Congregational churches

Congregational or Congregationalist churches (both terms are used in English) are Protestant churches practicing congregationalist church governance, in which each independently and autonomously runs its own affairs. Congregationalism is often considered to be a part of the wider Reformed tradition.

In the United States and the United Kingdom, many Congregational churches claim their descent from Protestant denominations formed on a theory of union published by the theologian and English separatist Robert Browne in 1582. Ideas of nonconforming Protestants during the Puritan Reformation of the Church of England laid foundation for these churches. In England, the early Congregationalists were called Separatists or Independents to distinguish them from the similarly Calvinistic Presbyterians, whose churches embrace a polity based on the governance of elders. Congregationalists also differed with the Reformed churches using episcopalian church governance, which is usually led by a bishop. Congregational churches were widely established in the Plymouth Colony and the Massachusetts Bay Colony (in present-day New England), and together wrote the Cambridge Platform of 1648 which described the autonomy of the church and its association with others.

Within the United States, the model of Congregational churches was carried by migrating settlers from New England into New York, then into the Old North West, and further. With their insistence on independent local bodies, they became important in many social reform movements, including abolitionism, temperance, and women's suffrage. Modern Congregationalism in the United States is largely split into three bodies: the United Church of Christ, the National Association of Congregational Christian Churches and the Conservative Congregational Christian Conference, which is the most theologically conservative.

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