No, heresy is a theological word. That it has crept into common parlance is irrelevant. The issue on this thread was theological. We were asked whether we consider you non-free-willers to be heretics. You asked us what we believe about heresy. Do us the common courtesy of letting us define heresy for ourselves. You can define it for yourself and we won't bug you. But if you ask us whether we consider non-free-willers heretics but insist that you get to define the terms, you are arrogant.
This definition of heresy goes back to the very earliest days of the Church. Calvin agreed with it. Luther agreed with it. All Protestant churches that still have canon law and rules about beliefs still accept this definition. I anticipated your silly response and that's why I mentioned in passing that Charles Finney was tried for heresy under this definition by the very high Calvinist fathers the non-free-willers venerate--the Princeton Old School Calvinists whose legacy was taken up by Hodge and Warfield.
Do you get that, blue-duncan? This definition of heresy which you dismiss as being merely Catholic special pleading was the definition of heresy held by B. B. Warfield and Charles Hodge of Princeton Theological Seminary. It is the universal theological definition of heresy. Webster's dictionary simply gives a non-technical, common-parlance definition that is irrelevant to a discussion of what heresy means for the Church.
"Do you get that, blue-duncan? This definition of heresy which you dismiss as being merely Catholic special pleading was the definition of heresy held by B. B. Warfield and Charles Hodge of Princeton Theological Seminary"
Are you saying that Warfield and Hodge agreed that this is the only definition of heretic?
"her·e·tic ( P ) Pronunciation Key (hr-tk) n. A person who holds controversial opinions, especially one who publicly dissents from the officially accepted dogma of the Roman Catholic Church."
Are you saying you can only be a heretic if you "publicly dissent from the officially accepted dogma of the Roman Catholic Church"?
Why would Warfield and Hodge or Calvinists care whether Finney held beliefs contrary to "the officially accepted dogma of the Roman Catholic Church" when as Presbyterians, they also held opposing beliefs? He was deemed a heretic because he was espousing doctrine contrary to their beliefs, not those of the Roman Catholic Church.