United Church of Canada
| United Church of Canada | |
|---|---|
| Église unie du Canada | |
The official crest of the United Church of Canada.
|
|
| Classification | Protestant |
| Orientation | Mainline Reformed |
| Polity | Presbyterian |
| Associations | Canadian Council of Churches; World Communion of Reformed Churches; World Council of Churches; World Methodist Council |
| Region | Canada (plus Bermuda) |
| Origin | June 10, 1925 Mutual Street Arena, Toronto, Ontario |
| Merger of | Methodist Church, Canada; two thirds of the Presbyterian Church in Canada; and the Congregational Union of Ontario and Quebec |
| Congregations | 3,016 |
| Members | Over 2 million (affiliates); 525,673 (regular worshippers: 2008) |
| Official website | united-church |
The United Church of Canada (French: Église unie du Canada) is a mainline Reformed denomination and the largest Protestant Christian denomination in Canada, and the largest Canadian Christian denomination after the Roman Catholic Church. The United Church was founded in 1925 as a merger of four Protestant denominations with a total combined membership of about 600,000 members: the Methodist Church, Canada, the Congregational Union of Ontario and Quebec, two-thirds of the congregations of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, and the Association of Local Union Churches, a predominantly prairie-based movement. The Canadian Conference of the Evangelical United Brethren Church joined the United Church of Canada on 1 January 1968.
Membership peaked in 1964 at 1.1 million, and has declined since that time. From 1991 to 2001, the number of people claiming an affiliation with the United Church decreased by 8%, the third largest decrease in mainstream Christian denominations in Canada. Church statistics for the beginning of 2014 showed 450,886 members and approximately 2 million adherents. About 139,000 people attend services in 2,172 pastoral charges representing 3,016 congregations on a regular basis. According to the statistics released in May 2013 the United Church in Canada had 2,008,000 adherents, about 5.7% of the total Canadian population.
The United Church has a "council-based" structure, where each council (congregational, regional, or denominational) have specific responsibilities. In some areas, each of these councils have sole authority, while in others, approval of other councils is required before action is taken. (For example, a congregation requires Presbytery approval before a minister can be called or appointed to the congregation.) The policies of the church are inclusive and liberal: there are no restrictions of gender, sexual orientation or marital status for a person considering entering the ministry; interfaith marriages are recognized; communion is offered to all Christian adults and children, regardless of denomination or age.
The rules for governance are set out in The Manual, first written in 1925, and updated on a regular basis.
...
Wikipedia