The United Church of Christ Is Running Out of People—and Pastors

The UCC is a really interesting denomination because it was once a genuine powerhouse in American Protestantism. The UCC was formed in 1957 through a merger of two older traditions—the Congregational Christian Churches and the Evangelical and Reformed Church. And for the record, Congregationalism mattered a lot in early American history. In The American Religious Landscape, I make the point that Congregationalists likely represented the single largest religious tradition during the Revolutionary era. Today, the UCC is best understood as a mashup of Congregational polity—especially its strong emphasis on local church autonomy—and German Reformed theology. It’s one of the so-called...