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The
Dutch Reformed Church in Canada
(1800-1900)
The
Christian Reformed Church
(1800-1900)
The Canadian Reformed Churches (1950 to present)
The Dutch Reformed Church in Canada The Dutch Reformed Church had settled in the New York area in the early seventeenth century and had been aroused by the vigorous preaching of Theodore Frelinghuysen in the early eighteenth century. He founded the first theological seminary to be built in this country. This college, located in New Jersey, was called Queen's College, but is now called Rutgers University.
The great emigration from Europe brought many from the Netherlands also. Many entire congregations came with their pastors. One group led by Dominie Albertus Van Raalte established their first settlement some distance from the east shore of Lake Macatawa in the western part of Michigan in the year 1847 and called it Holland. They joined the Reformed Church of America in 1850. Another colony, led by Dominie Hendrik Scholte, made a settlement in central Iowa to which they gave the name Pella. In 1858 they also merged with the Reformed Church. Other groups of immigrants made themselves homes in Paterson, New Jersey; in Grand Rapids, Michigan; and in Chicago. The Reformed Church has been greatly instrumental in preserving and spreading the Reformed faith in our own land and in sending out the Gospel to heathen countries. To this day it maintains the Confessions of the ancestral church in the Netherlands. But Liberalism, a foe against which no stronghold can afford to feel secure, has made an invasion here also. However, the larger part of the membership of this church remains orthodox, and hundreds of its ministers are proclaiming the true Gospel. It numbers 230,000 members in 900 churches.
Dissatisfaction on the part of some of the Michigan settlers with the hastiness of the union with the Reformed Church and with some of the practices of that church caused discontent to grow rapidly during the years 1850 to 1857. The use of hymns and choirs in the East was criticised. Questions concerning lodge membership and open communion were introduced at the meetings of Classis Holland. It was claimed that catechism preaching, catechism classes, and house visitation were neglected. A new cause for dispute arose in the recommendation by Van Raalte of Richard Baxter's book, "Call to the Un-converted", which critics found to be a book containing Arminian sentiments. The discontent was in large part a reaction of laymen against the union fostered by their leaders. The result of this agitation was that at the meeting of Classis Holland of April 5. 1857, four documents of secession were presented. On October 7 of the same year five churches with only one minister, the Rev. K. Vanden Bosch, organized themselves into the Christian Reformed Church. Early growth was slow, but a large number of immigrants from the Netherlands from 1880 to 1890 increased the membership of the denomination. In 1881-1882 eight congregations as well as many individuals left the Reformed Church when it failed to take a positive stand against Free Masonry. These joined the Christian Reformed Church as did the entire Classis Hackensack of the True Reformed Dutch Church in 1890. |
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Last modified: December 01, 2002 |
