United Evangelical Church in Poland
Former religious organization in Poland / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The United Evangelical Church of the Polish People's Republic was a religious organization existing from 1947 to 1988, comprising five Polish Protestant communities characterized by evangelical piety and the practice of baptizing only those who were conscious of their faith. Two of them had a Pentecostal character. During the Polish People's Republic period, it was the largest evangelical church in Poland – the second largest denomination of this profile at the time was the Baptist Christian Church of the Republic of Poland. Since 1967, the church's headquarters had been located at Zagórna Street in Warsaw. Until 1953, the church was a federation, within which each group retained its distinctiveness; in 1953, these distinctions were abolished. In 1981, the United Evangelical Church returned to a federative structure.
United Evangelical Church of the Polish People's Republic | |
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Zjednoczony Kościół Ewangeliczny w Polskiej Rzeczypospolitej Ludowej | |
Type | Congregationalism Synod |
Classification | Christianity |
Theology | Protestantism Evangelicalism |
Region | Polish People's Republic |
Founder | Interim Committee of the Union of Evangelical Churches in Poland |
Origin | May 24–26, 1947 Ustroń |
Defunct | May 22, 1987 Warsaw |
Number of followers | 17,100 |
The first post-war unification initiatives among evangelical Christians in Poland emerged as early as 1945 when the Baptist Christian Church of the Republic of Poland was founded, bringing together various strands, but within the next two years, all groups withdrew from it, leaving only the Baptists. Soon after, a new unification initiative emerged, resulting in the establishment of the United Evangelical Church in 1947. Initially, three churches belonged to it, and from 1953, five. In 1956, some of the former Union of Evangelical Christians' congregations attempted to leave the United Evangelical Church and appealed to the authorities to legalize their association. The authorities responded with repression, and the congregations were forced to return to the United Evangelical Church. The "Lublin group" resisted the longest, until the late 1960s. Until 1975, Free Christians (Plymouth Brethren) dominated, and from 1981, Pentecostals. The change in the political situation after 1980 allowed the individual confessions to become subjects within one church. In 1981, a group of Free Christians left, forming a separate religious association called the Church of Free Christians of the Polish People's Republic. From then on, the United Evangelical Church encompassed four communities. In 1987, at the church's last synod, it was decided to dissolve the United Evangelical Church. Towards the end of its existence, it exceeded 17,000 believers, with the largest numerical growth occurring in the 1980s. As a result of its dissolution, four separate churches were formed: the Church of Christians of the Evangelical Faith in the Republic of Poland, the Church of Evangelical Christians, the Church of Christ Congregations, and the Pentecostal Church in Poland.
The basic unit in the United Evangelical Church was an autonomous congregation with legal personality. The congregation had the right to decide on the admission or exclusion of its own members. Among the Church's major achievements were the construction of a central chapel in Warsaw, the establishment of a Home for the Elderly in Ostróda, and publishing activities, including the publication of the monthly magazine Chrześcijanin. The United Evangelical Church was a member of the Polish Ecumenical Council.[1]