- Affinity (Christian organisation)
Affinity describes itself as "a growing network of many hundreds of Bible-centred churches and Christian agencies throughout Britain and Ireland". It was formerly known as the British Evangelical Council, which was formed in the 1950s, but stagnated in the 1980s following the death of
Martyn Lloyd-Jones . Therebranding and relaunch happened in 2004. Affinity provides networking and support to conservative evangelical churches in theUnited Kingdom andIreland . There are currently about 1200 church congregations linked to Affinity. The organisation's subtitle is "Church-centred Partnership for Bible-centred Christianity".Many churches linked with Affinity would consider "Bible-centred Christianity" to be
reformed ,calvinist , and non-charismatic , although some in the affiliation would disagree. Thus, many member churches are defined by a rigorous theology, adopting a separatistic outlook. They regard churches with differing viewpoints as being in error and refuse to associate with them. For this reason they rarely join theEvangelical Alliance , a similar but larger organisation with a broader membership.Groups of churches linked to Affinity include the
Apostolic Church , theAssociation of Grace Baptist Churches , theEvangelical Movement of Wales , theFellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches , the Free Church of Scotland, theFree Church of Scotland (Continuing) and theEvangelical Presbyterian Church in England and Wales and Ireland. At least two congregations of theEvangelical Connexion of the Free Church of England are also members.The current director of Affinity is
Jonathan Stephen , who is also principal of theWales Evangelical School of Theology .References
* cite web
title = Affinity's website
url = http://www.affinity.org.uk
accessdate = 2007-08-26
* cite news
last = Benton
first = John
title = To Affinity and Beyond - A new name for the British Evangelical Council
publisher =Evangelicals Now
date = 2004-05
url = http://www.e-n.org.uk/2895-To-Affinity-and-beyond.htm
accessdate = 2007-08-26
* cite news
last = Stephen
first = Jonathan
title = The Current Crisis In Evangelicalism
publisher =Evangelicals Now
date = 2005-06
url = http://www.e-n.org.uk/p-3026-The-current-crisis-in-evangelicalism.htm
accessdate = 2007-08-26
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