Christian Council of Norway

Founded in 1992, merged in 2006 with the Council of Free Churches in Norway.

Basis: The Christian Council of Norway (CCN) is a fellowship of churches, Christian religious communities, and parishes in Norway, worshipping and confessing one God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, as Creator, Saviour and Giver of Life, in accordance with the holy scriptures.

In March 2006, the Christian Council of Norway and the Council of Free Churches in Norway decided to merge and form one new body.  The merger became possible after a process of consultation among the member churches of the two councils. Two major considerations were the relationship between the Catholic Church, member of the Christian Council and the Pentecostal Movement, member of the Council of Free Churches, and the relationships between the Church of Norway as the majority church and the much smaller Free churches with their claims of equal religious rights in a country marked by a centuries long history of state church. The merger is a an example of a decision making process by consensus whereby representatives of the different member churches of the two councils carefully listened to one another and slowly moved towards the end result in full respect of the differences between the churches. The new council, which continues to carry the name Christian Council of Norway, is one of a handful of national church bodies in the world that are representative of all the Christian traditions in the country, i.e. historic protestant, anglican, catholic, orthodox, evangelical, pentecostal and charismatic.