Portal:Reformed Christianity

Portal topics: Activities; Culture; Geography; Health; History; Mathematics; Nature; People; Philosophy; Religion; Society; Technology; Random portal

The Reformed Christianity Portal

Reformed Christianity, also called Calvinism, is a major branch of Protestantism that began during the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation, a schism in the Western Church. In the modern day, it is largely represented by the Continental Reformed, Presbyterian, and Congregational traditions, as well as parts of the Anglican (known as "Episcopal" in some regions) and Baptist traditions.

Reformed theology emphasizes the authority of the Bible and the sovereignty of God, as well as covenant theology, a framework for understanding the Bible based on God's covenants with people. Reformed churches have emphasized simplicity in worship. Several forms of ecclesiastical polity are exercised by Reformed churches, including presbyterian, congregational, and some episcopal. Articulated by John Calvin, the Reformed faith holds to a spiritual (pneumatic) presence of Christ in the Lord's Supper.

Emerging in the 16th century, the Reformed tradition developed over several generations, especially in Switzerland, Scotland and the Netherlands. In the seventeenth century, Jacobus Arminius and the Remonstrants were expelled from the Dutch Reformed Church over disputes regarding predestination and salvation, and from that time Arminians are usually considered to be a distinct tradition from the Reformed. This dispute produced the Canons of Dort, the basis for the "doctrines of grace" also known as the "five points" of Calvinism. (Full article...)

Learn more about Reformed Christianity...

Refresh with new selections below (purge)

Selected article

The Presbyterian Ladies' College, Sydney (P.L.C. Sydney), is an independent, Presbyterian, day and boarding school for girls, located in Croydon, an inner-western suburb of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. It is the longest continuously running Presbyterian Church school in New South Wales.

Founded in 1888 by a committee of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church of New South Wales, the school has a non-selective enrolment policy for all years apart from Year 11, and currently caters for approximately 1350 girls from Branxton Reception (4 years old) to Year 12 (18 years old), including 70 boarders. Student's attend P.L.C from all regions of the greater metropolitan area, New South Wales country regions, and overseas.

Formerly a school of the Presbyterian Church, Pymble Ladies' College is P.L.C's 'daughter school' in Pymble.

More selected articles...

Read more...

Selected images

Image 1Moses Amyraut formulated Amyraldism, a modified Calvinist theology regarding the nature of Jesus' atonement. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 2Calvin preached at St. Pierre Cathedral in Geneva. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 3The burning of the Guernsey Martyrs during the Marian persecutions in 1556 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 4A Reformed church in Koudekerk aan den Rijn in the Netherlands in the 19th century (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 5The seal of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, an early American Presbyterian church founded in 1789 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 6Dutch prime minister Abraham Kuyper initiated Neo-Calvinism. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 7Early Calvinism was known for simple, unadorned churches as depicted in this 1661 portrait of the interior of the Oude Kerk, Amsterdam. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 8Fall of Man by Jacob Jordaens (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 9The Shield of the Trinity diagrams the classic doctrine of the Trinity. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 10Statues of William Farel, John Calvin, Theodore Beza, and John Knox, influential theologians in developing the Reformed faith, at the Reformation Wall in Geneva (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 11The Parable of the Prodigal Son, depicted in a portrait by Rembrandt, illustrates forgiveness. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 12The Grote Kerk in Haarlem in the Dutch Republic, c. 1665 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 13Stephen Bocskai, leader of Hungarian Calvinists in the anti-Habsburg rebellion and first Calvinist prince of Transylvania (r. 1605–1606) (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 14John Calvin depicted on his deathbed with church members in The last moments of Calvin, a late 19th century portrait by Lluís Domènech i Montaner (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 15The Directory for Public Worship described what should (and should not) occur in worship. (from Reformed Christianity)

Did you know...

... that the 1919 demolition of "one of the most costly religious edifices" in New York City, the 1906 Madison Square Presbyterian Church, was called "a distinct architectural loss"?

...that Peter Martyr Vermigli's best known work, the Loci Communes, is a compilation of excerpts from his biblical commentaries published after his death?