Church of South India

Church of South India

In this blog post, we will see the short history of the Church of South India. But before that, we discuss Christian Higher Education Institutions

Christian Education

Through the start of the 20th century; a number of Christian academic institutions got set up in the higher education subject. Many young Indians showed fantastic interest in western education. Because of that, the people attracted to those institutions. It no longer most effectively furnished them the opportunity to get a western better education; but also delivered people of different denominations, languages, and cultures.

Interactions and fellowship among them brought about the sensation of oneness in Christ regardless of their Denominational variations. One of the distinguished institutions in this regard changed into the one; that started with the aid of the Scottish Presbyterians in 1837.

Later it came to be called Madras Christian College (MCC). In 1910 it got reorganized as a union group and the Wesleyan Methodists; and the Anglicans have become the assisting bodies. Women’s Christian College (WCC) and Christian Clinical University (CCU), Vellore are other examples.

The formation of these higher education establishments also introduced a weather of oneness; and co-operation and furnished an atmosphere for people of diverse denominations to come together.

Rise of Nationalism

The rise of Indian nationalism was a contributing factor to the development of Ecumenism and union movements in India.  Nationalism brought members of Indian churches into a single political unit with common religious and social life.

Church of South India (CSI)

Church of South India (CSI)

Whilst the Church of South India (CSI) inaugurated on 27th September 1947; it changed into acclaimed as the maximum tremendous occasion in the Church Union Movement; because for the primary time after centuries of historical divisions; churches with Episcopal and Non­ Episcopal ministries had been brought together in a united Episcopal Church.

In Church of South India (CSI) has four distinctive Church traditions, they are Anglican (Episcopal), Congregational, Presbyterian, and Methodist. These types of churches had been hooked up in India through the missionary work of Church buildings in Europe. America and Australia had begun their work in India at different from the start of the eighteenth century.

Anglican Church

The Anglican Church changed into established through the paintings of the Church Missionary Society (CMS) and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (SPG), both closely related to the Church of England.

The Congregational Churches set up through the missionary activities of the London missionary with missionaries from extraordinary Britain and Australia, and the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Mission (ABCFM).

Presbyterian Church

The Presbyterian Churches were buildings through the work of the Church of Scotland Mission. The American’s Dutch reformed Church and Switzerland and Germany’s Basel Mission; also had connections with the Presbyterian Churches in England and Australia. The Methodist Church becomes established through the Methodist Missionary Society of the Methodist Church in notable Britain.

With the growth of nationalism during the latter part of the 19th century, there advanced among Indian Christians also a problem for self-reliance and independence. There was further the developing attention that the divisions some of the Churches in India had not the making of Christians in India, but introduced by way of the specific missions from abroad.

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Numerous efforts had made to bring about a united, indigenous Christian Church in India free from dependence on denominational links with churches in the west. None of these had lasting consequences.

However, confronted with the project of the mission frontier and the need for higher credibility; the churches began themselves to be increasingly aware of the scandal of disunity and sought ways of overcoming it. As end result, exceptional kinds of mergers or unions amongst churches have been beginning to take vicinity.

In October 1901, a Federal Union passed off between the Presbyterian missions in South India, the United Free Church of Scotland Mission, the American Arcot Mission of the American Dutch Reformed Church, and the Basel Mission.

You can read the short history of the Church of North India

Form of South India United Church

The Congregational churches of the American Board Missions in South India, and the London Missionary Society in Jaffna and South India came together in a Federal Union In 1904. The Presbyterian and the Congregational came together in 1904 and form the South India United Church (S.I.U.C.).

Lambeth Quadrilateral

Pretty early inside the negotiations, it becomes agreed that the Lambeth Quadrilateral will be the first foundation for the union of the churches. This supposed that the 4 basic concepts might be:

  • (1) The Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament as containing all matters important to salvation and because the ultimate and decisive preferred of faith;
  • (2) The Apostles ‘Creed and the Nicene creed as witnessing to and safeguarding this faith.
  • (3) The Baptism and the Lord’s Supper are the two sacraments, and
  • (4) The ordained ministry with the ancient episcopate.

The first three could be widespread with none controversial questions. But the fourth became tricky because of the fact that even as the Anglican Church had the ancient episcopate; and all its ministers have ordained by using the Episcopal laying on of the hand.

The opposite Churches within the negotiations did no longer have an Episcopalian ordained ministry.

Finally, a settlement reached that into this point as God had blessed all of the ministries with undistinguishing regard; all who were already ordained in any of the uniting churches could be acquired as ministers inside the United Church; and that all new ordinations might be via the Episcopal laying on of hands.

Conclusion (Church of South India)

After, twenty years took the agreement. In 1941, the Methodists gave their votes. The overall Council of the Church of India, Burma and Ceylon gave their consent for the four Anglican dioceses in South India in the year of 1945, to enter the Union. The general assembly of the South India United Church determined to accept the scheme in 1946. For these decisions the Church of South India inaugurated on 27th September 1947.