Non-Abrahamic essentially means a religion that’s not Judaism, Christianity or Islam. There are other, smaller Abrahamic religions (eg Druze) but those are the big three. Abrahamic just means they see Abraham as the sort of forefather of their religious tradition.

Christianity is Christianity

Evangelical Protestantism is usually used in the American sense which refers to Christian fundamentalism. It’s mostly a reaction to theological liberalism and is extremely conservative, upholds biblical inerrancy and infallibility. All Protestant traditions have fundamentalist churches, though some (eg Pentecostalism) are more associated with fundamentalism than others.

Catholicism is the Catholic Church, regarding itself as the true church carrying on the tradition of the first ministry founded by Jesus Christ. All churches consider themselves the one true church though.

Mainline Protestantism is as I explained above, a U.S. phenomenon of theologically liberal and progressive churches, most of which have roots stretching back to the colonial period and are associated with WASPs. The ones that aren’t were founded by German and Scandinavian immigrants. Historically there is a greater focus on social issues.

All those abbreviations are just particular denominations within certain Protestant traditions.

The episcopal church is in the Anglican tradition. However because the king/queen of England is head of the Anglican Church, after the American revolution the church in America has to reorganize and remove the monarch of England as their head, so they reorganized under a hierarchy of bishops. Episcopalian refers to the form of church government, while in terms of theology they are Anglican.

PCUSA is Presbyterian Church USA. Similar to Episcopalian, Presbyterian refers to a form of church government rather than theological tradition. The Presbyterian church is governed by a body of elected elders (or presbyters) - in contrast to the episcopal church above which is governed by bishops. Presbyterianism was founded by John Knox, a student of John Calvin, and so it is in the Reformed/Calvinist theological tradition. John Knox was Scottish and helped create the Church of Scotland which is Presbyterian, so Presbyterianism is often considered a Scottish phenomenon, though with great influence from John Calvin and Geneva.

ELCA is the evangelical Lutheran church in America. Evangelical has like a bunch of definitions, one of which is a synonym of fundamentalism as above. However Martin Luther used “evangelische” to refer to his church, essentially meaning adherence to the gospel. One of the most important Lutheran (and Reformed) doctrines is sola scriptura. Catholics upheld sacred tradition along with scripture, and this was something Luther took issue with. Luther subordinates tradition to scripture and it is in this sense that “evangelical” is used - putting utmost importance on gospel as opposed to the Catholic traditions. It goes without saying the ELCA is Lutheran. It mostly comes from churches founded by colonial era German immigrants, merged with those founded by 19th century Scandinavian immigrants.

UCC is United church of Christ. It is a merger of a bunch of different churches. One is the Congregationalist churches. Similar to Presbyterianism, congregationalism is more of a form of church government within the reformed tradition. In a lot of ways it traces its history to the puritans of New England. Another church that makes up the UCC is the German Reformed Church, which is as the name says a Reformed church. Founded by colonial era German immigrants. Then there is the German Evangelical Synod in North America.

On the continent of Europe historically the two most important Protestant traditions are Lutheranism, founded by Martin Luther, and the Reformed tradition, founded by Ulrich Zwingli. Both theologians (among others) come together at the Marburg Colloquy to attempt to unify Protestant theology. As a unified force Protestants would exert greater political power to better oppose the Habsburgs and the Catholic Church. Luther and Zwingli could reach agreement on nearly everything except the Eucharist, with Luther holding to the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, and Zwingli taking the position that it is essentially just symbolic. The churches are not unified. All this to set out the idea that from the beginning there are attempts to unify the Protestant churches.

In the 18th century pietism is a growing movement in Germany. Pietism essentially puts less importance on doctrine while putting the most importance on an individual’s relationship with Christ. Similar to many Pentecostal churches today I guess. But because of the influence of pietism, with a looser attitude towards theological doctrine, along with state attempts at centralization, the reformed and Lutheran churches in the various German states are able to merge into unified churches through the early 1800s. When the massive wave of German immigrants comes to the USA in the 19th century it is this unified church that comes with them. The German Evangelical church essentially holds to the Small Catechism and the Augsburg Confession (Lutheran) and the Heidelberg Catechism (Reformed) and says where there is disagreement the individual is free to believe whatever tradition.

There are a couple other churches that merge into the UCC, including a couple of Black churches I believe, but I think you get the gist of the ucc.

UMC is United Methodist Church. I…don’t know a lot about Methodism other than John Wesley is the founder, it comes from England and they’re really into the Holy Spirit. Methodism emerges out of the Anglican tradition.

ABCUSA is American Baptist Churches USA. They’re baptists, they do believers baptism (as opposed to infant baptism). Idk too much about them. There is some debate about what tradition baptists actually emerge from, but I believe the dominant view today is that they emerge from the various English dissenter groups trying to reform the Church of England (Anglican) - the same groups from which the New England puritans emerge.

DOC is disciples of Christ. I know even less about the restorationist movement than I do about Baptists and Methodism, but of the seven sisters it is this tradition which has the most recent founding date, coming out of the Second Great Awakening of the early 19th century. All of the other seven sisters have traditions that have some precedence in Europe; this is the only of the seven sisters that has no real connection to any european religious movement, being a purely American phenomenon. While I called them Restorationist above, they are specifically Stone-Campbell Restorationists. Restorationism just refers to beliefs that modern Christianity has strayed too far from the beliefs and practices of the early church and an earlier and purer form of Christianity must be restored. The Second Great Awakening as a whole is restorationist, in fact the whole Protestant reformation can be seen as restorationist.

It is important to note that these churches are only specific denominations within their tradition. For example, while the pcusa can be socially progressive and comes out of progressive tendencies within Presbyterianism, there are also conservative tendencies in Presbyterianism (the PCA being the largest conservative Presbyterian church in the USA), and the fundamentalist movement began partially in certain presbyterian churches. Similar to how ABCUSA might be overall progressive, but when most of us hear Baptist we probably think of the southern Baptist convention, today an extremely conservative organization, or maybe the Westboro Baptist Church.

WASPs are white Anglo Saxon Protestants. Historically making up the ruling class in the USA.

Pentecostalism comes in a lot of ways out of the Azusa street revival in Los Angeles in the early 20th century. As I alluded to above, there is a lot of importance placed on the direct experience with God. Speaking in tongues is big with them. The above post talking about evangelicalism in Latin America is probably reacting to experiences with Pentecostalism, which is very actively trying to spread in the global south. It can in many ways be seen as emerging from Methodism, specifically the Holiness Movement. Pentecostalism shares with fundamentalism a belief in biblical inerrancy and infallibility.

Jehovahs witnesses also emerge in the early 20th century in the USA. They are the youngest tradition on this list. They ultimately emerge from the beliefs of Charles Taze Russell who was very much influenced by Adventism, a tradition emerging from the Second Great Awakening like Stone-Campbell Restorationism above, though the Jehovah’s Witnesses have changed a lot from Russell’s original traditions, especially influenced by Russell’s successor Joseph Franklin Rutherford. Today many Christians do not consider Jehovah’s Witnesses Christians since their beliefs are so radically different.

i just watch that one Emo Phillips sketch