Editing Methodism (section)

====Italy====
[[File:Ponte - memoria Gavazzi e chiesa evangelica 1130333.JPG|thumb|The Methodist chapel in [[Rome]] houses Italian and English-speaking congregations.]]

The [[Methodist Evangelical Church in Italy|Italian Methodist Church]] ({{langx|it|Chiesa Metodista Italiana}}) is a small Protestant community in Italy,<ref>{{cite web |title=Opera per le Chiese Metodiste in Italia |url=http://www.metodisti.it/cms/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131023053809/http://www.metodisti.it/cms/ |archive-date=23 October 2013 |access-date=22 April 2013 |publisher=Evangelical Methodist Church in Italy |language=it |df=dmy-all}}</ref> with around 7,000 members.<ref name="italy1">{{cite web|title=La diaspora Valdese |url=http://www.chiesavaldese.org/pages/storia/dove_viviamo.php |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120724023747/http://www.chiesavaldese.org/pages/storia/dove_viviamo.php |url-status=dead |archive-date=24 July 2012 |publisher=Chiesa Evangelica Valdese |access-date=22 April 2013 |language=it }}</ref> Since 1975, it is in a formal covenant of [[Union of Methodist and Waldensian Churches|partnership with the Waldensian Church]], with a total of 45,000 members.<ref name="italy1" /> [[Waldensians]] are a Protestant movement which started in [[Lyon]], France, in the late 1170s.

Italian Methodism has its origins in the Italian Free Church, British [[Wesleyan Methodist Church (Great Britain)|Wesleyan Methodist]] Missionary Society, and the [[American Methodist Episcopal Mission]]. These movements flowered in the second half of the 19th century in the new climate of political and religious freedom that was established with the end of the [[Papal States]] and unification of Italy in 1870.<ref name="Italy">{{cite web|title=Italian fact sheet|url=http://www.methodist.org.uk/downloads/wc_italian_factsheet.doc|publisher=The Methodist Church in Britain|access-date=22 April 2013|format=Microsoft Word document}}</ref>

[[Bertrand M. Tipple]], minister of the American Methodist Church in Rome, founded a college there in 1914.<ref>{{cite news| url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1914/01/26/100671159.pdf | work=The New York Times | title=Methodists buy Rome Site; Will Build a College in Connection with Mission Work | date=26 January 1914}}</ref>

In April 2016, the World Methodist Council opened an Ecumenical Office in Rome. Methodist leaders and the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, [[Pope Francis]], jointly dedicated the new office.<ref>{{cite web|title=World Methodist Council opens new ecumenical office in Rome|url=http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2016/04/06/world_methodist_council_opens_new_ecumenical_office_in_rome/1220756|website=en.radiovaticana.va|publisher=Vatican Radio|access-date=21 May 2016|date=6 April 2016}}</ref> It helps facilitate Methodist relationships with the wider Church, especially the Roman Catholic Church.<ref>{{cite web|title=About the Methodist Ecumenical Office Rome|url=http://www.methodist.org.uk/who-we-are/relationships-with-other-denominations/ecumenism-in-europe/the-methodist-ecumenical-office-rome/about-the-methodist-ecumenical-office-rome|publisher=Methodist Church in Britain|access-date=21 May 2016}}</ref>