You may be asking "What is the relevance of 'denominational studies'  in a post-denominational age?"

Quite a lot actually!

It is not wrong to say this is a post-denominational era, but the implications we draw from the observation are important.

These days although family traditions and childhood experience of church matter, many committed Christians are more interested in whether a congregation feels spiritually right for them than whether they or it belong to a particular denomination. 

As a result we have many in Presbyterian churches who do not identify with the word "Presbyterian".

Sometimes this is a fruit of greater ecumenical understanding of other Christian traditions, sometimes it is a willingness to let bygones be bygones, or because the denomination as a whole is perceived as supporting things they disagree with. Often it is because the search for a place of worship which meets a person's needs is intensely personal and very specific. With some important exceptions and boundaries, those needs are often more defined by the character of the local congregation than they are by the tradition as a whole.

Recognizing the gifts people bring to our church from other denominations and from their personal experience of God is important. However for those called into leadership, commitment to the present and future of the even just the local church, never mind its regional, national and global dimensions, requires an understanding of it's heritage. We cannot understand who we are if we do not know where we have come from - whether we like everything in our heritage or not. While it is a good thing to avoid defining ourselves against others, particularly in terms of past conflicts, or in terms of dominant cultures be they ethnic, modern or postmodern, responsible leadership involves helping people navigate all these elements which affect our identity, worship and mission.

A church today that is relevant to its own times cannot sustain that relevance, or deal appropriately with controversy, if it does not pay attention to the patterns of belief, processes of decision-making, and systems for conflict resolution, that come to us from the past as well as those which arise out of our contemporary life and culture.

If you find yourself in a Presbyterian church you may want to understand where it came from - and if you don't you may still be curious!

People with a Presbyterian background, whatever their present commitments, will find something of themselves in this story. This website is about understanding, not about promoting denominationalism. Perhaps we also need to say that the views expressed are not necessarily those of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand!

Presbyterianism has at times been a promise of power and enlightenment for all people, it has also been seen as an inhumane faith and a political threat.

The first rector of the High School in Dunedin, Rev Frank Simmons, a Scottish Episcopalian, was forced to resign after describing Presbyterianism as "the driest, narrowest, least humane of all religions." A H McLintok, The History of Otago, 1949, p.510.

After the American Revolution, a loyalist, Thomas Jones complained about a "Triumvrate of Presbyterians" in New York who had "subverted the best constitution in the world, and upon its ruins erected presbyterianism, republicanism and hypocrisy." (Quoted in Joseph S Tiedemann, "Presbyterians and the American Revolution in the Middle Colonies," Church History 74(2) June 2005, p306.

I hope that you will also discover it is as a living tradition, and even as a means of grace, one which still offers renewal and hope as a way of being Christian in changing circumstances.