The United Church of Christ in Japan (UCCJ) (Japanese: 日本キリスト教団, Nihon Kirisuto Kyōdan) is the largest Protestant denomination in Japan. It was a union of thirty three diverse Protestant religious bodies forcibly brought together by the Japanese wartime government on June 24, 1941.The UCCJ is a member of the World Council of Churches (WCC).
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With the establishment of religious freedom by the Allied Occupation Forces in 1946, many groups left the Kyōdan to reestablish their prewar denominational identities. The most significant departures were the Anglican Church in Japan, the Japan Lutheran Church, Japan Baptist Convention, Japan Holiness Church, Japan Assemblies of God plus numerous smaller Evangelical churches.
The controversy had both theological and nontheological roots, some tending back into an earlier period. The union's wartime origin and the church's self-acknowledged complicity in the war were called into question [2] While the 1954 Confession of Faith, a doctrinal statement, clarified the postwar church's identity, many cite the 1967 Confession of responsibility During World War II as recovering the church's integrity, by openly dealing with the church's wartime role.
Twenty six UCCJ missionaries now serve in eleven overseas lands in a variety of ministries, a heritage begun when the first postwar missionary was sent to Brazil in 1957.
United Church of Christ in Japan permits openly gay and lesbian and transsexual female pastor to act as ministers.
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