Civil parish
In England, a civil parish is a type of administrative parish used for local government, they are a territorial designation, the lowest tier of local government below districts and counties, or their combined form, the unitary authority. Civil parishes can trace their origin to the ancient system of ecclesiastical parishes which played a role in both civil and ecclesiastical administration; the unit rolled out across England in the 1860s. A civil parish can range in size from a large town with a population of about 75,000 to a single village with fewer than a hundred inhabitants. Eight parishes have city status. A civil parish may be known as and confirmed as a town, neighbourhood or community by resolution of its parish council, a right reserved not conferred on other units of English local government. 35% of the English population live in a civil parish. As of 31 December 2015 there were 10,449 parishes in England; the most populous is Weston super Mare and those with cathedral city status are Chichester, Hereford, Ripon, Salisbury and Wells.
On 1 April 2014, Queen's Park became the first civil parish in Greater London. Before 2008 their creation was not permitted within a London borough. Wales was divided into civil parishes until 1974, when they were replaced by communities, which are similar to English parishes in the way they operate. Civil parishes in Scotland were abolished for local government purposes by the Local Government Act 1929, the Scottish equivalent of English civil parishes are community council areas, which were established by the Local Government Act 1973; the Parish system in Europe was established between the 8th and 12th centuries and in England was old by the time of the Conquest. These areas were based on the territory of one or more manors, areas which in some cases derived their bounds from Roman or Iron Age estates. Parish boundaries were conservative, changing little, after 1180'froze' so that boundaries could no longer be changed at all, despite changes to manorial landholdings - though there were some examples of sub-division.
The consistency of these boundaries, up until the 19th century is useful to historians, is of cultural significance in terms of shaping local identities, a factor reinforced by the adoption of parish boundaries unchanged, by successor local government units. There was huge variation in size between parishes, for instance Writtle in Essex was 13,568 acres while neighbouring Shellow Bowells was just 469 acres, Chignall Smealy 476 acres; until the break with Rome, parishes managed ecclesiastical matters, while the manor was the principal unit of local administration and justice. The church replaced the manor court as the rural administrative centre, levied a local tax on produce known as a tithe. In the medieval period, responsibilities such as relief of the poor passed from the Lord of the Manor to the parish's rector, who in practice would delegate tasks among his vestry or the monasteries. After the dissolution of the monasteries, the power to levy a rate to fund relief of the poor was conferred on the parish authorities by the Act for the Relief of the Poor 1601.
Both before and after this optional social change, local charities are well-documented. The parish authorities were consisted of all the ratepayers of the parish; as the number of ratepayers of some parishes grew, it became difficult to convene meetings as an open vestry. In some built up, areas the select vestry took over responsibility from the entire body of ratepayers; this innovation allowed governance by a self-perpetuating elite. The administration of the parish system relied on the monopoly of the established English Church, which for a few years after Henry VIII alternated between the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of England, before settling on the latter on the accession of Elizabeth I in 1558. By the 18th century, religious membership was becoming more fractured in some places, due for instance to the progress of Methodism; the legitimacy of the parish vestry came into question and the perceived inefficiency and corruption inherent in the system became a source for concern in some places.
For this reason, during the early 19th century the parish progressively lost its powers to ad hoc boards and other organisations, for example the loss of responsibility for poor relief through the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834. Sanitary districts covered England in Ireland three years later; the replacement boards were each entitled to levy their own rate in the parish. The church rate ceased to be levied in many parishes and became voluntary from 1868; the ancient parishes diverged into two distinct, nearly overlapping, systems of parishes during the 19th century. The Poor Law Amendment Act 1866 declared all areas that levied a separate rate: C of E ecclesiastical parishes, extra-parochial areas and their analogue, chapelries, to be "civil parishes". To have collected rates this means these beforehand had their own vestries, boards or equivalent bodies; the Church of England parishes, which cover more than 99% of England, became termed "ecclesiastical parishes" and the boundaries of these soon diverged from those of the Ancient Parishes in order to reflect modern circumstances.
After 1921 each ecclesiastical parish has been the responsibility of the parochial church councils. In the late 19th century, most of the ancient irregularities inheri
Leyburn railway station
Leyburn railway station is on the Wensleydale Railway, a seasonal, heritage service and serves the town of Leyburn in North Yorkshire, England. During the summer months it is served by at least three trains per day; the Leyburn branch of the Wensleydale Railway Association meets monthly at the station. The station postal address is Leyburn Station, Harmby Road, North Yorkshire, DL8 5ET; the railway first reached Leyburn in November 1855, when the Bedale & Leyburn Railway opened its line from Leeming. Passenger services commenced six months with a further extension westwards to Hawes being built by the North Eastern Railway in 1877/8. At Hawes, another end-on junction was made with the Midland Railway branch from Hawes Junction that gave the NER access to the Settle-Carlisle Railway by means of running powers; the branch became part of the LNER under the terms of the 1923 Grouping. For most of its life, the route had a basic service of five passenger trains each day along its entire length with one or two extras reaching Leyburn from Northallerton, along with a small number of parcels and goods trains.
Nationalisation followed at the end of 1947, but less than a decade the station was closed when the Northallerton to Hawes route fell victim to road competition, services being withdrawn on 26 April 1954. The line beyond Redmire closed in April 1964, but aggregate traffic from the quarry there kept the rest of the line open. Leyburn retained its status as a goods depot until 1982, but latterly the entire route operated as a'one train' single line; the limestone traffic to and from Teesside ended in December 1992 but after a spell of disuse, traffic resumed in the form of Ministry of Defence military equipment trains to Redmire. Occasional passenger specials ran along the line, such as the "Three Dales Tour" on 20 May 1967; the Wensleydale Railway reopened the station at Leyburn in May 2003 after leasing the line from Railtrack. The station buildings had survived after closure, which made the re-instatement of passenger facilities there straightforward. Passenger trains ran eastwards from Leyburn to Leeming Bar, but these were extended on to Redmire in August 2004.
The company plans to relay/re-instate a run-round loop trackbed, but hopes to one day rebuild and reopen the abandoned line westwards to Hawes and to Garsdale and run trains along the full length of the entire Yorkshire dale from Northallerton to Garsdale — a trip of 40 miles in length. In July 2017, it was announced that the station was benefitting from a grant of £72,000, which would allow the installation of a passing loop, a water tower with water cranes, a footbridge and a signal box with working levers; the footbridge and signal box have been donated by Network Rail from redundant areas when upgrades have been carried out. Grafton, Peter. Edward Thompson of the LNER. Usk: Oakwood Press. ISBN 978-0-85361-672-6. OL145
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, as described in the New Testament. Its adherents, known as Christians, believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and savior of all people, whose coming as the Messiah was prophesied in the Old Testament. Depending on the specific denomination of Christianity, practices may include baptism, prayer, confirmation, burial rites, marriage rites and the religious education of children. Most denominations hold regular group worship services. Christianity developed during the 1st century CE as a Jewish Christian sect of Second Temple Judaism, it soon attracted Gentile God-fearers, which lead to a departure from Jewish customs, the establishment of Christianity as an independent religion. During the first centuries of its existence Christianity spread throughout the Roman Empire, to Ethiopia and some parts of Asia. Constantine the Great decriminalized it via the Edict of Milan; the First Council of Nicaea established a uniform set of beliefs across the Roman Empire.
By 380, the Roman Empire designated Christianity as the state religion. The period of the first seven ecumenical councils is sometimes referred to as the Great Church, the united full communion of the Roman Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Oriental Orthodoxy, before their schisms. Oriental Orthodoxy split after the Council of Chalcedon over differences in Christology; the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church separated in the East–West Schism over the authority of the Pope. In 1521, Protestants split from the Catholic Church in the Protestant Reformation over Papal primacy, the nature of salvation, other ecclesiological and theological disputes. Following the Age of Discovery, Christianity was spread into the Americas, sub-Saharan Africa, the rest of the world via missionary work and colonization. There are 2.3 billion Christians in the world, or 31.4% of the global population. Today, the four largest branches of Christianity are the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church and Oriental Orthodoxy.
Christianity and Christian ethics have played a prominent role in the development of Western civilization around Europe during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. In the New Testament, the names by which the disciples were known among themselves were "brethren", "the faithful", "elect", "saints" and "believers". Early Jewish Christians referred to themselves as'The Way' coming from Isaiah 40:3, "prepare the way of the Lord." According to Acts 11:26, the term "Christian" was first used in reference to Jesus's disciples in the city of Antioch, meaning "followers of Christ," by the non-Jewish inhabitants of Antioch. The earliest recorded use of the term "Christianity" was by Ignatius of Antioch, in around 100 AD. While Christians worldwide share basic convcitions, there are differences of interpretations and opinions of the Bible and sacred traditions on which Christianity is based. Concise doctrinal statements or confessions of religious beliefs are known as creeds, they began as baptismal formulae and were expanded during the Christological controversies of the 4th and 5th centuries to become statements of faith.
The Apostles' Creed is the most accepted statement of the articles of Christian faith. It is used by a number of Christian denominations for both liturgical and catechetical purposes, most visibly by liturgical churches of Western Christian tradition, including the Latin Church of the Catholic Church, Lutheranism and Western Rite Orthodoxy, it is used by Presbyterians and Congregationalists. This particular creed was developed between the 9th centuries, its central doctrines are those of God the Creator. Each of the doctrines found in this creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period; the creed was used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Its main points include: Belief in God the Father, Jesus Christ as the Son of God, the Holy Spirit The death, descent into hell and ascension of Christ The holiness of the Church and the communion of saints Christ's second coming, the Day of Judgement and salvation of the faithful; the Nicene Creed was formulated in response to Arianism, at the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople in 325 and 381 and ratified as the universal creed of Christendom by the First Council of Ephesus in 431.
The Chalcedonian Definition, or Creed of Chalcedon, developed at the Council of Chalcedon in 451, though rejected by the Oriental Orthodox churches, taught Christ "to be acknowledged in two natures, unchangeably, inseparably": one divine and one human, that both natures, while perfect in themselves, are also united into one person. The Athanasian Creed, received in the Western Church as having the same status as the Nicene and Chalcedonian, says: "We worship one God in Trinity, Trinity in Unity. Many evangelical Protestants reject creeds as definitive statements of faith while agreeing with some or all of the substance of the creeds. Most Baptists do not use creeds "in that they have not sought to establish binding
Richmondshire
Richmondshire is a local government district of North Yorkshire, England. It covers a large northern area of the Yorkshire Dales including Swaledale and Arkengarthdale and Coverdale, with the prominent Scots' Dyke and Scotch Corner along the centre. Teesdale lies to the north. With a total area of 1,319 km², it is larger than seven of the English ceremonial counties; the history of this district in antiquity is not well known, but archeologists have found artifacts from the Neolithic Period, the Bronze Age, the Iron Age and the Roman Period in the Richmond area. The closest important Roman settlement was at Catterick in what became known as Rheged, site of the Battle of Catterick. At the terminus of Scandinavian York, there was a local bout of rebellion in Stainmore, which resulted in the death of Eric Bloodaxe; the Scandinavian settlement of this area was eastwards from the Irish Sea with names such as Gilpatrick in Middleham and Thorfinn in Bedale occurring at the time of the Domesday Book.
At the time of the Norman Conquest it was the Fee of Gillingshire, held by Earl of Mercia. Gillingshire was made up of the Borough of Richmond and five wapentakes of Gilling West, Gilling East, Hang West, Hang East and Hallikeld. After the Harrying of the North, the land became capital of the Duchy of Brittany's Honour of Richmond; the Honour of Richmond was one of the three largest lordships created by William the Conqueror. King William granted it to his double-second-cousin, Alan the Red, the leader of the Bretons in England and a cousin of Hawise, Duchess of Brittany. According to the Register of the Honour of Richmond, the official transfer of the lands of Earl Edwin occurred at the "Siege of York" in 1068 or early 1069. Edwin's brother Morcar, Earl of Northumbria, lost his title to Robert Commines on 28 January 1069 and lost lands to Count Alan following the brothers' participation in the northern rebellion of 1068. A charter of Count Alan Rufus's dated before 1086 states that he obtained the honour with the help of Queen Matilda.
Alan had many other English estates, by the time of the compilation of the Domesday Book he was one of the richest and most powerful barons. He was succeeded by two of his brothers in turn; the family held on to this estate until 1399. Work on Richmond Castle started in 1071; the Honour of Richmond comprised 782 manors throughout England. The Yorkshire portion was a compact unit of 199 manors and 43 outlying properties situated near the main roads from Scotland into the Vale of York. Northern England is said to differ from the other areas of the country and the difference between Breton and Norman lordship is seen as being a cause. Richmondshire became an appanage of the English Royal Family during the reign of Edward III of England. In 1525 Henry FitzRoy, 1st Duke of Richmond and Somerset became Lord Warden of the Marches and Lord President of the Council of the North while living at Sheriff Hutton. One of the most distinctive Christian names of Richmondshire folk was Marmaduke, but this is an old and fading tradition.
St. Paulinus baptised the locals in the River Swale and as a result, it was known as the "Jordan of England". Richmondshire is an archdeaconry which consisted of present-day Richmondshire and the Barony of Kendal in Westmorland, Copeland in Cumberland and what is now Lancashire north of Ribblesdale, such as Amounderness and Lonsdale. After composing part of the Diocese of York, it was transferred to the Diocese of Chester, before moving into the Diocese of Ripon and Leeds and the Diocese of Leeds known as the Diocese of West Yorkshire and the Dales; the current district was formed on 1 April 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972. It was a merger of the municipal borough of Richmond with the Aysgarth Rural District, Leyburn Rural District, Reeth Rural District and Richmond Rural District along with part of the Croft Rural District, all in the North Riding of Yorkshire; the Council was controlled by independent councillors until May 2003, when elections returned a council with no overall control.
Conservative John Blackie was elected as leader of the Council. In December 2005 Blackie was replaced by the leader of the Independent Coalition for Richmondshire, Bill Glover, following the resignation of several councillors from the Conservative group and the merger of the rival independent groups; as of January 2019, the 34 member council was controlled by a Conservative administration. The Chairman was Councillor Bill Glover and the Vice Chairman was Councillor Stuart Parsons; the region is agricultural but there are many commercial enterprises, supported by four main business associations: Richmond Business and Tourism Association and Arkengarthdale Business Association, Lower Wensleydale Business Network and Upper Wensleydale Business Association. Tourism is an important part of the economy with some visitors attracted by the Yorkshire Dales. In 2014 3.62 million people visited the area. There are many hiking trails in the region as well as various attractions. Travellers using the Trip Advisor site recommend Richmond Castle, Green Howards Museum, Georgian Theatre Royal, The Station, Millgate House Garden, Richmondshire Museum, Foxglove Covert Local Nature Reserv
Fire services in the United Kingdom
The fire services in the United Kingdom operate under separate legislative and administrative arrangements in England and Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland. Emergency cover is provided by over fifty agencies; these are known as a fire and rescue service, the term used in modern legislation and by government departments. The older terms of fire brigade and fire service survive in informal usage and in the names of a few organisations. England and Wales have local fire services which are each overseen by a fire authority, made up of representatives of local governments. Fire authorities have the power to raise a Council Tax levy for funding, with the remainder coming from the government. Scotland and Northern Ireland have centralised fire services, so their authorities are committees of the devolved parliaments; the total budget for fire services in 2014-15 was £2.9 billion. Central government maintains national standards and a body of independent advisers through the Chief Fire and Rescue Adviser, created in 2007, while Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services provides direct oversight.
The devolved government in Scotland has HMFSI Scotland. Firefighters in the United Kingdom are allowed to join unions, the main one being the Fire Brigades Union, while chief fire officers are members of the National Fire Chiefs Council, which has some role in national co-ordination; the fire services have undergone significant changes since the beginning of the 21st century, a process, propelled by a devolution of central government powers, new legislation and a change to operational procedures in the light of terrorism attacks and threats. See separate article History of fire safety legislation in the United Kingdom Comprehensive list of recent UK fire and rescue service legislation: Fire services are established and granted their powers under new legislation which has replaced a number of Acts of Parliament dating back more than 60 years, but is still undergoing change. 1938: Fire Brigades Act 1938. This Act provided for centralised co-ordination of fire brigades in Great Britain and made it mandatory for local authorities to arrange an effective fire service.
1947: Fire Services Act 1947 This Act transferred the functions of the National Fire Service to local authorities. Now repealed in England and Wales by Schedule 2 of the Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004. 1959: Fire Services Act 1959 This Act amended the 1947 Act. It was repealed in Wales along with the 1947 Act. 1999: Greater London Authority Act 1999 This act was necessary to allow for the formation of the Greater London Authority and in turn the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. In 2002, there was a series of national fire strikes, with much of the discontent caused by the aforementioned report into the fire service conducted by Prof Sir George Bain. In December 2002, the Independent Review of the Fire Service was published with the industrial action still ongoing. Bain's report led to a change in the laws relating to firefighting. 2002: Independent Review of the Fire Service published 2004: Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004 only applying to England and Wales. 2006: The Regulatory Reform Order 2005 This piece of secondary legislation or statutory instrument replaces several other acts that dealt with fire precautions and fire safety in premises, including the now defunct process of issuing fire certificates.
It came into force on 1 October 2006. The DfCLG has published a set of guides for non-domestic premises: 2006: The Government of Wales Act 2006 gave the National Assembly for Wales powers to pass laws on "Fire and rescue services. Promotion of fire safety otherwise than by prohibition or regulation." But does not prevent future legislation being passed by the UK government which applies to two or more constituent countries. There are further plans to modernise the fire service according to the Local Government Association, its website outlines future changes, specific projects: "The aim of the Fire Modernisation Programme is to adopt modern work practices within the Fire & Rescue Service to become more efficient and effective, while strengthening the contingency and resilience of the Service to react to incidents. " The fire service in England and Wales is scrutinised by a House of Commons select committee. In June 2006, the fire and rescue service select committee, under the auspices of the Communities and Local Government Committee, published its latest report.
Committee report The committee's brief is described on its website: The Communities and Local Government Committee is appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure and policy of the Department for Communities and Local Government and its associated bodies. Government response This document, the subsequent government response in September 2006, are important as they outlined progress on the FiReControl, efforts to address diversity and the planned closure of HMFSI in 2007 among many issues. Both documents are interesting as they refer back to Professor Bain's report and the many recommendations it made and continue to put forward the notion that there is an ongoing need to modernise FRSs. For example, where FRSs were inspected by HMFSI, much of this work is now carried out by the National Audit Office. Fire Control On 8 February 2010 the House of Commons Communities and Local Governm
Hawes
Hawes is a small market town and civil parish in Upper Wensleydale in the Richmondshire district of North Yorkshire, granted its market charter in 1699. In the North Riding of Yorkshire, Hawes is located at the head of Wensleydale in the Yorkshire Dales, it is known as the home to the Yorkshire Wensleydale Cheese. The population in 2011 was 887; the parish of Hawes includes the neighbouring hamlet of Gayle. The population of the full parish was 1,137 in 2011 and was estimated at 1,138 in 2016. Hawes is 31.2 miles west of the county town of Northallerton. The Wensleydale Creamery is a major producer of Yorkshire Wensleydale cheese. Described by Reader's Digest as The Village That Refused to Die, Hawes has a active non-profit community group that seeks funding and uses the money to re-open keep community amenities that were closing. There is no mention in the Domesday Book of a settlement. There is little mention of the town until the 15th century when the population had risen enough for a chapel of ease to be built.
The settlement was first recorded in 1307 as having a marketplace. The place's name is derived from the Old Norse word hals, meaning "neck" or "pass between mountains"; the town was granted a charter to hold markets by King William III in 1699. It allowed for two fairs a year. In 1887 an auction market was established in the town. In addition, five cattle fairs and three sheep fairs were held each year. Soon after, four cheese fairs spread over the year became a regular event in the town; the Richmond to Lancaster turnpike was diverted in 1795 and from on, it passed through Hawes. The Wensleydale Railway reached Hawes in 1878; the village once had a railway station, the terminus of the Hawes branch of the Midland Railway and an end-on terminus of the line from Northallerton from its opening in 1878 to its closure in April 1954. British Railways kept the line to Garsdale Junction open for passengers until 1959; the Wensleydale Railway Association which operates a heritage train has plans to rebuild the railway from Northallerton to Garsdale including re-opening the station in the village.
Hawes railway station remains in its original site, now part of the Dales Countryside Museum. Since 2015, the building has been rented to a business operating a bike shop and a cafe. In the past, a water powered mill operated in Hawes; the mills were used to produce textiles, generate electricity or saw wood. Limestone was burnt in kilns. In 1789, Gayle Mill adopted new technology, became a mechanised sawmill powered by a double-vortex turbine. In 1919, part of the mill was hired to provide electricity to the area using turbines for the generator; the mill provided electricity for the village until 1948. The town lies within the Richmond UK Parliament constituency, it lies within the Upper Dales electoral division of North Yorkshire County Council and the Hawes & High Abbotside ward of Richmondshire District Council. The civil parish shares a grouped parish council with the civil parish of High Abbotside, known as Hawes & High Abbotside Parish Council; this is an electoral ward with a combined population taken at the 2011 Census of 1,347.
The 2001 UK census showed that the population was split 50% male to 50% female. The religious constituency was made of 82% Christian, 1.5% Jewish and the rest stating no religion or not stating at all. The ethnic make-up was 97.9 % 1.3 % White other, 0.5 % Mixed ethnic and 0.3 % Chinese. There were 601 dwellings; the 2011 UK census showed. The religious constituency was made of 70.8% Christian, 3.8% Buddhist, 0.1% Muslim and the rest stating no religion or not stating at all. The ethnic make-up was 91.4% White British, 3.5% White Other, 0.3% Mixed Ethnic, 4.2% British Asian and 0.4% each British Black. There were 683 dwellings; the parish of Hawes covers the large areas of moorland on Dodd Fell, Snays Fell, Stags Fell and Widdale Fell and includes the River Ure tributaries of Widdale Beck and Gayle Beck. The latter flows through the town of Hawes. There are many abandoned lead mines and limekilns in the parish indicating its industrial past. A short distance from the town on Gayle Beck are the Aysgill Force waterfalls.
The highest point in the parish is Great Knoutberry Hill at 2,205 feet. The parish extends as far north as Hellgill Bridge along a narrow strip either side of the Ure; the civil parish of Hawes includes the neighbouring hamlets of Gayle and Burtersett. The A684 road from Sedbergh to Osmotherley passes through the town and the B6255 begins at the western edge of the town and links it to Ingleton. Hawes is on the A684 Leyburn to Sedbergh road; the M6 and the A1 to the east are under an hour away by car. Now the largest company, with a staff of 224 and visited by 250,000 people each year, the Wensleydale Creamery Centre closed down in 1992. Within six months, four ex-employees and a local businessman purchased the dormant creamery and reopened it; the operation moved to its current location in 2015 and still handcrafts the eponymous cheese using traditional recipes following those first done by French monks in the 12th century. Wensleydale Creamery has won many prestigious cheese awards, including Supreme Champion in 201
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism, evangelical Christianity, or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide, transdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity which maintains the belief that the essence of the Gospel consists of the doctrine of salvation by grace through faith in Jesus Christ's atonement. Evangelicals believe in the centrality of the conversion or "born again" experience in receiving salvation, in the authority of the Bible as God's revelation to humanity, in spreading the Christian message; the movement has had a long presence in the Anglosphere before spreading further afield in the 19th, 20th and early 21st centuries. Its origins are traced to 1738, with various theological streams contributing to its foundation, including English Methodism, the Moravian Church, German Lutheran Pietism. Preeminently, John Wesley and other early Methodists were at the root of sparking this new movement during the First Great Awakening. Today, evangelicals are found across many Protestant branches, as well as in various denominations not subsumed to a specific branch.
Among leaders and major figures of the evangelical Protestant movement were John Wesley, George Whitefield, Jonathan Edwards, Billy Graham, Bill Bright, Harold John Ockenga, John Stott and Martyn Lloyd-Jones. The movement gained great momentum during the 18th and 19th centuries with the Great Awakenings in Great Britain and the United States. In 2016, there were an estimated 619 million evangelicals in the world, meaning that one in four Christians would be classified as evangelical; the United States has the largest concentration of evangelicals in the world. American evangelicals are a quarter of the nation's population and its single largest religious group. In Great Britain, evangelicals are represented in the Methodist Church, Baptist communities, among evangelical Anglicans; some evangelical Christian denominations are grouped together in the World Evangelical Alliance. The word evangelical has its etymological roots in the Greek word for "gospel" or "good news": εὐαγγέλιον euangelion, from eu "good", angel- the stem of, among other words, angelos "messenger, angel", the neuter suffix -ion.
By the English Middle Ages, the term had expanded semantically to include not only the message, but the New Testament which contained the message, as well as more the Gospels, which portray the life and resurrection of Jesus. The first published use of evangelical in English was in 1531, when William Tyndale wrote "He exhorteth them to proceed in the evangelical truth." One year Sir Thomas More wrote the earliest recorded use in reference to a theological distinction when he spoke of "Tyndale his evangelical brother Barns". During the Reformation, Protestant theologians embraced the term as referring to "gospel truth". Martin Luther referred to the evangelische Kirche to distinguish Protestants from Catholics in the Roman Catholic Church. Into the 21st century, evangelical has continued in use as a synonym for Protestant in continental Europe, elsewhere; this usage is reflected in the names of Protestant denominations, such as the Evangelical Church in Germany and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
In the English-speaking world, evangelical was applied to describe the series of revival movements that occurred in Britain and North America during the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Christian historian David Bebbington writes that, "Although'evangelical', with a lower-case initial, is used to mean'of the gospel', the term'Evangelical', with a capital letter, is applied to any aspect of the movement beginning in the 1730s." According to the Oxford English Dictionary, evangelicalism was first used in 1831. The term may be used outside any religious context to characterize a generic missionary, reforming, or redeeming impulse or purpose. For example, the Times Literary Supplement refers to "the rise and fall of evangelical fervor within the Socialist movement". One influential definition of evangelicalism has been proposed by historian David Bebbington. Bebbington notes four distinctive aspects of evangelical faith: conversionism, biblicism and activism, noting, "Together they form a quadrilateral of priorities, the basis of Evangelicalism."Conversionism, or belief in the necessity of being "born again", has been a constant theme of evangelicalism since its beginnings.
To evangelicals, the central message of the gospel is justification by faith in Christ and repentance, or turning away, from sin. Conversion differentiates the Christian from the non-Christian, the change in life it leads to is marked by both a rejection of sin and a corresponding personal holiness of life. A conversion experience can be emotional, including grief and sorrow for sin followed by great relief at receiving forgiveness; the stress on conversion differentiates evangelicalism from other forms of Protestantism by the associated belief that an assurance of salvation will accompany conversion. Among evangelicals, individuals have testified to both gradual conversions. Biblicism is a high regard for biblical authority. All evangelicals believe in biblical inspiration, though they disagree over how this inspiration should be defined. Many evangelicals believe in biblical inerrancy, while other evangelicals believe in biblical infallibility. Crucicentrism is the centrality that evangelicals give to the Atonement, the saving death and resurrection of Jesus, that offers forgiveness of sins and new life.
This is understood most in terms of a substitutionary atonement, in which Christ died as a substitute for sinful humanity by takin
