Catholic Answers Forums Closing

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Thank you, @MNathaniel, that’s really kind of you 😃 I will miss the camaraderie of CAF, though. Hopefully we’ll be able to find a few alternatives!
 
There is always a silver lining: it might be a good thing for those who need to get a life.

I need to step away as social media really is a time sink. This is as good a spur as any.
 
This is just my opinion and I don’t want the people who do this to take it the wrong way. I don’t think the forum concept lends itself to the clear conveyance of solid Catholic teaching. To do that it would have to be moderated much more heavily, and that costs money.

I think CA generally does a great job at it’s mission, but the discussion forum which carries the credibility of the CA label doesn’t really contribute to that credibility.
As a catechist I have had to wade through erroneous things that catechumens read on here and believed were in line with Church teaching because of the CA label.

In any case, thanks to CA for providing a discussion spot.
 
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AdamP88 said:
I think you’re missing the point a bit. Nobody is doubting that CA is a good resource. But the users of this forum have been a unique community and many of us will miss that when it goes.
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I apologize if I’m missing the point. It sounds like some folks want a space to mourn the loss of a specific community forum? I can back out, I’ve said my piece in that case.

I just wanted to be honest with my own thoughts, because I do think that overall, CA is making the right decision here. Their message and rationale really made sense to me. And if any of their team read these comments, I’d like them to see that there are people who were members of the community who think they’re doing the right thing (rather than seeing only negative comments suggesting people think they’re doing the wrong thing).

Again, I think it’s wonderful that you met your wife here, and I hope that everyone frightened at the potential loss of an online community they value, manages to port over to another online community (e.g. I see that folks are already discussing Reddit, Discord, etc). There’s over a month of time before CAF closes down, so I hope that those who value the unique online community built here, take the opportunity to carry it forward onto another platform. In particular I think Discord sounds like a great possibility; as far as I know it’s free, and there’s sort of an equivalent of ‘threads’, etc. Folks can use the next month of CAF forum access to share links to such alternative forums, and share the usernames they’re known by there if interested in continuing to be ‘known’ as their continuous self, by users from CAF.
 
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MNathaniel said:
CA is making the right decision here. T
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I get why they’ve made the decision. I can see why they might think the forum isn’t necessarily the best way of doing their work. But it has just been such a great community and I’ll be so sorry to see it go. I doubt anywhere else will have the same collection of people.
 
Not moving anywhere online. This was a good place to hang out for awhile. But in the long run I won’t miss it. Nothing so important as real life and living that in Christ. Which I haven’t always done here or IRL.
 
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MNathaniel said:
Again, I think it’s wonderful that you met your wife here, and I hope that everyone frightened at the potential loss of an online community they value, manages to port over to another online community (e.g. I see that folks are already discussing Reddit, Discord, etc). There’s over a month of time before CAF closes down, so I hope that those who value the unique online community built here, take the opportunity to carry it forward onto another platform. In particular I think Discord sounds like a great possibility; as far as I know it’s free, and there’s sort of an equivalent of ‘threads’, etc. Folks can use the next month of CAF forum access to share links to such alternative forums, and share the usernames they’re known by there if interested in continuing to be ‘known’ as their continuous self, by users from CAF.
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I’m definitely thinking of doing something in terms of encouraging people to move to a new platform.
 
I honestly hope to wean off of discussion forums. Would be good for my faith and my community to live in data silence.
 
Tough as it is to say, this is the right decision. Mr. Check’s memo is 100% correct. I would also add that the user base has gone down over the years, such that CAF represented diminishing returns. This is true for web forums in general. Social media and Reddit have taken a lot of the user base that once went to forums. Moreover, there are just not enough English-speaking web-savvy practicing and engaged Catholics around such that the user base could grow.

With that said, I want to express my gratitude to CA and the forum staff, and all of you reading this. Back in the day, CAF was important to my conversion. I had good and bad experiences here, but the good definitely outweighed the bad.
 
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CAClosingDown said:
Catholic Answers is closing down because it is increasingly Difficult for them to justify certain opinions which are in contradiction with Roma Catholic Church Dogma. Let them close the forum; it is for the better. The Catholic Church prevails. We will move on.
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Thank you Kanye, very cool!
 
Sunbreak said:
What about this other forum? Looks like it could use more participants.
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I’m on there too. Haven’t been there in ages.

Edit: just reactivated my account. Bound to be one of these boards that sticks 😉
 
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I have a feeling that many people including management at Catholic Answers have missed this point too. Here’s the thing, once this Forum disappears, I’m not coming back to give them money. So, they can expect to see their revenue continue decline. Congratulations!
 
Cruciferi said:
I have a feeling that many people including management at Catholic Answers have missed this point too
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No, they didn’t.

The sad truth is that the user base just isn’t there to support CAF anymore. This is not CA’s fault.
 
MarysLurker said:
The sad truth is that the user base just isn’t there to support CAF anymore.
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How long have you been here?

I’ve been here since 2013. They couldn’t have done more to run people out of here. That’s why you literally have no more Priests or Religious posting here.

You can only Suspend so many people and allow trolls to run rampant like Visigoths before people leave. This is what happens!

To be fair, I can’t blame Catholic Answers for everything but they’re definitely partly to blame.
 
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Cruciferi said:
Here’s the thing, once this Forum disappears, I’m not coming back to give them money. So, they can expect to see their revenue continue decline.
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I’m sure their bean counters already calculated this.
The income loss you speak of will not be as high as the one in keeping the forum running.
 
Cruciferi said:
How long have you been here?
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Since 2009 on a different handle. So long enough to know what you are taking about. The decline of this forum has a lot more to so with macro trends influencing the Church than with anything having to do with CAF itself.
 
Cruciferi said:
I have a feeling that many people including management at Catholic Answers have missed this point too. Here’s the thing, once this Forum disappears, I’m not coming back to give them money. So, they can expect to see their revenue continue decline. Congratulations!
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I’m not sure I follow your math. If patron donations (and it sounds like, any/all CAF-specific donations) weren’t even covering 10% of CAF’s running costs, then CA was losing 90% of the budget they poured into CAF, for whatever amount of time. They will immediately regain that 90% of CAF’s haemorrhage of their budget for CA, simply by ceasing to bleed it.

So your revenue (if it was through/because of CAF) never added any profit to CA at all. It encouraged them to continue draining 90% of their own money.

I’m no mathematician but I just don’t follow how any cutoff in donations from ex-CAFers, would have an additional effect on CA’s revenue declining. Unless CAFers have been donating thousands and thousands and thousands of dollars, that they specifically instructed to bypass CAF’s costs and go to other CA costs only?

Am I seriously just braindead right now? Not trying to provoke an argument. Just honestly don’t understand the suggestion that it will be a net financial loss for CAF if (regarding some category of activities) they save 90% of ongoing expenditures while losing 10% (or less) of that ongoing revenue.

Personally, I’m financially unable right now, but will certainly intend to resume financially supporting CA when financially able. Their apologetics apostolate adds charity and clarity to the world, and I very much appreciate them.
 
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