Cambridge Platform

The Cambridge Platform is a statement describing the system of church government in the Congregational churches of colonial New England. It was written in 1648 in response to Presbyterian criticism and eventually came regarded as the religious constitution of Massachusetts. The platform explained and defended the practice of congregational polity in New England and also endorsed the majority of the Westminster Confession of Faith. The document was shaped primarily by the thinking of Puritan ministers Richard Mather and John Cotton.