religious people having the right to discuss their own faith inside their own meetings without, for example, unbelievers entering and shouting them down.
Free Republic tries to mirror that, in my experience. Some threads are open.
However, a caucus cannot begin attacking other points of view or have a title that attacks other points of view. That would make it an open thread, because others have the right to respond. The idea is to be able to have a place to discuss without disruption.
To balance that, you are perfectly free to post a similar thread and have it be an “open” discussion.
Thank you for your reply. Maybe I now understand how things are worked in the Religion forum, which I did not realize was a distinctly differently-administered forum from the whole of Free Republic and, more importantly, had it’s own set of (unwritten?) rules, guidelines, and traditions.
My browser is set to land on Latest Articles posted on Free Republic as always. That means even the Latest Articles in the Religion section, it would seem.
Should posting on Free Republic Religion forum threads be treated differently than any other Free Republic forum thread? No.
I shall try harder to avoid the Religion section of FR.
R2z