The American Lutheran Church
| American Lutheran Church | |
|---|---|
| Classification | Protestant |
| Orientation | Lutheran |
| Structure | National church, middle level synods, and local congregations |
| Associations |
Lutheran World Federation Lutheran Council in the United States of America |
| Region | United States and Canada |
| Headquarters | Minneapolis, Minnesota |
| Origin | 1960 Minneapolis, Minnesota |
| Merger of | first American Lutheran Church The Evangelical Lutheran Church United Evangelical Lutheran Church |
| Absorbed | Lutheran Free Church (1963) |
| Separations |
Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada (1966) American Association of Lutheran Churches (1987) |
| Merged into | Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (1988) |
| Congregations | 4,959 (1986) |
| Members | 2,319,443 (1986) |
| Ministers | 7,671 (1986) |
| Publications | Lutheran Standard |
The American Lutheran Church (ALC or sometimes TALC) was a Christian Protestant denomination in the United States and Canada that existed from 1960 to 1987. Its headquarters were in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Upon its formation in 1960, the ALC designated Augsburg Publishing House, also located in Minneapolis, as the church publisher. The Lutheran Standard was the official magazine of the ALC.
The ALC's immigrant heritage came mostly from Germany, Norway, and Denmark, and its demographic center was in the Upper Midwest (with especially large numbers in Minnesota). Theologically, the church was influenced by pietism. It was slightly more conservative than the Lutheran Church in America (LCA), with which it would eventually merge. While it officially taught biblical inerrancy in its constitution, it was seldom enforced by means of heresy trials and the like.
The ALC was a founding member of the "Lutheran Council in the United States of America", which began on January 1, 1967. The ALC cooperated with the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod in many ventures, but the ties came to an end when talks concerning a merger of the ALC with the Lutheran Church in America began.
After six years, in 1966, Canadian congregations of the ALC formed the autonomous Evangelical Lutheran Church of Canada (ELCC), which in 1986 joined with the Lutheran Church in America – Canada Section (LCA-CS) (former LCA congregations in separate regional synods in Canada) to form the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC).
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