RCHES]

[Illustration: MAP 15 UNITED BRETHREN IN CHRIST]

[Illustration: MAP 16 PRESBYTERIAN]

[Illustration: MAP 17 BAPTIST]

[Illustration: MAP 18 DISCIPLES OF CHRIST]

[Illustration: MAP 19 LUTHERAN]

[Illustration: MAP 20 CATHOLIC]

[Illustration: MAP 21 CHRISTIAN]

[Illustration: MAP 22 METHODIST PROTESTANT]

[Illustration: MAP 23 REFORMED]

[Illustration: MAP 24 CONGREGATIONAL]

[Illustration: MAP 25 EVANGELICAL ASSOCIATION]

In Table E the Protestant churches are grouped according to their polity.
It will be seen that about 1,600 have a Congregational form of government,
in which authority rests in the local church; that in nearly 1,200
churches the polity is Presbyterian, in which authority is largely in the
local church, but partly in a representative body of several churches
grouped in districts. Under the title of "Episcopal Bodies" are grouped
denominations comprising 2,721 churches, or more than the total number of
the Presbyterian and Congregational combined.

The Methodist Protestant Churches are not placed in either of these groups
because their polity resembles, in some respects, that of the
Congregational and in others that of the Episcopal churches. Authority
with them rests largely in the local church, which owns its property and
has authority to receive and dismiss its own members, but in other
respects resembles closely the churches of the Episcopal order. In the
fourth group are 82 other churches or religious organizations which we
have failed to classify. The Catholic bodies, including Greek and Russian,
number 253.

Differences as to church polity are not sufficiently great to constitute a
dangerous obstacle to the progress of church unity among the Protestant
rural churches of Ohio. Our system of universities and public schools,
together with the custom of reading religious articles, books, and other
literature without regard to the denomination of the author, is tending to
remove theological differences as between denominations. It may be said it
has already removed them in the eleven denominations represented in the
Committee of Interchurch Cooperation. This is true whatever differences
may still exist between individuals.

TABLE E

CHURCHES GROUPED ACCORDING TO THEIR POLITY

CONGREGATIONAL BODIES

Total 1,601
Baptist, including Free, Free Will and Missionary 379
Disciples