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Updated: May 11, 2025
In 1847 the hitherto separated synods of various dissenting bodies came together as United Presbyterians, and in 1902 they united with the Free Church as "the United Free Church," while a small minority, mainly Highland, of the former Free Church, now retains that title, and apparently represents Knoxian ideals.
In addition there are some forty classical academies, under the care of different Synods and Presbyteries, which have over 3,000 students, and property whose net value is over $1,000,000. Fourteen theological seminaries are scattered over the country, with more than 1,200 students. These have property and endowments amounting to $8,164,762.
The characteristics of Congregationalism during its first quarter of a century upon New England soil were: the clearly defined independence or self-government of the local churches; the fellowship of the churches; the development of large and authoritative powers in the eldership; a more exact definition of the functions of synods, a definite limitation of their authority; and, finally, a recognition of the authority of the civil magistrates in religious affairs generally, and of their control in special cases arising within individual churches.
The Lutheran loyalty and determination of the Henkels over against the unionistic and Reformed tendencies within the North Carolina Synod led to the organization of the Tennessee Synod, July 17, 1820, a synod which espoused the cause of pure Lutheranism, and zealously opposed the enthusiastic, unionistic, and Reformed aberrations then prevalent in all other Lutheran synods of America.
Their contendings issued in breach of organic fellowship in 1840. Indeed the sister-hood which had subsisted for many years among the Synods east and west of the Atlantic ocean, was violated in 1833; when the rupture took place in the Synod of America, by the elopement of the declining party, who are since known by alliance with the civil institutions of the United States.
"The committee of the Lutheran and Reformed Synods to consider the matter relating to a theological seminary have prepared a plan for this purpose, and carefully examined the same, and found that such a theological seminary would be not only exceedingly useful for our youth preparing for the ministerial office, but also can easily be established.
Leovigild, the Gothic monarch of Spain, deserved the respect of his enemies, and the love of his subjects; the Catholics enjoyed a free toleration, and his Arian synods attempted, without much success, to reconcile their scruples by abolishing the unpopular rite of a second baptism.
Any new plan that makes a man quit his sin, and that prostrates a wrong, I am as much in favor of as though all the doctors, and the bishops, and the archbishops, and the synods, and the academical gownsmen of Christianity sanctioned it. The temple of Berith must come down, and I do not care how it comes. Still further, I learn from this subject the power of example.
The rules, so often repeated because so frequently broken, respecting the inalienability of Church property, were to be specially watched, and also the celebration, as prescribed, of yearly synods.
When, in 1824, some members of the North Carolina Synod made proposals for a union of the two synods, Tennessee forthwith appointed a committee to negotiate with them. In this way they hoped to enable every one to decide for himself which party taught according to the Augsburg Confession.
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