Church and Sect

Church and sect

Characteristics of free churches

Different types of free churches

The Pentecostals

As a world wide order we as Secular Franciscans often come into contact with Christians of other denominations. In some parts of the world this has always been part of everyday life, while in other areas the marked presence of other Christian denominations is a relatively new phenomenon.

In two articles in the Bulletin (1997, issues 3 and 4) we gave a brief introduction to one of the major non-Catholic Christian churches, the Lutheran Church. As a follow-up to those articles we here present a brief overview of the phenomenon of free churches and sects. The field is vast, so the description will necessarily be of a very summary nature. Nevertheless, since ecumenism is on the agenda of the Catholic Church at large, we as an official order are obliged to be at least informed about our fellow Christians, however sketchy this information may be. In the areas where the Christian presence is traditionally Roman Catholic, and where another Christian presence in the form of sects is a result of a relatively recent development, it may also be useful for our members to be prepared to identify these movements and understand their mode of existence. Since many Christian sects have arisen out of a free church context, it is easier to understand the phenomenon of sects if we understand what characterises the free churches, and how they differ from our own experience and understanding of being Church.

Church and sect

All agree that it is very important to distinguish between churches and sects, but in spite of this the demarcation line is not completely clear. Free churches are numerous, and one free church differs from another in structure as well as doctrine, but it is nevertheless possible to sum up certain characteristics of the self understanding of a free church. Since the same characteristics are found in many of the Christian sects, mingled with other elements, it might be useful to give an overview of these characteristics.

Characteristics of free churches

a. Choice

Free churches have often developed out of the principle that being Christian represents a voluntary conscious choice. Hence they often arose as a movement within a state church or a dominant folk church. The foundational ideal for these churches was and is the ancient form of congregation as described in the Acts of the Apostles, and hence some free churches reject baptism of infants and passive members.

b. Independence

As a fundamental choice the free churches insist on being free of any binding or dependence, particularly with regard to the state, but also freedom from dependence on any institution outside their communities. This means that these churches are financially independent, this being a consequence of the fundamental choice of their membership.

c. Congregation as church

The free churches understand their mode of being church not as an institution with a hierarchy of ministries and corresponding administration. In fact some of them reject the name "church" altogether. In the free churches the individual congregation of faithful is the real church In this respect they follow the tendency initiated by the Reformation to see congregation as a creation of the word of God. Each individual congregation is thus largely autonomous, and congregations form federations on a voluntary principle.

d. The common priesthood of the baptised

The free churches have ministers or pastors, but no order of priesthood. They consistently uphold the principle of the common priesthood of the baptised. Hence the service or ministry given by pastors or trained preachers is not constitutive, while the congregation of the faithful is. In this respect the free churches differ from the Lutheran Church for example, which acknowledges a separate pastoral ministry as constitutive.

e. Missionary character

An important concern for free church congregations is mission, particularly in the sense of religious revival: reviving people to a personal following of Christ in the congregation and also to the diaconal aspect of the Christian vocation: help to the poor and needy. Free churches do conduct mission work amongst non-Christians, but in principle originally Christian but now largely secularised countries are considered as the primary missionary field. Their call to make a decision for the faith is often addressed to the baptised who do not live an active life of faith in their own church.

f. Devotion and discipline

The characteristic devotion of the free churches requires of the individual a personal confession of faith, and the free decision to follow the way of Christ is often expressed in terms of spiritual rebirth. In some churches this is connected with baptism or even a second baptism. (It is important to remember that baptism as a sacramental rite has a limited meaning in most free churches. The important thing is confessing Jesus Christ and beginning a new life in the faith. Without this re-birth baptism as "sacrament" has little value for them. Sacraments do not play a great role in Free church Christianity in general.)

The decision to live a life of faith, or conversion as we might call it, is often a sudden event, and the re-born is expected to live a life of unlimited and conscious surrender to the message of Jesus Christ and to show a will to be part of a community of saints. The person who decides to become a member of a free church will feel fully and personally responsible for this church, including the financial aspects.

Different types of free churches

Free churches are of different kinds, and the six characteristics mentioned here must of course be differentiated and supplemented with individual traits. It is not within the scope of this article, however, to describe individual free churches, but it may be helpful to an understanding of them to distinguish two or three groups:
-- the Baptists (different types);
-- the churches that have arisen out of revival movements (e.g. Methodists, originally an 18th century revival movement within the Anglican Church), and
-- a third group whose status as church is doubtful (e.g. Quakers, -- 17th century -- and the Salvation Army -- 19th century).

Interestingly, all the four communities mentioned here started in England within the Anglican Church, or as a reaction to it. The Baptists referred to in this connection is the church that originated in England in the 17th century and later grew to become the largest free church in the US with about 35 million members. There are other Baptist free churches of an older date, originating in the German speaking area, and the inspiration probably wandered to England from there.

The Pentecostals

It is debatable whether the Pentecostals should be included in the paragraph above under type 2. The Pentecostals began as a movement, and parts of this movement now see themselves as a church or as churches. From the Pentecostals have arisen many of the sects we are going to refer to later; and the Pentecostal presence is now the largest Protestant reality on the Latin-American continent.

With the established free churches it is possible and profitable to carry on an ecumenical dialogue, while the same thing can hardly be said for the sects. An official dialogue has been carried on between the Roman Catholic Church and the World Council of Baptists in the 1980s and with that of the Methodists in 1967, and the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity has conducted three dialogues with the Pentecostal churches in the years 1972-1989.