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When I put together the first international conference of pentecostal and charismatic scholars at Brighton 91 – after being turned down by the WCC General Superintendent in his Geneva office to join along with Canberra and their theme ‘Come Holy Spirit’ – I developed a model that remains useful to this today. That is, when organizing a conference I always draw from four streams and five continents. The four streams in this paradigm are Roman Catholic, Orthodox Churches, Protestants, and Pentecostals. Obviously this does not account for the whole of Christianity and does not explain many important nuances but it provides a working premise. Despite centuries of fragmentation, Roman Catholics and the Orthodox have managed to keep ‘internal’ divisions of the last century shrouded in thick clouds of mystery. Using the paradigm above, I can say that the division and fragmentation associated with Classical Pentecostalism is no worse than that known to Protestantism. With the rise of conciliar ecumenism in the 20th century, ecclesial bodies that achieve organic unity are held in high esteem. Despite the lack of proper recognition, organic unity is also part of the story of Classical Pentecostals. In the USA, among the most representative examples are the International Pentecostal Holiness Church, the Open Bible Churches, the United Pentecostal Church International and the International Pentecostal Church of Christ. This paper addresses the question of how some Pentecostals compare to the Canberra model of church unity made visible or, to use conciliar language, achieve full communion.
“’Full Communion’: A Pentecostal Model”
When I put together the first international conference of pentecostal and charismatic scholars at Brighton 91 – after being turned down by the WCC General Superintendent in his Geneva office to join along with Canberra and their theme ‘Come Holy Spirit’ – I developed a model that remains useful to this today. That is, when organizing a conference I always draw from four streams and five continents. The four streams in this paradigm are Roman Catholic, Orthodox Churches, Protestants, and Pentecostals. Obviously this does not account for the whole of Christianity and does not explain many important nuances but it provides a working premise. Despite centuries of fragmentation, Roman Catholics and the Orthodox have managed to keep ‘internal’ divisions of the last century shrouded in thick clouds of mystery. Using the paradigm above, I can say that the division and fragmentation associated with Classical Pentecostalism is no worse than that known to Protestantism. With the rise of conciliar ecumenism in the 20th century, ecclesial bodies that achieve organic unity are held in high esteem. Despite the lack of proper recognition, organic unity is also part of the story of Classical Pentecostals. In the USA, among the most representative examples are the International Pentecostal Holiness Church, the Open Bible Churches, the United Pentecostal Church International and the International Pentecostal Church of Christ. This paper addresses the question of how some Pentecostals compare to the Canberra model of church unity made visible or, to use conciliar language, achieve full communion.
