The Catholic Apostolic Church, a religious movement…

July 1835 CE

The Catholic Apostolic Church, a religious movement that originated in England around 1831 and will later spread to Germany and the United States, is organized, initially in the U.K., on July 14, 1835, under the lead of apostles.

While often referred to as Irvingism or the Irvingian movement, it was neither actually founded nor anticipated by Edward Irving.

The impulse to the prayer movement in the 1820s had been given (among others) by the Anglican priest James Haldane Stewart, who made an appeal to this by means of more than half a million pamphlets which were spread throughout Great Britain, the United States and Europe.

They longed for renewed spiritual power, as had been visible in the first century after the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in the young church.

This movement was by no means restricted to the British Isles, with similar investigations and prayers being offered in France, Germany and elsewhere.

In the same period, the Presbyterian John McLeod Campbell preached in Scotland, contrary to the prevailing Calvinist orthodoxy, that Christ died for the salvation of all (unlimited atonement) and not only for a small, predetermined group of individuals known as the "elect" (limited atonement).

In 1830, prophetic utterances had been recorded in Port Glasgow, Scotland, among dissenters and Karlshuld, Bavaria, among Roman Catholics.

Taking the form of prophecy, speaking in tongues and miraculous healing, these were regarded as the answer to the prayers many had prayed.

These occurrences spread in Scotland and England where certain ministers allowed their practice, although they were not approved of by existing church authorities.

However, they died out in Bavaria under the opposition of the responsible clergy.

Edward Irving, also a minister in the Church of Scotland and supporter of Campbell, had preached in his church at Regent Square in London on the speedy return of Jesus Christ and the real substance of his human nature.

He had attracted thousands of listeners, even from the highest circles, and during his summer tours in Scotland (1827, 1828) believers came to listen to him with tens of thousands in attendance.

Irving's relationship to this community was, according to its members, somewhat similar to that of John the Baptist to the early Christian Church.

He was hailed by his followers as the forerunner of a coming dispensation, not the founder of a new sect.

Around him, as well as around other congregations of different origins, coalesced persons who had been driven out of other churches, wanting to "exercise their spiritual gifts".

Shortly after Irving's trial and deposition (1831), he restarted meetings in a hired hall in London, and much of his original congregation followed him.

These, over the course of the next two years, accepting the presence of restored "apostles" and guided by claimed words of prophecy, saw Edward Irving officially installed as their bishop.

This congregation became known as the "Central Church", one of seven that were defined in London as forming a pattern of the whole Christian Church.

Within these congregations, over the course of a short time, six persons were designated as apostles by certain others who claimed prophetic gifts.

In 1835, six months after Irving's death, six others had been similarly designated as called to complete the number of the twelve.

Since all those so designated are acting to one degree or another in local congregations, they are now formally separated from these duties, by the bishops of the seven congregations, to occupy their higher office in the universal church on July 14, 1835.