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The English Covenant was a proposed merger in
England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
of the
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
, the
Methodist Church Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related Christian denomination, denominations of Protestantism, Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John W ...
, the
United Reformed Church The United Reformed Church (URC) is a Protestant Christian church in the United Kingdom. As of 2022 it has approximately 40,000 members in 1,284 congregations with 334 stipendiary ministers. Origins and history The United Reformed Church resulte ...
(URC), and the
Moravian Church The Moravian Church ( cs, Moravská církev), or the Moravian Brethren, formally the (Latin: "Unity of the Brethren"), is one of the oldest Protestantism, Protestant Christian denomination, denominations in Christianity, dating back to the Bohem ...
. First published as an
ecumenical Ecumenism (), also spelled oecumenism, is the concept and principle that Christians who belong to different Christian denominations should work together to develop closer relationships among their churches and promote Christian unity. The adjec ...
initiative in 1980 after extensive discussions in the 1970s, it eventually failed because the Church of England rejected the covenant in 1982. In 1972, a Churches' Unity Commission was set up by church leaders. The commission published ''Ten Propositions on Visible Unity'' in 1976, and suggested the creation of the Churches Council for Covenanting (for Unity). Responding to this document, five churches agreed to proceed with a plan for unity – the Church of England, the Methodist Church, the URC, and the Moravian Church, and
Churches of Christ The Churches of Christ is a loose association of autonomous Christian congregations based on the ''sola scriptura'' doctrine. Their practices are based on Bible texts and draw on the early Christian church as described in the New Testament. T ...
(which merged with the URC in 1981). The plan was generally welcomed by the Methodist Church. The URC, an ecumenically-spirited denomination created in the same year as the commission, approved the initiative and sought to reorganize itself accordingly up to 1982. However, in the same year, the
General Synod of the Church of England The General Synod is the tricameral deliberative and legislative organ of the Church of England. The synod was instituted in 1970, replacing the Church Assembly, and is the culmination of a process of rediscovering self-government for the Church ...
failed to secure the required two-thirds
supermajority A supermajority, supra-majority, qualified majority, or special majority is a requirement for a proposal to gain a specified level of support which is greater than the threshold of more than one-half used for a simple majority. Supermajority ru ...
in the
House of Clergy The House of Clergy is the middle house in the tricameral Church of England General Synod legislature. It consists of representatives of the ordained clergy of the Church of England. Composition The House of Clergy comprises ordained members o ...
, even though the other two chambers of the synod had approved the plan.


See also

*
Anglican Communion and ecumenism Anglican interest in ecumenical dialogue can be traced back to the time of the Reformation and dialogues with both Orthodox and Lutheran churches in the sixteenth century. In the nineteenth century, with the rise of the Oxford Movement, there ...
* Churches Together in England *
Local ecumenical partnership In England and Wales, a local ecumenical partnership (or project) is a partnership between churches of different denominations. First piloted in 1964, over 850 now exist to promote unity between different Christian denominations. The missiolo ...
*
Synod of Whitby In the Synod of Whitby in 664, King Oswiu of Northumbria ruled that his kingdom would calculate Easter and observe the monastic tonsure according to the customs of Rome rather than the customs practiced by Irish monks at Iona and its satellite ins ...
(664) *
Westminster Assembly The Westminster Assembly of Divines was a council of Divinity (academic discipline), divines (theologians) and members of the English Parliament appointed from 1643 to 1653 to restructure the Church of England. Several Scots also attended, and ...
(1643 to 1653)


References


External links


Churches' Council for Covenanting , The National Archives
History of Christianity in England Protestant ecumenism United and uniting churches {{Christianity-stub