The Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is an

Old Catholic The terms Old Catholic Church, Old Catholics, Old-Catholic churches or Old Catholic movement designate "any of the groups of Western Christians who believe themselves to maintain in complete loyalty the doctrine and traditions of the Great Chu ...

denomination in

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

. This denomination is part of the

Union of Utrecht (Old Catholic) The Union of Utrecht of the Old Catholic Churches, most commonly referred to by the short form Union of Utrecht, is a federation of Old Catholic churches, nationally organized from schisms which rejected Roman Catholic doctrines of the First ...

Recent developments

In 1871 the Zürich Catholic community planned to build a church to commemorate the 1270s Augustinian abbey church. As the whole community was excommunicated from the Catholic Church for refusing to accept the

First Vatican Council The First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the First Vatican Council or Vatican I was convoked by Pope Pius IX on 29 June 1868, after a period of planning and preparation that began on 6 December 1864. This, the twentieth ecu ...

, the Augustinerkirche at the Münzplatz became its present parish church. Ferdinand Stadler (1813–1870), an architect born in Zürich, was charged with the construction of a new church building. In February 2000, Denise Wyss was

ordained Ordination is the process by which individuals are consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the denominational hierarchy composed of other clergy) to perform ...

, within the Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland, as the first female

priest of

. Between 1970 and 1990, the membership of the Christian Catholic Church decreased from 20,268 to only 11,748 members. Data from the last censuses show that the aging of the population is a much greater problem for the Christian Catholic Church than for the other national churches. However, contrary to the trend of church departures from the two large national churches, the Christian Catholic Church has again recorded a constant increase in membership since 1990. Between 1990 and 2000, the number of members grew by over 13% from 11,748 to 13,312. In 2009,

Bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ...

Harald Rein was elected as the head of the church. Prior to this, he served as a parish priest and as

vicar general A vicar general (previously, archdeacon) is the principal deputy of the bishop of a diocese for the exercise of administrative authority and possesses the title of local ordinary. As vicar of the bishop, the vicar general exercises the bishop ...

of the church. On September 12, 2009, he was consecrated in Zurich by

Archbishop In Christian denominations, an archbishop is a bishop of higher rank or office. In most cases, such as the Catholic Church, there are many archbishops who either have jurisdiction over an ecclesiastical province in addition to their own archdio ...

Joris Vercammen of Utrecht. In August 2020,

same-sex marriages Same-sex marriage, also known as gay marriage, is the marriage of two people of the same sex or gender. marriage between same-sex couples is legally performed and recognized in 33 countries, with the most recent being Mexico, constitutin ...

were allowed in Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland.

Ecumenism

In ecumenism, the Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is a member at the national level of the Association of Christian Churches in Switzerland, and at the international level of the

Conference of European Churches The Conference of European Churches (CEC) was founded in 1959 to promote reconciliation, dialogue and friendship between the churches of Europe at a time of growing Cold War political tensions and divisions. In its commitment to Europe as a who ...

and the

World Council of Churches The World Council of Churches (WCC) is a worldwide Christian inter-church organization founded in 1948 to work for the cause of ecumenism. Its full members today include the Assyrian Church of the East, the Oriental Orthodox Churches, most ju ...

. At the national level, the Dialogue Commission of the Christian Catholic and Roman Catholic Churches in Switzerland (CRGK) has existed since 1966. At the international level, within the framework of the ecumenical dialogues of the Union of Utrecht, the Christian Catholic Church was represented in the E. Orthodox-Old Catholic Dialogue at all meetings from 1975 to 1987; in the International Roman Catholic-Old Catholic Dialogue Commission (IRAD), the Christian Catholic bishop exercised the function of co-president from 2004 to 2009. Christian Catholic theologians are also significantly involved in the current (international) dialogue commissions of the Union of Utrecht for Dialogue with Rome, with the

Ecumenical Patriarchate The Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople ( el, Οἰκουμενικὸν Πατριαρχεῖον Κωνσταντινουπόλεως, translit=Oikoumenikón Patriarkhíon Konstantinoupóleos, ; la, Patriarchatus Oecumenicus Constanti ...

, the

Church of Sweden The Church of Sweden ( sv, Svenska kyrkan) is an Evangelical Lutheran national church in Sweden. A former state church, headquartered in Uppsala, with around 5.6 million members at year end 2021, it is the largest Christian denomination in Sw ...

, and the Mar Thoma Church of India.

Church buildings

The episcopal Church of the denomination has been St. Peter and Paul in Bern since 1875. Another church buildings is the

Augustinerkirche Zürich Augustinerkirche was once one of the five main churches in the old town of Zürich, Switzerland, together with Fraumünster, Grossmünster, Predigern and St. Peter's. First built around 1270 as a Romanesque church belonging to the Augustinian ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Christian Catholic Church Of Switzerland Members of the World Council of Churches Old Catholicism in Switzerland Union of Utrecht of the Old Catholic Churches