United and uniting churches
A united church, also called a uniting church, is a church formed from the merger or other form of union of two or more different Protestant Christian denominations.[1]
Glass window in the town church of Wiesloch (Stadtkirche Wiesloch) with Martin Luther and John Calvin commemorating the 1821 union of Lutheran and Reformed churches in the Grand Duchy of Baden.
Historically, unions of Protestant churches were enforced by the state, usually in order to have a stricter control over the religious sphere of its people, but also other organizational reasons. As modern Christian ecumenism progresses, unions between various Protestant traditions are becoming more and more common,[2] resulting in a growing number of united and uniting churches. Some of the recent major examples are the United Protestant Church of France (2013) and the Protestant Church in the Netherlands (2004).[3][4][5][6] As mainline Protestantism shrinks in Europe and North America due to the rise of secularism,[7][8][9][10] Reformed and Lutheran denominations merge, often creating large nationwide denominations.[1] The phenomenon is much less common among evangelical, nondenominational and charismatic churches as new ones arise and many of them remain independent of each other.
Perhaps the oldest official united church is found in Germany, where the Evangelical Church in Germany is a federation of Lutheran, United (Prussian Union) and Reformed churches, a union dating back to 1817. The first of the series of unions was at a synod in Idstein to form the Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau in August 1817, commemorated in naming the church of Idstein Unionskirche one hundred years later.[11][12]
Around the world, each united or uniting church comprises a different mix of predecessor Protestant denominations.[1] Trends are visible, however, as most united and uniting churches have one or more predecessors with heritage in the Reformed tradition and many are members of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches.
Conciliar movement
In the 1950s and 1960s an ecumenical spirit emerged in many churches in the United States of America, leading to a conciliar movement known in some circles as Conciliarity. A product of this movement was the Consultation on Church Union (COCU). The COCU disbanded formally in 2002 but moved into the Churches Uniting in Christ movement.[13]
United and uniting churches around the world
Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau (founded in 1817) is a United Protestant member church under the Evangelical Church in Germany's umbrella.
Unionskirche in Idstein held by the Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau. It commemorates the union of Lutheran and Reformed Protestants in the Duchy of Nassau in August 1817, the first of its kind and a month before the Prussian Union in September of the same year.
- Australia: Uniting Church in Australia, the 1977 union of Congregationalist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches.[14]
- Bangladesh: Church of Bangladesh, established in 1974 as a union of Anglican and Presbyterian churches.[15]
- Canada: United Church of Canada, the 1925 union of Congregationalist, Methodist, and a majority of Presbyterian churches (including Bermuda).[16]
- Czech Republic: Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren, formed in 1918 in Czechoslovakia through the unification of the Protestant churches of the Lutheran and Reformed confessions.[17] However, the ECCB has deeper roots in the Czech reformation: in the Utraquist Hussite Church (1431–1620) and in the Unity of Brethren aka Moravian Church (1457–1620).
- France: United Protestant Church of France, formed in 2013 through the unification of the Reformed Church of France and the Evangelical Lutheran Church of France.[3][18]
- Germany: 10 united church bodies within the Evangelical Church in Germany from unions of Lutheran and Reformed churches: Evangelical Church of Berlin-Brandenburg-Silesian Upper Lusatia, Evangelical Church in the Rhineland, Evangelical Church of Westphalia (all of them are successors of the Evangelical Church of the old-Prussian Union), Evangelical State Church of Anhalt, Evangelical State Church in Baden, Bremian Evangelical Church, Evangelical Church in Central Germany, Evangelical Church in Hesse and Nassau, Evangelical Church of Hesse-Kassel and Waldeck and Evangelical Church of the Palatinate (Protestant State Church).[19]
- India: Church of North India, the 1970 union of Anglican, Methodist, Baptist, Disciples of Christ, Presbyterian, Congregational, and the Church of the Brethren churches.[20]
- India: Church of South India, the 1947 union of Anglican, Methodist, Congregational, Presbyterian, and Reformed churches.[21]
- Indonesia: Indonesia Christian Church or Gereja Kristen Indonesia, union of GKI East Java, GKI West Java and GKI Central Java in 1988, and the Indonesian Gospel Tabernacle Church.[22]
- Italy: Union of Methodist and Waldensian Churches, the 1975 union of Waldensian and Methodist churches.
- Jamaica: United Church in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, the 1965 union of Presbyterian, Congregationalist, and Disciples of Christ churches.[23]
- Japan: United Church of Christ in Japan, the 1941 union of thirty-three Protestant denominations.[24]
- Kiribati: Kiribati Uniting Church[25]
- Melanesia: United Church in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands[26]
- the Netherlands: Protestant Church in the Netherlands, the 2004 union of the Dutch Reformed Church, the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands.[6]
- Pakistan: Church of Pakistan, the 1970 union of Anglicans, Scottish Presbyterians (Church of Scotland), Methodists, and Lutherans.[27]
- Philippines: United Church of Christ in the Philippines[28]
- Sweden: Evangelical Free Church in Sweden, the 2002 union of the Örebrö Mission, the Free Baptists in Sweden and the Holiness Union.[29]
- Sweden: Uniting Church in Sweden, the 2011 union of the Baptist Union of Sweden, the Swedish branch of the United Methodist Church, and the Mission Covenant Church of Sweden.[30]
- Thailand: Church of Christ in Thailand[31]
- United Kingdom: United Reformed Church, the 1972 union of Congregationalist and Presbyterian churches in England and Wales, later joined by the Churches of Christ and the Congregational Union of Scotland.[32]
- United Kingdom: United Free Church of Scotland[33]
- United States: United Church of Christ, the 1957 union of the two previously united churches: Congregational Christian Churches and the Evangelical and Reformed Church.[34]
- United States: United Methodist Church, the 1968 union of The Methodist Church and the Evangelical United Brethren Church.[35]
- United States: Unitarian Universalist Association, the 1961 consolidation of the American Unitarian Association and the Universalist Church of America.[36]
See also
References
- "United and Uniting churches — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- Haire, James (2017-03-06). "United and Uniting Churches". The Oxford Handbook of Ecumenical Studies. doi:10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199600847.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199600847-e-30. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- France, Eglise protestante unie de. "La création de l'Église protestante unie de France". Eglise protestante unie de France (in French). Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "United Protestant Church of France — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Three-way PKN union drastically changes Dutch denominational landscape » The Windmill news articles » goDutch". www.godutch.com. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Protestant Church in the Netherlands — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Mainline Protestants make up shrinking number of U.S. adults". Pew Research Center. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "American Religion Statistics: Trends in U.S. Religious Affiliations". Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project. 2015-05-12. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Amid Evangelical decline, growing split between young Christians and church elders". Christian Science Monitor. 2017-10-10. ISSN 0882-7729. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- Burge, Ryan P. "Evangelicals Show No Decline, Despite Trump and Nones". News & Reporting. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Staatlicher Dirigismus und neue Gläubigkeit (Die Kirche im Herzogtum Nassau)" (in German). Nassau-info.de.
- Block, Mathew (2017-10-05). "Remembering the 200th anniversary of the forced union of Lutheran and Reformed churches in Prussia". International Lutheran Council. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- Lahutsky, Nadia (Winter 2003). "The Union of Christians and Disciples in 1832 and COCU/CUIC". Discipliana. 63 (4): 120. ISSN 0732-9881.
- "UCA - Our History". nswact.uca.org.au. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Our History". Church of Bangladesh. 2012-01-29. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "A Brief History | The United Church of Canada". United-church.ca. Archived from the original on 2013-05-11. Retrieved 2013-05-21.
- Archa, Tomáš Pilát. "Českobratrská církev evangelická". www.e-cirkev.cz. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- The Union of Protestant Churches of Alsace and Lorraine is not an actual united church, but a union of churches, even if the differences are quite faint in the field.
- "Evangelical Church in Germany". www.ekd.de. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- CNI. "History – CNI". Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "CSI SYNOD". www.csisynod.com. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Indonesian Christian Church (GKI) — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "United Church in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE KYODAN - The United Church of Christ in Japan" (in Japanese). Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Kiribati Uniting Church — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "United Church in Papua New Guinea — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- Office, Anglican Communion. "Anglican Communion: Member Church". Anglican Communion Website. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Our Story". Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Intro till EFK - Evangeliska Frikyrkan (EFK)". www.efk.se (in Swedish). Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Uniting Church in Sweden — World Council of Churches". www.oikoumene.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "ประวัติศาสตร์ – The Church of Chirst in Thailand" (in Thai). Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "About us". The United Reformed Church. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "Our History – United Free Church of Scotland". Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "About Us". United Church of Christ. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "History". The United Methodist Church. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
- "History of Unitarian Universalism | UUA.org". www.uua.org. Retrieved 2020-09-04.
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