New Apostolic Church

Heritage

The New Apostolic Church descends from the Catholic Apostolic movement that formed around the London revival circles of Edward Irving in the 1830s, which by 1835 had designated twelve new apostles to prepare the church for Christ's return. When those apostles began dying without successors, a German branch centered in Hamburg called new apostles to continue the office — the 1863 separation from which the New Apostolic Church descends. It grew strongest in Germany and, through missions, in Africa, where most of its worldwide membership now lives. In the United States, RCMS 2020 counts 187 congregations, listed as the New Apostolic Church USA.

Theological family

Trinitarian Christian, with a distinctive sacramental structure: baptism, Holy Communion, and Holy Sealing — the imparting of the Holy Spirit through the laying on of an apostle's hands. The expectation of Christ's imminent return, the conviction that drove the original apostolic revival, remains central. It is not Stone-Campbell Restorationist and not Oneness Pentecostal, despite the shared adjective.

Who decides what

Hierarchical under living apostles: a Chief Apostle leads the worldwide church, with district apostles over regions and ordained ministers serving congregations — the apostolic office itself being the church's defining institution.

What a first-time visitor would find

A divine service on Sunday: hymns and choral music, prayer, a sermon delivered from the altar, and Holy Communion offered in wafers pre-moistened with wine; services are broadly liturgical in feel but centered on the preached word. Congregations tend to be modest in size and closely knit.

What it has always cared about

The apostle ministry as a living office rather than a closed era; Holy Sealing; watchfulness for the return of Christ; and choral music, which holds an honored place in congregational life.

Its gift to the wider church

A sustained, sincere answer to a question most churches leave theoretical — what would it mean for the church to have apostles now? — held together with a devotional seriousness about Christ's return.

Commonly confused with

With Oneness Pentecostal "Apostolic" churches and with Stone-Campbell Restorationist churches — entirely different families that happen to share the adjective; and with its own parent, the Catholic Apostolic Church of the Irvingite revival, which declined after its last apostle died in 1901 and survives today in only vestigial form.

Range of views inside it

Range chiefly in language and culture between congregations (the American church includes German-heritage and immigrant communities), and in music from traditional choral to contemporary; doctrine and order are uniform by design.

Where New Apostolic Church churches are on the map

20 New Apostolic Church congregations appear on The Church Map, across 15 states.

• California — 4
• Indiana — 2
• Pennsylvania — 2
• Arkansas — 1
• Florida — 1
• Maryland — 1
• Michigan — 1
• North Carolina — 1
• New York — 1
• Ohio — 1