'''Anglikanisme''' merupakan satu tradisi kepercayaan agama [[Kristian]]. Gereja-gereja dalam tradisi ini sama ada mempunyai hubungan sejarah dengan [[Gereja England]] atau mempunyai kepercayaan, ibadat, dan struktur gereja yang mirip.<ref name="cofe">{{cite web | url=http://www.cofe.anglican.org/faith/anglican/ | title=What it means to be an Anglican | Church of England | accessdate=2009-03-16}}</ref> Perkataan ''Anglikan'' berasal daripada ''ecclesia anglicana'', satu frasa Bahasa Latin zaman pertengahan bertarikh ke sekurang-kurangnya tahun 1246 bermaksud ''Gereja Inggeris''. Para penganut Anglikanisme digelar sebagai ''Anglicans''. Kebanyakan besar Anglikan merupakan ahli kepada gereja-gereja yang merupakan sebahagian daripada [[Anglican Communion]] antarabangsa.<ref name="acomm">{{cite web | url=http://www.anglicancommunion.org/ | title=The Anglican Communion Official Website - Home Page | accessdate=2009-03-16}}</ref> Namun terdapat sesetengah gereja di luar Anglican Communion yang juga menganggap mereka sendiri dalam tradisi Anglikan, yang paling terkenal ialah mereka yang dirujuk sebagai gereja-gereja [[Anglikan Berterusan]].
The faith of Anglicans is founded in the scriptures, the traditions of the apostolic church, the [[apostolic succession]] – "historic episcopate" and the early Church Fathers.<ref name="cofe" /> Anglicanism forms one of the branches of [[Western Christianity]]; having definitively declared its independence from the Roman pontiff at the time of the [[Elizabethan Religious Settlement]]. The earliest Anglican formularies corresponded closely to those of contemporary [[Reformed]] [[Protestantism]]; but by the end of the 16th century, the retention in Anglicanism of many traditional liturgical forms and of the episcopate was already seen as unacceptable by those promoting the most developed Protestant principles. In the first half of the 17th century the Church of England and associated episcopal churches in Ireland and in England's American colonies were presented by some Anglican divines as comprising a distinct Christian tradition, with theologies, structures and forms of worship representing a middle ground, or ''via media'', between Reformed Protestantism and Roman Catholicism; a perspective that came to be highly influential in later theories of Anglican identity. Following the [[American Revolution]], Anglican congregations in the United States and [[Canada]] were each reconstituted into an independent church with their own bishops and self-governing structures; which, through the expansion of the [[British Empire]] and the activity of [[Christian missions]], was adopted as the model for many newly formed churches, especially in [[Africa]], [[Australasia]] and the regions of the [[Pacific]]. In the 19th century the term ''Anglicanism'' was coined to describe the common religious tradition of these churches; as also that of the [[Scottish Episcopal Church]], which, though originating earlier within the [[Church of Scotland]], had come to be recognised as sharing this common identity.
The degree of distinction between Reformed and western Catholic tendencies within the Anglican tradition is routinely a matter of debate both within specific Anglican churches and throughout the ''[[Anglican Communion]]''. Unique to ''Anglicanism'' is the ''[[Book of Common Prayer]]'', the collection of services that worshippers in most Anglican churches used for centuries. While it has since undergone many revisions and Anglican churches in different countries have developed other service books, the ''Prayer Book'' is still acknowledged as one of the ties that bind the ''Anglican Communion'' together. There is no single ''Anglican Church'' with universal juridical authority, since each national or regional church has full autonomy. As the name suggests, the ''Anglican Communion'' is an association of those churches in [[full communion]] with the [[Archbishop of Canterbury]].<ref name="ODCC">The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church by F. L. Cross (Editor), E. A. Livingstone (Editor) Oxford University Press, USA; 3 edition p.65 (March 13, 1997)</ref> With over eighty<ref name="acomm" /> million members the Anglican Communion is the third largest Christian communion in the world, after the [[Roman Catholic Church]] and the [[Eastern Orthodox Church]].
