Ecclesiology with Unintended Consequences

This article explores how the growth of international Pentecostal local churches has impacted the native Classical Pentecostal movement in Sweden, Pingströrelsen, in the Stockholm Region. Pentecostal immigration, and the resulting growth of international Pentecostalism, is analysed from the perspective of Pingströrelsen and with the help of church historical methodology. The ecclesiology of Pingströrelsen was developed in the 1910s. It was a radical congregationalism emphasizing the possibilities of Christian unity and effective evangelism on the local level and presumed a homogeneous population. But Pingströrelsen’s early inroads among old national minorities displayed an openness to adapt to a more culturally diverse situation. Pingströrelsen proved a readiness to accommodate the immigration of Finnish Pentecostals after the Second World War within the movement. They were allowed to create worship groups under the umbrella of a mother church and later they could start their own autonomous churches, while at the same time being a part of the movement. This occurred although the practical ecclesiology developed in a restrictive direction, dissuading the founding of new churches in cities were local churches belonging Pingströrelsen already existed. When later the immigration of Roma and Latino Pentecostals increased, they were accommodated in the same way. But no autonomous Roma or Latino churches were founded before 1997, probably because of the restrictive ecclesiology. From 2001, Pingströrelsen has abandoned this ecclesiology and developed a legal denominational structure with a process for new member churches, networks for pastors and acceptance of transnational networks of local churches. This has facilitated the integration of a growing number of international churches. But at the present a majority of the local international Pentecostal churches in Stockholm are not part of Pingströrelsen.