Back Geānede Cirice of Canadan ANG Sjednocená církev Kanady Czech United Church of Canada German Unuiĝinta Eklezio de Kanado Esperanto Iglesia Unida de Canadá Spanish کلیسای یونایتد کانادا Persian Église unie du Canada French Kanadai Egyesült Egyház Hungarian Chiesa unita del Canada Italian カナダ合同教会 Japanese

United Church of Canada

United Church of Canada
Église unie du Canada
The official seal of the United Church of Canada
ClassificationMainline Protestant
OrientationMethodist and Reformed
PolityPresbyterian
General SecretaryMichael Blair
ModeratorCarmen Lansdowne
Associations
RegionCanada (plus Bermuda)
OriginJune 10, 1925 (1925-06-10)
Mutual Street Arena, Toronto, Ontario
Merger of
AbsorbedCanadian Conference of the Evangelical United Brethren Church (1968)
Congregations2,451[1]
Members325,315 registered (baptized) members[1]
Official websiteunited-church.ca

The United Church of Canada (French: Église unie du Canada) is a mainline Protestant denomination[2] that is the largest Protestant Christian denomination in Canada and the second largest Canadian Christian denomination after the Catholic Church in Canada.[3]

The United Church was founded in 1925 as a merger of four Protestant denominations with a total combined membership of about 600,000 members:[4] 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 movement predominantly of the Canadian Prairie provinces. The Canadian Conference of the Evangelical United Brethren Church joined the United Church of Canada on January 1, 1968.[5]

Membership peaked in 1964 at 1.1 million.[4] From 1991 to 2001, the number of people claiming an affiliation with the United Church decreased by 8%, the third largest decrease among Canada's large Christian denominations.[6] In 2011, Statistics Canada reported approximately 2 million people identifying as adherents.[7] The 2021 Canadian census found that more than 1 million Canadians (3.3% of the population) self-identified with the church, remaining the second-largest Christian denomination in Canada.[8] Church statistics for the end of 2023 showed 2,451 congregations and 325,315 members in 243,689 households under pastoral care, of whom 110,878 attend services regularly.[1]

The United Church has a "council-based" structure, where each council (congregational, regional, or denominational) has specific responsibilities. In some areas, each of these councils has sole authority, while in others, approval of other councils is required before action is taken. (For example, a congregation requires regional council 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.[9]

  1. ^ a b c "The United Church of Canada Statistics 2023" (PDF). The United Church of Canada. Retrieved October 29, 2024.
  2. ^ "Appendix B: Classification of Protestant Denominationsdate=2015-05-12". Pew Research Center's Religion & Public Life Project. May 12, 2015. Archived from the original on December 5, 2021. Retrieved May 24, 2016.
  3. ^ "Religions in Canada". www12.statcan.ca. Archived from the original on January 18, 2017. Retrieved June 20, 2010.
  4. ^ a b Lewis, Charles (May 14, 2011). "The split in the United Church". National Post. Toronto. Archived from the original on July 13, 2012. Retrieved May 15, 2011.
  5. ^ Don Schweitzer United Church of Canada: a history, Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2011. ASIN 1554583314.
  6. ^ "Religions in Canada". Statscan. Archived from the original on October 2, 2022. Retrieved November 19, 2009. "The largest decline occurred among Presbyterians, whose numbers fell 36% to about 409,800. Pentecostals recorded the second largest decline, their numbers falling 15% to almost 369,500. The number of United Church adherents declined 8% to over 2.8 million; the number of Anglicans fell 7% to about 2.0 million; and the number reporting Lutheran dropped 5% to 606,600."
  7. ^ United Church Statistics The United Church of Canada Archived December 29, 2019, at the Wayback Machine
  8. ^ Government of Canada, Statistics Canada (October 26, 2022). "The Daily — The Canadian census: A rich portrait of the country's religious and ethnocultural diversity". www150.statcan.gc.ca. Retrieved November 29, 2022.
  9. ^ Kevin N. Flett, After evangelism: the sixties and the United Church of Canada, McGill- University Press, 2011

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