What is a Paulician?
Paulicians are serious born-again Christians who believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the promised Messiah and the Son of God who was sent from the heavens to save the world. Though baptized believers were first called "Christians" in Antioch (Acts 11:26), we believe that baptized believers can and have been called by many other different titles the world over, all depending on the context and language at any given time. More examples from scripture include the "sect of the Nazarenes" (Acts 24:5) and the "sect of the Way" (Acts 24:14). Paulicians follow the command to be perfect, just as God in heaven is perfect (Matthew 5:48). They know that the one who is born of God does not continue to sin, but protects himself from darkness, and the evil one cannot harm him (1 John 5:18).
The term "Paulician" refers directly to the apostle Paul, the evangelist to the gentiles (Acts 9:15). A Paulician Christian is a baptized believer who places great emphasis on the teachings of Paul as found in his epistles contained within the New Testament. Paulician Christians know that the apostle Paul's writings contain some of the most difficult teachings to understand from among the biblical writers (2 Peter 3:16), which others distort in their ignorance or willfully ignore to their own shame and detriment. Yet the one who carefully learns and understands the teachings of Paul will mature magnificently into the likeness of Christ and God (Ephesians 4:14).
Holding the apostle Paul in high regard and imitating his character, Paulician Christians know that the apostle imitated Christ himself, a great angel of God (Galatians 4:14). They also recognize that false teachers have been sent into the churches to test the resolve of the flock, and that such people were already at work even in Paul's day from the beginning of his ministry, working to undermine the doctrines of Christ which the apostles diligently planted among the nations they reached. Paulician Christians, therefore, remain sober-minded and alert, understanding that cunning imposters and lukewarm believers from within the church pose the greatest danger to the salvation of the the elect. These dark ones capture the weak-minded and work diligently to quench the effort of the Holy Spirit within a baptized believer. Paulician Christians keep the spiritual armor of God on themselves at all times.
What is the history of Paulicianism?
After the first century and the destruction of Jerusalem by Roman general Titus, Christianity continued to spread rapidly and even flourished under the persecutions of the Roman empire, which kept the faithful on their feet as martyrs were commonplace under the Roman emperors Nero and Diocletian. As the years pressed on, the original church began to face greater challenges from without and within. Various false doctrines emerged which began to seriously threaten the purity of the churches, and violent disputes broke out among these churches as to what was right and wrong. The Edict of Milan in 312 AD brought an end to state sponsored persecution, and by the end of the first ecumenical council in Nicaea in 325 AD, the church had significantly changed from its humble beginnings. Paul's difficult teachings were becoming increasingly ignored and even resisted by those in positions of power.
But in remote regions such as Cappadocia in Asia Minor, north of Antioch, determined Pauline Christians would continue to live out their pure faith according to the teachings of Christ and the apostles, especially Paul. By the 7th century, the imperial state churches of Constantinople and Rome had become quite corrupt after a succession of counterproductive councils. But a certain man named Constantine, from the village of Mananalis in Anatolia, vigorously opposed these developments. After studying the Gospels and Epistles, he took it upon himself to restore the pure Christianity of Paul the Apostle and adopted the name of Silvanus, after one of Paul's disciples. At about 660 AD, he founded his first congregation at Kibossa, in western Armenia, but was arrested a few years later by imperial authorities and then put to death by stoning. After surviving a number of various difficulties in the 8th century, the Paulicians continued to grow in number and many more were brought to the faith by evangelism efforts. In 843 AD, the Byzantine empress Theodora instituted a major persecution against the Paulicians throughout Asia Minor, in which hundreds of thousands of Paulician Christians lost their lives in western Armenia alone. Following this wave of persecution and more after it, a very large number of Paulician survivors were forcibly resettled in Bulgaria by the Byzantine emperor John I Tzimiskes.
Instead of being extinguished in Thrace between Roman Catholicism and Greek Orthodoxy, the Paulicians bravely preserved their biblical doctrine and even made many new converts of the surrounding peoples. Many Paulician missionaries would travel into Europe during the years of the crusades, planting the seeds of the Gospel there which would ultimately culminate in the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century against the corruption of the Roman Catholic empire.
Why is the Paulician church returning now?
Following extensive research of Scripture in the spirit of Paul the apostle and the founder Constantine-Silvanus, it has become apparent that the churches of the present day are woefully inadequate to the standard of Scripture, and the time for a restoration of the Christian church to the core doctrines as outlined by Paul and Christ could not be more needed. In many regions today, churches have long departed from their higher standings and have fallen to various degrees of sinful secularism, completely ignoring the righteous commandment to be holy just as God is holy. Modern churches have rejected the proper codes of righteousness and instead indulge shamelessly in spiritual lawlessness among their congregations and in their domestic lives.
Our desire with the Paulician Christian Church is to truly restore the assembly to what Jesus had originally intended for it to be, where the correct spiritual doctrines are taught and maintained, church discipline is exercised without fear, and proper decency of conduct is restored with reverent hymns sung in respectable God-pleasing apparel. Scripture studies and sermons are done with the utmost respect for the sacred writings and are cleanly taught and understood on a sufficiently deeper level, for the benefit of the entire Body of Christ for the unity of mind in the purpose of truth.
Our new founders understand the scope of the doctrinal restorations that must be carried out, which will be done in full accordance with Scripture by the will of the Holy Spirit of God and Christ. The workman must make every effort to present himself approved to God, unashamed as he accurately handles the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15). The nine fruits of the Holy Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). The Paulician Church of Christ must only operate under these spiritual fruits at all times, and must be blameless and pure, without fault in a crooked and perverse generation, in which we shine as lights in the world (Philippians 2:15).
Our mission
To carry the Good News of Jesus's resurrection and victory over sin and death across the whole world, making disciples of all the nations in Jesus's Name and teaching them all that He has commanded us.
Our vision
Our vision is to bring relief to Christians who are looking for the truth but not finding it in the right places. We, the Paulicians, welcome all into the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ given unto the apostles.
