Pentecostal Union of Romania
Apostolic Church of God | |
---|---|
Biserica lui Dumnezeu Apostolică | |
Type | Congregationalist |
President | Filip Ioan |
Associations | |
Region | Sector 5, Bucharest |
Origin | 10 September 1922[1] Păuliș, Arad County |
Recognition | 1950 |
Separations | Assemblies of God (Romania) (1996) |
Congregations | 1,343 |
Members | 404,307 (in 2022)[2] |
Pastors | 354 |
Secondary schools | 3 |
Tertiary institutions | 1 |
Other name(s) | Pentecostal Union of Romania |
Publications | Cuvântul Adevărului |
Official website | cultulpenticostal |
The Pentecostal Union of Romania (
History
Pentecostalism was introduced to Romania in 1922 by Gheorghe Bradin, who set up a thirty-member church in
In 1940 the
During the
The church strove to transform its members to become model socialist citizens of industry and integrity; while some Pentecostal views clearly perplexed state authorities, they found within these communities signs of the moral qualities and ethnic reconciliation needed in Romanian society.
Since the
The church has held congresses in 1951, 1956 and every four years since 1986. After Bochian, who retired in 1990, Emil Bulgar was president until 1994, when he was succeeded by Pavel Riviş Tipei, the present incumbent.[20] Each congress, made up of community representatives and other church notables, elects a 21-member Church Council and a 7-member Executive Board, including the president.[11] Pastors are trained in Bucharest at the Pentecostal Theological Institute and at the Betania Pentecostal Theological Faculty in Arad; the church also has three high school-level seminaries, two post-secondary schools,[4] and schools for younger children.[11] The church's first magazine, Glasul Adevărului ("The Voice of Truth"), was printed in Brăila in 1929; its name was changed to Cuvântul Adevărului ("The Word of Truth") two months later. Banned in 1937, it was revived as Buletinul Cultului Penticostal ("Newsletter of the Pentecostal Cult") in 1953 and restored to its interwar name in 1990. The church now has several other publications as well as a presence on radio, television and the Internet.[11]
Demographic history
Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org. |
Year | Number |
1922 | 20[9] |
1945 | 15,000[9] |
1950 | 30,000[9] |
1956 | 54,000[9] |
1976 | 100,000[9] |
1982 | 150,000[9] |
1989 | 170,000[9] |
1992 | 219,151[21] |
2002 | 330,486[22] |
2011 | 367,938[23] |
2022 | 404,307[2] |
Pentecostal Dissidents
During the Communist era, the Pentecostal Dissidents were one of the Romania's least known unofficial religious communities. They represented groups of believers scattered throughout the country, some of whom may also have belonged to the official church but who gathered in rural areas for their own Bible Studies and prayer meetings “unauthorized” by the Institutionalized Church. The official church was restrained in its public exercise of the spiritual gifts, and this attitude may have been important in bringing about extralegal inspirational meetings. The group may also have included a segment of the church that originally remained outside the union because of what it perceived as the official body's unacceptable relationship to the state. Additional concerns were similar to those openly voiced by the Baptists: difficulties in building new churches, baptism restrictions, registration of church members, evangelism and approval of pastors. They deplored what they saw as their leaders' "blind submissiveness", the "political elements" expected to be embodied in preaching, the censorship of the Buletin, the control of visits from abroad, and reports that had to be filed with the Securitate. The Dissidents maintained an extremely low profile and no accurate estimate of their strength can be made. It may have experienced considerable growth alongside the official church, attracting those who favoured more independent leadership. It very likely had close ties with Eastern European missions in Western Europe and the US that strongly supported this type of clandestine community.[24]
Notes
- ^ (in Romanian) “Cultul creștin penticostal” at the Pentecostal Union of Romania site
- ^ a b c "2022 Romanian Census (preliminary results)" (PDF) (in Romanian). INSSE. Retrieved 7 January 2023.
- ^ (in Romanian) Populaţia după etnie şi religie, pe medii, at the 2002 Census official site; accessed March 13, 2009.
- ^ Ministry of Culture and Religious Affairs, Under-Secretariat for Culture and Religious Affairs; accessed April 7, 2008.
- ^ Bell, p. 500 gives 2,455 churches and 525 pastors as of December 2001. Rusu claims 2,311 churches.
- ^ a b c d e Pope, p. 184.
- ^ Until 1989, the church had branches only at Arad, Oradea and Suceava, the one in Cluj being banned in 1959. Rusu.
- ^ Pope, p. 183-4.
- ^ a b c d e f g h "Istoria mişcării penticostale din România" ("History of the Pentecostal Movement in Romania") Archived 2008-04-17 at the Wayback Machine, Creştinul; accessed April 7, 2008.
- ^ a b Anderson, p. 100.
- ^ a b c d e f g Rusu.
- ^ This is still more rural than Romania as a whole, which was 52.7% urban in 2002. Populaţia, gospodăriile şi locuinţele la recensământul din 2002 Archived 2008-02-19 at the Wayback Machine; accessed April 8, 2008.
- ^ a b Pope, p. 184-5.
- ^ (in Romanian) Lavinia Betea, "Biserica Penticostală şi lucrarea Duhului Sfânt"; Adevărul, October 8, 2012; accessed October 18, 2012
- ^ a b Pope, p. 185.
- ^ Ramet (1995), p. 165.
- ^ Pope, p. 186.
- ^ Bell, p. 500.
- ^ a b Hann, p. 269.
- ^ "85 de ani de la înfiinţarea primei biserici penticostale din România" ("85 Years Since the First Pentecostal Church Was Established in Romania"), in Cuvântul Adevărului; accessed April 7, 2008.
- ^ Romanian census, 1992
- ^ (in Romanian) Populaţia după religie la recensământul din 2002 Archived 2009-07-06 at the Wayback Machine, at the 2002 Census official site; accessed April 7, 2008.
- ^ (in Romanian) Comunicat de presă privind rezultatele provizorii ale Recensământului Populaţiei şi Locuinţelor – 2011, at the 2011 census official site; accessed October 28, 2012.
- ^ Pope, pp. 192-3.
References
- Anderson, Allan. An Introduction to Pentecostalism. Cambridge University Press, 2004, ISBN 0-521-53280-9.
- Bell, Imogen. Central and South-Eastern Europe 2003. Routledge, 2002, ISBN 1-85743-136-7.
- Hann, C. M. (ed.) The Postsocialist Religious Question. LIT Verlag Berlin-Hamburg-Münster, 2007, ISBN 3-8258-9904-7.
- Earl A. Pope, "Protestantism in Romania", in Sabrina P. Ramet (ed.), Christianity under Stress. Vol. III: Protestantism and Politics in Eastern Europe and Russia: The Communist and Postcommunist Eras, ISBN 0-8223-1241-7.
- Ramet, Sabrina Petra. Social Currents in Eastern Europe. Duke University Press, 1995, ISBN 0-8223-1548-3.
- Bianca Ioana Rusu, Daniela Tarnovschi, "Pentecostals in Romania", Ethnocultural Diversity Resource Center.