History of Scottish dissentng Presbyterianism in Lancaster County, PA : an account of Associate, Associate Reformed, and United Presbyterian Church of North America clergy and congregations
"America’'s Dissenting Presbyterians have somewhat difficult histories to understand but basically they are unified in this fact, for some reason, they chose to separate from the Church of Scotland, and upon arriving in America they could not in good conscience join the mainline Presbyterian Church...There are today only two groups of dissenting Presbyterians left in the United States and they are the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America. Both have different yet somewhat similar histories. The Reformed Presbyterians are known as “Covenanters†they are the Society people that at the time of Revolution Settlement could not in good conscience go back into the Church of Scotland. The Associate Reformed Presbyterians or ARP are a merger of two Presbyterian groups, the Associate Church and the Reformed Presbyterians, to form a uniquely Scottish and American Presbyterian Church in the United States. The things that set the Dissenting Presbyterians apart from their mainline counterparts were strict confessional adherence to the point of becoming in many ways countercultural, holding strictly to the Regulative Principle of Worship, and never assimilating as quickly into American Society as their mainline counterparts." [https://purelypresbyterian.com/2017/09/23/americas-dissenting-presbyterian-heritage/]
