sakrilege

I am socializing with people from a nondenominational church. The topic of religion hasn't been broached yet but when it does I'm hoping to be somewhat prepared. My question is can nondenominational beliefs be categorized? I was raised catholic so have only a smattering of experience with protestants in general.

Thanks for any insight.

Susan

frostymama

I can only speak from my personal experience. Every "non denominational" church that I have been to has sort of been like a mix of Assemblies of God and really toned down Pentacostal. Oddly enough all of the churches that have been labeled as "Community" have been fairly similar to some type of liberal Baptists or Methodists.

Amos

It tells me that they want to be sly like foxes because they are telling tell you that they only have the goodness from religion and no bad influences from history or tradition.

HelenM

My church is non-denominational. It simply means they aren't part of a denomination. I.e. there's only one of them (or maybe they might have one or two offshoot churches, in a few cases, but that's about it).

As best I know non-denominational churches are typically relatively conservative in belief i.e. they believe the Bible is true, that everyone who doesn't believe in Jesus is going to hell etc.

I don't know of any liberal Christian non-denominational churches.

A group being non-denominational might mean they are very extreme or separatist but often it is simply a historical thing, that there was no church in town which was quite in line with what a group of Christians was looking for so they started their own church.

Some are Pentecostal/Charismatic, like frostymama said, but many are not.

The biggest non-denominational church in Chicagoland is Willow Creek Community Church - which is non-denominational. I wouldn't call it liberal since they believe the Bible is true and only people who believe in Jesus are saved. However, in their methods they are quite 'low-key', having deliberately tried to aim their weekend services at people who aren't Christians, and having worked to eliminate elements from those services that they determined were most annoying to non-Christians.

(But that doesn't mean that people here wouldn't find their services annoying... )

love
Helen

sakrilege

frostymama wrote ...
I got this feeling when one of the young adults talked about attending bible college.


HelenM wrote ...
Ditto above. Are bible colleges denominational? Are there nondenominational bible colleges?


My understanding of the church I'm dealing with fits into this category.


Other than the bible college statement I haven't been able to categorize them. I'm not ready to ask to discuss religion with my acquaintances yet.


This is also consistent with my experience with them.

Helen, just curious, how did you become associated with your particular church?

Susan

[ September 11, 2002: Message edited by: sakrilege ]

[ September 11, 2002: Message edited by: sakrilege ]</p>

RJS

Non-Denominational usually describes a Protestant church that is bible-based and believes that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and is Lord and Saviour.

It is not generally used to describe something that is more Pentecostal in nature.

I think Helen's description of Willow Creek is very good - it is the largest church in the US, btw.

<a href="http://www.willowcreek.org" target="_blank">www.willowcreek.org</a>

or for their beliefs (which is pretty good characterization of non-denominational)

<a href="http://www.willowcreek.org/what_we_believe.asp" target="_blank">http://www.willowcreek.org/what_we_believe.asp</a>

[ September 11, 2002: Message edited by: RJS ]</p>

Corwin

As a good rule of thumb, 'nondenominational' churches are churches that have been thrown out of a more traditional denomination for being to wacked out fascist right wing. On the liberal side... I think UU's and congregationalists are considered more or less nondenominational... (not so sure on that one.)

Nondenominational churches are like talking to the fundamentalists who claim to not have a religion. You know the ones... 'Religion is bad... I don't have a religion I have a RELATIONSHIP...' (I still don't know where that one came from, if anyone can enlighten me please go ahead...)

HelenM

That would be a typical thing for someone from a non-denominational church to say.

But it's also typical of Christians in denominations that are Bible-believing/relatively conservative.

Susan, the people who lived down the hall from me at college went to a non-denominational church (that was Charismatic/Pentecostal, fwiw) and when I became a Christian I went to church with them...and I've been in non-denominational churches ever since.

I didn't think Willow Creek was the biggest church in America - I thought there were a few bigger ones still. But maybe I'm wrong. Or maybe the count is based on Willow Creek itself plus some affiliated churches who belong to the Willow Creek Association.

Helen

p.s. Corwinhere's a website page about "having a relationship with God"

<a href="http://www.promisekeepers.org/meet/meet10.htm" target="_blank">Personally Meet Jesus</a>

[ September 11, 2002: Message edited by: HelenM ]</p>

Corwin

It's typical, and it's annoying as all hell.

Of course I usually respond to it with 'Oh... ok... I guess we can ban your organization then. After all... it doesn't say Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of relationship, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...'



(morons)

HelenM

I just added a link to my post for you in case you wanted to read more about what Christians believe re: 'a relationship with Jesus'

Maybe you didn't though...

Helen