-
1054
Eastern Orthodox church
The Eastern Orthodox Church, officially the Orthodox Catholic Church, is the second-largest Christian church, with approximately 220 million baptized members. It operates as a communion of autocephalous churches, each governed by its bishops in local synods. -
1517
Lutheran Church
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism that identifies with the teachings of Jesus Christ and was founded by Martin Luther, a 16th-century German reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the church launched the Protestant Reformation. -
1534
Church of England/Anglican
The Church of England is a Christian church and also the established church of England. The archbishop of Canterbury is the most senior cleric, although the monarch is the supreme governor. The Church of England is also the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. -
Baptist
(founded by John Smyth in 1609) Started as a Puritan “Seperatist” movement from the Church of England or Anglican Church in Lincolnshire and then moved to Holland. With his colleague, Thomas Helwys chose to be “Baptised” as adults into Christ. -
Methodist
(Founded in London, England by John, and Charles Wesley 1738) Began as a movement from within the Church of England. John Wesley is quoted as saying, “The Church of England has never had a more faithful son than I!”. However, they would apply a more Arminianist outlook on the Anglican Churches’ 39 articles of Religion. Although the brothers only traveled to America once, as missionaries in 1736, they quickly returned home, dejected and down about their experience. -
Uniting Church
The United Church of Christ came into being in 1957 with the union of two Protestant denominations: the Evangelical and Reformed Church and the Congregational Christian Churches. Each of these was, in turn, the result of a union of two earlier traditions.
The Congregational Churches were organized when the Pilgrims of Plymouth Plantation (1620) and the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1629) acknowledged their essential unity in the Cambridge Platform of 1648. -
Presbytarian
(based on teachings of John Calvin) A denomination that arose from the Reformed Church in Switzerland started by Zwingli and promoted by John Calvin, whereby the method of church governance was by the elders (presbyters) of the congregation.