Find an Evangelical sub-tradition
Each sub-tradition below opens a deep page covering beliefs, practice, internal diversity, and contested areas. Cross-links between sub-tradition pages avoid duplication: COGIC is treated on the African-American Evangelical page; the historic Black Baptist conventions are treated there as well; Reformed Baptist distinctives are treated on the Reformed Evangelical page.
- African-American Evangelical The Black Christian tradition in the US: the seven historic Black Baptist conventions (NBC USA Inc., NBCA, PNBC, NMBC, others), the Church of God in Christ (COGIC, the largest predominantly-Black Pentecostal body, approximately 5.5M), the AME / AME Zion / CME Methodist family, Black non-denominational and Black Pentecostal-Charismatic streams. The contested identity question (whether the Black Church is best understood as Evangelical, as the Black Church as its own category, or as a distinct theological orientation) is named per Decision 10.
- Baptist The substantial US Baptist tradition. Southern Baptist Convention (SBC, approximately 13M, the largest US Protestant denomination), American Baptist Churches USA (ABCUSA), Cooperative Baptist Fellowship (CBF), Independent Baptists, Free Will / Primitive / General Baptists, the historic Black Baptist conventions (cross-linked to the African-American Evangelical page). Distinctives: sola scriptura, believer's baptism by immersion, soul competency, congregational governance, the Lord's Supper as memorial, religious liberty. Contested areas including women's ordination, the SBC sexual-abuse reckoning, the CRT / Resolution 9 conversation, Calvinism within the SBC, and LGBTQ+ inclusion.
- Non-denominational Evangelical The fastest-growing US Christian category: local churches that are not affiliated with a Christian denomination. The substantial megachurches (Lakewood, Life.Church, Elevation, Saddleback, North Point, Church of the Highlands), the multi-site / video venue / network church-planting model (Acts 29, ARC, Calvary Chapel, Vineyard), the substantial brand-of-church entities (Hillsong, Bethel, Elevation, Passion), and the substantial small / storefront congregations that hold most non-denominational Evangelical Christianity by count. Contested areas including celebrity-pastor accountability, denominational-structure protective function, megachurch-as-organization vs church-as-community.
- Pentecostal The US Pentecostal tradition rooted in the 1906 Azusa Street Revival. Assemblies of God (AOG, approximately 3M), International Church of the Foursquare Gospel (approximately 1.8M), Church of God Cleveland TN (COG, approximately 1M), Pentecostal Holiness Church, United Pentecostal Church International (UPCI, Oneness Pentecostal, approximately 1M, theologically distinct from Trinitarian Pentecostalism), the Charismatic movement (Pentecostal practice within non-Pentecostal denominations), Vineyard, Word of Faith. COGIC is cross-linked to the African-American Evangelical page. Contested areas including cessationist vs continuationist, prosperity gospel, women in ministry, Oneness vs Trinitarian, televangelism.
- Reformed Evangelical Reformed theology (sola scriptura, the doctrines of grace TULIP, covenant theology, the regulative principle) within broader Evangelical orientation. Reformed Baptist (Founders Ministries within SBC, ARBCA, Sovereign Grace Churches, 1689 confession), Reformed Presbyterian (PCA, OPC, EPC, smaller bodies), the coalitional "young restless Reformed" identity (The Gospel Coalition founded 2005 by Tim Keller and D.A. Carson, Together for the Gospel 2006-2022, 9Marks), the MacArthur orientation (Grace Community Church, The Master's Seminary), the Reformed-Charismatic synthesis, and the Moscow Idaho adjacency. Contested areas including the complementarianism debate, the Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel (2018) divide, the MacArthur-vs-progressive-Reformed dynamics, the Gospel Coalition post-Keller succession.
The Bebbington Evangelical framework
The working definition of Evangelical identity widely cited across these pages is the Bebbington quadrilateral (David Bebbington, 1989): four marks that distinguish Evangelical Christianity across denominational lines. Biblicism, the Bible as supreme authority for faith and practice. Crucicentrism, the cross of Christ as the center of salvation. Conversionism, the necessity of personal conversion. Activism, the active expression of the gospel in evangelism and service. The four marks hold across the five sub-traditions while theological, liturgical, and cultural differences distinguish them. Each sub-tradition page addresses the Bebbington framework as it applies to that particular tradition.
What these pages do not currently cover
The five sub-traditions above cover the substantial majority of US Evangelical Christianity. Smaller Evangelical streams (Wesleyan-Holiness bodies including the Church of the Nazarene, the Wesleyan Church, the Free Methodist Church; the substantive Mennonite, Brethren, and Anabaptist-Evangelical streams; the substantial Hispanic Evangelical Christianity that overlaps Pentecostal and Reformed streams; the Asian- American Evangelical communities; smaller Reformed bodies; the substantial Messianic Jewish congregations) are named where they appear within the sub-tradition pages but are not given separate page treatment in this Phase. Phase 3.7 and later phases may expand coverage.
Cross-tradition relationships
The boundaries between the five sub-traditions are sometimes porous. African-American Evangelical congregations are often Baptist (the historic Black Baptist conventions) or Pentecostal (COGIC) in formal denominational identity while substantially distinct in theology, worship culture, and self-understanding. Non-denominational Evangelical congregations often hold Baptist practice on baptism and the Lord's Supper. Reformed Evangelical is a theological orientation that crosses denominational structures (Reformed Baptists are Baptists; Reformed Presbyterians are Presbyterian; coalitional Reformed Evangelicalism is cross-denominational). The page-level treatment addresses the cross-tradition relationships through cross-links and substantive discussion within each sub-tradition page.