State Church
State churches are organizational bodies within a Christian denomination which are given official status or operated by a state.
State churches are not necessarily national churches in the ethnic sense of the term, but the two concepts may overlap in the case of a nation state where the state boundary largely corresponds to the distribution of a single ethnic group to which a certain denomination is attached as an aspect of ethnic identity. State churches, by contrast, may also be minority denominations which are given political recognition by the state.
Read more about State Church: Denmark, Greece, Iceland, Tuvalu, United Kingdom
Famous quotes containing the words state and/or church:
“If a hermit lives in a state of ecstasy, his lack of comfort becomes the height of comfort. He must relinquish it.”
—Jean Cocteau (1889–1963)
“I have a good eye, uncle; I can see a church by daylight.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)