The Kiribati Protestant Church (KPC) (formerly the Gilbert Islands Protestant Church) is a Congregationalist

Congregationalist polity

Congregationalist polity, often known as congregationalism, is a system of church governance in which every local church congregation is independent, ecclesiastically sovereign, or "autonomous"...

 Protestant Christian

Christian

A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

 denomination in Kiribati

Kiribati

Kiribati , officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. The permanent population exceeds just over 100,000 , and is composed of 32 atolls and one raised coral island, dispersed over 3.5 million square kilometres, straddling the...

. With approximately 40,000 members, the KPC is the second-largest religious group in Kiribati and accounts for approximately 36 percent of the population of the country.

Protestant missionaries sent by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions

American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions

The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions was the first American Christian foreign mission agency. It was proposed in 1810 by recent graduates of Williams College and officially chartered in 1812. In 1961 it merged with other societies to form the United Church Board for World...

 first arrived in Kiribati in 1857, and missionaries from the London Missionary Society

London Missionary Society

The London Missionary Society was a non-denominational missionary society formed in England in 1795 by evangelical Anglicans and Nonconformists, largely Congregationalist in outlook, with missions in the islands of the South Pacific and Africa...

 arrived in 1870. The Protestant converts were served by visiting Samoa

Samoa

Samoa , officially the Independent State of Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in...

n pastor

Pastor

The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....

s until 1968, when the first general assembly of the Gilbert Islands Protestant Church met to organise an autonomous church. In 1979, when the Gilbert Islands was renamed Kiribati, the church changed its name to the Kiribati Protestant Church.

The KPC is a member of the World Council of Churches

World Council of Churches

The World Council of Churches is a worldwide fellowship of 349 global, regional and sub-regional, national and local churches seeking unity, a common witness and Christian service. It is a Christian ecumenical organization that is based in the Ecumenical Centre in Geneva, Switzerland...

, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches

World Alliance of Reformed Churches

The World Alliance of Reformed Churches is a fellowship of more than 200 churches with roots in the 16th-century Reformation, and particularly in the theology of John Calvin...

, and the Council for World Mission

Council for World Mission

The Council for World Mission is a worldwide community of Christian churches. The 31 members share their resources of money, people, skills and insights to carry out their missionary work.CWM was established in 1977 in its present form...

. The pastors for the KPC are trained at Tangintebu Theological College, which is owned by the church.

External links

• Thomas Scarborough, Kiribati Protestant Church (K.P.C.) : 2003 report on the church from a South African missionary from the London Missionary Society