MIAMI - After 87 years, the University Baptist Church of Coral Gables, Fla., recently shed its name for something it felt was more forward looking - Christ Journey.

It was following the lead of First Baptist Church of Perrine, Fla., which dropped the name it had held for 89 years in favor of Christ Fellowship.

Coral Baptist Church of Coral Springs, Fla., relaunched itself in 2006 as Church By the Glades.

And First Baptist Church of Fort Lauderdale is now known as “First Fort Lauderdale” in its new website. The word “Baptist” is found in a faintly lettered tagline.

These South Florida churches are joining a growing number of Southern Baptist congregations around the country that are quietly moving away from their denomination’s historic namesake - worried that it conjured up images of pipe organs, narrow-mindedness or stuffy, formal services.

The reality, pastors say, is that many modern Baptist churches mix their liturgy with rock bands and gourmet coffee, and sermons are more likely to be about personal growth than fire and brimstone.

While their approach to saving souls has kept up with the times, some pastors feel the name has not.

“Baptist today has as many flavors as Baskin and Robbins ice cream. It has no defined meaning, and where it does, no positive meaning,” explained Bill White, Christ Journey’s lead pastor. Ninety-three percent of his congregation voted to change the name.

Their restlessness isn’t new. The 168-year-old Southern Baptist Convention - the country’s largest Protestant denomination with some 46,000 cooperating U.S. churches and over 4,800 field personnel worldwide - was asked to consider changing its name at least seven times between 1965 and 2004, said spokesman Roger Oldham.

Congregations have been concerned that their denomination’s strict biblical interpretations of creation, women’s roles and homosexuality have been politicized, even by their own members.