Protestant Church in the Netherlands

Protestant Church in the Netherlands
Classification	Protestant
Orientation	United church
Polity	Mixture of presbyterian and congregationalist
Associations	Conference of European Churches World Communion of Reformed Churches Communion of Protestant Churches in Europe Lutheran World Federation World Council of Churches
Origin	1 May 2004 Netherlands
Merger of	Dutch Reformed Church Reformed Churches in the Netherlands Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands
Separations	Restored Reformed Church Continued Reformed Churches in the Netherlands (newly organized denominations; refused to participate in the merger)
Congregations	1,487
Members	1.5 million (8.6% of the population)[1]
Official website	www.protestantsekerk.nl

The Protestant Church in the Netherlands (Dutch: de Protestantse Kerk in Nederland, abbreviated PKN) is the largest Protestant denomination in the Netherlands, being both Calvinist and Lutheran.

It was founded on 1 May 2004 as the merger of the vast majority of the Dutch Reformed Church, the vast majority of the Reformed Churches in the Netherlands, and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Kingdom of the Netherlands.^[2][3] The merger was the culmination of an organizational process started in 1961. Several orthodox Reformed and liberal churches did not merge into the new church.

The Protestant Church in the Netherlands (PKN) forms the country's second largest Christian denomination after the Catholic Church, with approximately 1.5 million members as per the church official statistics or some 8.6% of the population in 2021.^[1] It is the traditional faith of the Dutch Royal Family – a remnant of historical dominance of the Dutch Reformed Church, the main predecessor of the Protestant Church.