89 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
United States
confirmation. There are, on the contrary, thousands of grown persons who have not been baptized; but there are comparatively few who hold themselves entirely aloof from all church attendance and from all contributions for religious purposes. And the churches independent of State control are more particular as to the conduct and beliefs of their members than State churches are; so that the churches of America are more faithful to their avowed principles than the mother churchesin Europe. The different churches are, almost without exception, dependent entirely upon voluntary subscriptions and contributions. The most prominent exceptions are Trinity Church (Episcopalian) and the Collegiate Church (Reformed Dutch), both in New York City, which have inherited property from the colonial period. But, speaking generally, the churches look to their membership for the means to carry on their work and for support of their ministers. The theological seminaries are the foundations of churches or individuals. The minister’s salary is paid by the pewrents or collections. Voluntary payments support Bible, tract, and other societies, and send out colporteurs and missionaries in city and country. It is considered a general duty and privilege to support religion as a necessary and useful element of society. The average salary of ministers in the United States is about $800; of theological professors, $1,500. A few ministers in large cities receive from $5,000 to $15,000. The voluntary system has its drawbacks, especially in the new congregations formed of immigrants who are accustomed to the European system of State support. But, on the other hand, it promotes liberality and individual enterprise; and the result is a yearly increase in churches, ministers, and ecclesiastical organizations of all sorts, while the old are maintained with vigor. On the average, it is said, each minister serves a thousand souls; but, of course, there is great disproportion. This free, self-regulated, and self-supported Christianity and church existence is one of the most characteristic features, and one of the greatest glories, of the United States, and constitutes a new leaf in church history; but it has its antecedents in the first three centuries and in the history of dissenters and free churches in Europe.
IV. Leading Denominations: For denominational history and statistics see the articles on the denominations in this work. Almost all American denominations are of European origin; but those which in Europe are divided by geographical and political boundaries are in the United States found thrown together. In England there are as many sects as in the United States; but all Christians outside the Church of England are classed together as dissenters. In America, there being no State Church, there can be no dissenters. Churches of many denominations are found in all the large cities. Thus in the city of New York, which has a population of 4,766,883, there are 1,600 congregations, of different nationalities and creeds, each of which has its church or regular place of meeting. This is one church to 2,090 of the population. Twenty-five years ago the ratio was one church to 2,413.
The American denominations may be divided into three groups: (1) the Evangelical churches;
i.e., those which stand upon the principles of the Reformation theology, and accept the Bible as the sole guide of faith and life, and the confessions of the sixteenth or seventeenth centuries as a rule of public teaching. They embrace the great majority of the Christian population, and exert the strongest influence upon society. The Protestant Episcopal Church is the oldest, dating from 1607, the year of the settlement of Virginia; next come the Congregationalists, from the landing of the Pilgrims (1620); then the Reformed (Dutch), from 1628, the year of the formation of the first congregation in New York City. The first prominent Baptist in America was Roger Williams (q.v.), the founder of Rhode Island, 1636. The Quakers date from 1680; and the Methodists, from 1766. The German churches, in their organized state, date from the middle of the last century. Among them the Lutheran Church is by far the largest and most influential; then come the German Reformed, the Evangelical United, and the Moravians. A considerable number of Germans belong to the different branches of the Methodist Church, which also sends missionaries to Germany. (2) The Roman Catholic Church was a century ago inconsiderable, but, through the enormous immigration, now outnumbers any other single denomination. Yet it does not keep pace with the Roman Catholic migration, which is reported to form more than one-half of the total immigration to the United States. The emigration from Ireland is predominantly, that from Germany largely, and that from southern Europe almost exclusively Roman Catholic. (3) A third class consists of those denominations which reject the doctrines of the ecumenical creeds and the confessions of the Reformation churches, and strike out in new paths. Among these are the Unitarians, whose headquarters are in Boston and Cambridge, who are distinguished by high literary and social culture and active philanthropy; the Universalists, who teach as one of the three articles of their creed the ultimate restoration of all men to holiness and happiness; and the Swedenborgians, who believe in the divine mission of the great Swedish seer, and accept his revelations of the spirit-world.
V. Theological Education: This differs with the different denominations. It is carried on in Theological Seminaries (q.v.), endowed and supported by free gifts. Each denomination of importance has one or more, and in all there are 150. The faculties number from one to seventeen professors, and the number of students ranges from four to more than 300. The libraries (see THmotoaicaL Li- BRARIBS) comprise from a few hundred to over 100,000 volumes. The course of instruction lasts three or four years. Greater stress is laid upon practical gifts and moral and religious character than upon the ministerial training-schools of State churches. é
VI. Development: Something of the growth of American religious sentiment under the voluntary system may be seen in the fact that, while in the year 1800 Evangelical church-membership embraced one in fourteen of the population, in the year 1909 it included one in four. Evangelical communicants
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