The Reformed churches are a group of Protestant denominations connected by a common Calvinist system of doctrine.
Europe Albania Reformed Church in Durrës mission of the PCA Emmanuel reformed church in Tirana Armenia Congregational Churches in Armenia Austria Reformed Church in Austria Evangelical Reformed Church (Westminster Confession) Azerbaijan International Presbyterian Church, Baku Belarus Belarusian Evangelical Reformed Church
Belgium United Protestant Church in Belgium
Bulgaria Union of Evangelical Congregational Churches in Bulgaria
Croatia The Reformed Christian Calvinist Church in Croatia was part of the Hungarian Reformed Church. It is a member of the World Communion of Reformed Churches. The Protestant Reformed Christian Church in Croatia is an Anglican church which split from the Reformed Christian Calvinist Church in Croatia in 2001.
Cyprus Greek Evangelical Church Trinity Community Christian Fellowship in Larnaca, Cyprus
Czech Republic Evangelical Church of Czech Brethren Church of the Brethren in the Czech Republic or Evangelical Brethren Church in the Czech Republic - Czech Republic and Slovakia
Denmark Reformed Synod of Denmark German Reformed of Copenhagen Reformed Congregation in Fredericia
Finland Christ Church of Oulu France In France, the Calvinist Protestants were called Huguenots. The Reformed Church of France survived under persecution from 1559 until the Edict of Nantes (1598), the effect of which was to establish regions in which Protestants could live unmolested. These areas became centers of political resistance under which the Calvinist church was protected until 1628, when La Rochelle, the Protestant center of resistance to Louis XIII, was overrun by a French army blockade. After the Protestant resistance failed, the Reformed Church of France reorganized, and was guaranteed toleration under the Edict of Nantes until the final revocation of toleration in 1685 (Edict of Fontainebleau). The periods of persecution scattered French Reformed refugees to England, Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands, Africa (especially South Africa), and America. Louis XVI granted an edict of toleration. Freedom of religion came with the French Revolution. Napoleon organized state controlled French Reformed church with the Organic Articles in 1802. A free (meaning, not state controlled) synod of the Reformed Church emerged in 1848 and survives in small numbers to the present time. The French refugees established French Reformed churches in the Latin countries and in America.
The first Calvinist churches in France produced the Gallic Confession and French Calvinist confession of faith, which served as models for the Belgic Confession of Faith (1563).
Today, about 300,000 people are members of the Reformed Church of France (now United Protestant Church of France). There is also the smaller Protestant Reformed Church of Alsace and Lorraine and the more conservative National Union of Independent Reformed Evangelical Churches of France (the name of the denomination was changed in 2009).
The Malagazy Protestant Church in France is a Calvinist denomination whose members come from Madagascar. The Union of Free Evangelical Churches in France is another denomination.
Germany The German Reformed Church (Reformierte Kirche) forms, together with German Lutheran and united Protestant churches, the umbrella named Protestant Church in Germany (German: Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland) or EKD. The member churches of EKD were formerly the Protestant state churches in German states before the separation of religion and state in 1919. EKD represents, alongside Catholicism, Germany's "mainstream" religious bodies.
The German Reformed Church, unusually, does not trace its origins back to Zwingli or Calvin, but rather to Philipp Melanchthon, Luther's best friend and closest ally. After Melanchthon's death in 1560, extremist Lutherans (from whom Luther had previously distanced himself) accused Melanchthon's successors in the "Philippist" cause of Crypto-Calvinism and mercilessly persecuted and sometimes killed them in several states, especially Saxony. Other states, such as Hesse(-Cassel), remained openly Philippist and Calvinist. Only during the time of Calvin (1509–1564) himself did genuinely Calvinist influences enter the German Calvinist faith; even today, it remains more Philippist than Calvinist.
In the German Empire (1871–1918) some states were Lutheran, some Reformed. King Frederick William III of Prussia united both major Protestant confessions in his domains into the Prussian Union of churches in 1817, allowing congregations to maintain Lutheran or Calvinist confession, or declare their union, also in Bremen (1877), Hesse-Cassel (1817), and Hesse-Darmstadt (1832) Reformed and Lutherans form a union merely in administration. Some states saw unions of Reformed and Lutherans to a united confession, such as Anhalt (1820 in Anhalt-Bernburg, 1827 in Anhalt-Dessau, and 1880 in Anhalt-Köthen), Baden (1821), Nassau (1817) and Bavarian Palatinate (1848), while Lutherans in other states (Bavaria proper, Hamburg, Hanover, Lübeck, the Mecklenburgs, Oldenburg, Saxon Duchies, Saxony, Schaumburg-Lippe, Schleswig-Holstein, and Württemberg) did not followed suit.
The German Reformed Church's finest hour arguably occurred during the Third Reich (1933–1945): although by far not all Calvinist clergy and their flocks opposed the Nazis, the Reformed Church dominated the Confessing Church resistance against Hitler.
As of 2009, German Protestants come in four different guises, all under one national umbrella, but differentiated by region (Landeskirche, usually regions smaller than the states):
Lutheran Calvinist, namely Evangelical Reformed Church in Bavaria and Northwestern Germany (comprising Reformed congregations in all areas, where Lutherans and Reformed did not unite, but Lippe), and Church of Lippe Administration-United - in these churches, each parish is either Lutheran, Reformed or united Protestant, and so is the congregation and the Pastor, but all share the same administration Consensus-United - there is no difference even at the parish level
In Germany, as of 2009, roughly 25 million Germans (less than one-third of the entire population, slightly more than half of German Christians) are Protestant. Of these, less than 2 million are Calvinist. The main coordinating body for Calvinist churches in Germany is the Reformed Alliance.
Smaller, separate denominations include the Evangelical Old-Reformed Church in Lower Saxony, the Union of Evangelical Reformed Churches in Germany, and the episcopally governed Free Reformed Churches of Germany.
Great Britain and Ireland The churches with Presbyterian traditions in the United Kingdom have the Westminster Confession of Faith as one of their important confessional documents. United Reformed Church (URC) in the United Kingdom is the result of the union of Presbyterian, Congregational and Church of Christ churches Several hundred Congregational churches opted to remain outside the initial 1972 union, forming the Evangelical Fellowship of Congregational Churches and the Congregational Federation. Some congregations were gathered into the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches whilst others are now wholly independent without any national affiliation. The Evangelical Presbyterian Church in England and Wales has currently 17 congregations The International Presbyterian Church has English and Korean congregations in Great Britain and missions in Romania, Italy and Armenia and in other parts of the world. Metropolitan Tabernacle-a famous independent Reformed Baptist congregation pastored by Spurgeon -not a denomination
In Wales, there are the Union of Welsh Independents, which is another congregational body. The Presbyterian Church of Wales is one of the biggest Christian denomination in Wales.
In Scotland, presbyterianism was established in 1560 by John Knox who studied in Geneva and planted Calvinism in his home country. The presbyterian churches in the Canada, Australia, New Zealand trace their origin back primarily from Scotland.
The Presbyterian churches in Scotland, including: The Church of Scotland, the established, national church in Scotland Free Church of Scotland Free Church of Scotland (Continuing) United Free Church of Scotland Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland Reformed Presbyterian Church of Scotland Associated Presbyterian Churches Didasko
In Ulster, Northern Ireland and The Republic of Ireland spread the Calvinist faith in the 17th century. The Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland The Presbyterian Church in Ireland serves the whole of the island There are also other churches with smaller flocks, notably in Northern Ireland The Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster The Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Ireland Non-subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland Congregational Union of Ireland
A group of churches called Newfrontiers began in England and also exists elsewhere in the world. This group tends to hold to Calvinist theology, but is also charismatic in its experience.
Anglicanism Historically, the Church of England upheld both Lutheran and Calvinist doctrines.Matthews, W.R. The Thirty-Nine Articles. London: Hodder & Stoughton. 1961. (Matthews acknowledged the Calvinism of the Articles while disagreeing with them.) Several continental Calvinist theologians moved to England to aid with the doctrinal and liturgical developments there, including Martin Bucer, Peter Martyr, and Jan Łaski. Especially Calvinistic distinctions of the Church of England include the division of the Ten Commandments after the Calvinist numbering (rather than the Lutheran or Catholic division), the iconoclastic reforms of Edward VI and Elizabeth I, and the Eucharistic doctrine of Receptionism. The Church of England so took part in the Synod of Dort, and monarchs since the Glorious Revolution have sworn in the coronation oath to protect the “true profession of the Gospel, and the Protestant Reformed religion established by law.”
However, the ascendency of William Laud to the archbishopric saw a periodic suppression of pro-Calvinist clergymen under Charles I, and the Oxford Movement of the 19th century sought to further distance the Church of England from its Calvinistic ties. Because of the political success of Anglo-Catholicism there have been a few conservative Reformed movements which have left the Church of England:
The Free Church of England The Countess of Huntingdon's Connexion The Church of England (Continuing)
Greece Greek Evangelical Church Congregational Churches in Greece
Hungary The Reformed Church in Hungary, Transylvania and southern Slovakia is one of the largest branches of the Calvinist movement. The Reformed Church is the second largest church in Hungary, it has 4 seminaries in the country (Debrecen, Papa, Budapest, Sarospatak). The Hungarian Reformed Church adopted the Heidelberg Catechism and the Second Helvetic Confession as a definition of their teaching, together the Ecumenical creeds of the Christian Church: Athanasian Creed, Nicene Creed, Chalcedon, and the common creed ("Apostles' Creed"). The Hungarians organised the Calvinist church in 1557 in the Synod of Csenger and adopted the Second Helvetic Confession in 1567 in Debrecen.
The Hungarian Reformed Church maintains educational institutions, almost 80 primary schools, 28 high schools, 47 nurseries and several vocational schools and the Bethesda Hospital. There are diaconal institutions and conference centres.
In 2001, more than 1.6 million people in Hungary identified as members of the Hungarian Reformed Church. Of that number, about 600,000 are considered active members, in 1,249 congregations. The HRC has 27 presbyteries, four districts and a General Synod. In Romania, 700,000 people identified as Calvinist in 800 congregations, nearly all of them ethnic Hungarians living in Transylvania.