Chris"tian (?), n. [L.
christianus, Gr. ?; cf. AS. cristen. See
Christ.]
1. One who believes, or professes or is
assumed to believe, in Jesus Christ, and the truth as taught by
Him; especially, one whose inward and outward life is conformed
to the doctrines of Christ.
The disciples were called Christians first
in Antioch.
Acts xi. 26.
2. One born in a Christian country or of
Christian parents, and who has not definitely becomes an adherent
of an opposing system.
3. (Eccl.) (a) One
of a Christian denomination which rejects human creeds as bases
of fellowship, and sectarian names. They are congregational in
church government, and baptize by immersion. They are also called
Disciples of Christ, and Campbellites.
(b) One of a sect (called Christian
Connection) of open-communion immersionists. The Bible is
their only authoritative rule of faith and practice.
☞ In this sense, often pronounced, but not by the members
of the sects, krīs"chan.
Chris"tian (?), a.
1. Pertaining to Christ or his religion; as,
Christian people.
3. Pertaining to the church;
ecclesiastical; as, a Christian court.
Blackstone.
4. Characteristic of Christian people;
civilized; kind; kindly; gentle; beneficent.
The graceful tact; the Christian art.
Tennyson.
Christian Commission. See under
Commission. -- Christian court.
Same as Ecclesiastical court. --
Christian era, the present era, commencing
with the birth of Christ. It is supposed that owing to an error
of a monk (Dionysius Exiguus, d. about 556) employed to calculate
the era, its commencement was fixed three or four years too late,
so that 1890 should be 1893 or 1894. -- Christian
name, the name given in baptism, as distinct from
the family name, or surname.
Chris"tian, a. -- Christian
Endeavor, Young People's Society of. In various
Protestant churches, a society of young people organized in each
individual church to do Christian work; also, the whole body of such
organizations, which are united in a corporation called the United
Society of Christian Endeavor, organized in 1885. The parent society
was founded in 1881 at Portland, Maine, by Rev. Francis E. Clark, a
Congregational minister.