St Sam  

St Sam's Basics

 How do I join St Sam's?
Go to Anglican List. When you subscribe, you can choose to receive individual posts or in grups of posts, as a digest.

After the listserver has received your request, it will send an email back asking you to confirm that you want to subscribe. You'll see instructions in the post that tell you how to do that.

Finally, you'll receive a message from the listserv once you've been added to the ANGLICAN mailing list; that is, St Sam's Cyberparish.

St Sam's is a closed mailing list; that is, only people who have subscribed can post. We've found this decreases the amount of spam.
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 After joining, what should I do?
We invite you to post a short introduction, but it's certainly not a prerequisite for participation. Introductions in the past have been are extremely varied, some being complete faith histories, others simple biographical details; some very short, others quite long; some very personal, some humorous. They reveal the enormous diversity of the Anglican Communion. Do remember that submitting an introduction is not compulsory.

 How do I unsubscribe?
Don't send mail to the list asking to be unsubscribed. We can't help you. Unsubscribe by going to Anglican List. At the bottom of that page is a form in which you can unsubscribe.

 I am having trouble subscribing or unsubscribing.
Help me.

Sometimes your ISP changes your email address, but you subscribed under the old one. If this happens, then go to the Anglican List, go to the bottom of the page where it says " To unsubscribe from Anglican, get a password reminder, or change your subscription options enter your subscription email address:" enter your address and it will take you to a page where you can look at and change your options for your list subscription. One of them will be to change your subscribed email address

 How do I post a message to everyone at St Sam's?
You may post to the entire list by sending messages to anglican@stsams.org

 What are my other mail options?
Go to the Anglican List, go to the bottom of the page where it says " To unsubscribe from Anglican, get a password reminder, or change your subscription options enter your subscription email address:" enter your address and it will take you to a page where you can look at and change your options for your list subscription.Here you can stop mail without unsubscribing, change from single mesages to disgest and vice versa, and set a number of options for you subscription.

 How do I format a post so it reads easily?
Please use line lengths of no more than 72 characters: this keeps your text within the 80 character per line limit of most monitors. Be sensible and use upper and lower case letters in your posts.

Please check and edit your subject line before sending. If what you've written really fits the subject, don't change it. If you've picked up on one angle of the subject and are heading in a new direction, please change the subject line. Nobody wants to delete good stuff without reading it. Nobody wants to retrieve something that looks good, just to find out it was wrapped in the wrong package.

Be careful when using initials and other abbreviations: not everyone may know what you mean, especially as this is an international list; a good idea is to spell the subject out in full the first time.
Include a signature with your name and email address at the end of your post; do not rely on the header's From: field to identify you, as this will not necessarily contain your correct email address. Many mail systems allow you to automatically include a specified signature file.
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 How can I stop mail temporarily? And then start again?
Go to the Anglican List, go to the bottom of the page where it says " To unsubscribe from Anglican, get a password reminder, or change your subscription options enter your subscription email address:" enter your address and it will take you to a page where you can look at and change your options for your list subscription.Here you can stop mail without unsubscribing.

 I haven't received any posts recently. Is there a problem?
Start by sending an email to the List Moderator to get the password, then click on the Anglican List Archives. This will take you to what we call St Sam's Mailbox, and you'll see (and can read and respond to, if you like) all the posts sent to the mailing list in the last 48 hours. Quite obviously, if there are posts listed on the page and you haven't received them, there is something wrong with your mail delivery.

 If you've received all the post the web page shows, well, then, the listserver may be down and you'll need to find something else to do. It's hard, but now's your chance to do all those things you used to do before you subscribed: like talk to people, or earn a living, or mow the lawn, or introduce someone to the Good News.

 What to do when you're not receiving mail:
Check the Anglican List Archives here at the web site: you might want to bookmark that page.

What NOT to do when you're not receiving mail:
Don't mail the list asking where everyone is. You'll just clog the list when things return.

Don't keep sending a message you've already posted. The first copy will almost certainly get through eventually, just wait and see. As will the second. And the third.
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 How do I reply privately to a post?
You must replace the 'To: anglican@list.stsams.org', which your mailer has put at the head of your message, with 'To: [Original sender's address]'.

It is very easy to forget to do this, and even experienced members of the list have made the mistake of sending private mail to the entire list--which can be very embarrassing.

 Someone has posted something I disagree with. What should I do?
Keep calm. Do not reply immediately. If you still have lots of mail to read (or the rest of the digest), then continue to read your mail. This will help you follow the first two steps. It will also let you see if someone else has already responded. Remember that someone else's response is probably almost as good as your own, as well as saving you some effort. Consider whether it might be better to reply by private email, rather than to the list.
If after all this, you still feel you must reply: fine, go ahead.

Please remember that it does not help to throw insults around, whether they are aimed at a group or at individuals. A careful use of language is likely to help readers appreciate what you are trying to say, rather than to concentrate on the way you say it. In particular, there is very little call for bad language; for gratuitous insults; for messages attacking people rather than making contributions to a discussion.

Of course, we appreciate that there are people whose native language is not English; or who have difficulty using the language or their computers. The comments about careful use of language are not meant to discourage people from taking an active part in discussions.
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Now, having written your response and before posting it, consider the whole matter again. Re-read your response, checking for errors of citation, logic, spelling, and fact. Check that it is correctly addressed, especially if you intend replying to the individual and not the list. Checking your mail before you send it will save you from much embarrassment.

 Can I regard my posts as safe from redistribution?

You should realize that this is a public forum: anyone can subscribe to this list. In short, you should post nothing that you would not be reasonably happy to see published in, say, a parish or diocesan newsletter. Nothing posted should be considered absolutely confidential.

A tip of the biretta to Simon Kershaw for providing
most of the information in this section.

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