Christmas Connectionalism

In the United Methodist Church there is a concept called "connectionalism."  The idea is that every congregation is connected to each other -- not just as part of the same denomination, or even in a broadly Christian kind of way, but in a deeper way.  It harkens back, in some ways to the circuit rider days on the American frontier (when ordained ministers were in short supply, but congregations were springing up in every new community it seemed).  It also has deeper, Biblical roots (see I Corinthians 12:12, where St. Paul compares the human body to the church/body of Christ).

I thought about this today because, for a variety of reasons, in the past five years, we as a family have attended Christmas Eve services at five different Methodist churches.  For our part, it isn't because we've moved five times in five years, or indulged in something I talk about in The Mainline (church shopping), or had a falling out with minister or congregations, or anything like that.  It is just how it worked out.  One year was at our current home church, one year it was because we were visiting relatives out of town, one year we went back to the church we were married in, and twice it was because friends or family had invited us to worship with them.  All five of those services were fine in their own right, and all added to our family's preparation for celebrating Christmas.

The reason I bring it up on Christmas Eve, is that even within a denomination so devoted (on some level) to this concept of connection, there can be division.  At this time of year, we don't want to dwell on such things of course.  We should want to focus on those things that bind us together in that connection, not that which divides us (even if those issues aren't likely to go away and are very important ones to discuss).  Interestingly enough, one of the other common things that connects my personal Christmas Eves of the recent past (and for several years beyond the last five actually) has been watching the Christmas Mass from St. Peter's Basilica.  This year, was Pope Francis's first, and Time magazine's "Person of the Year" did not disappoint.

And maybe there is something to all that.  Maybe if Christians listened to the Church's various branches (whether Protestant or Catholic, connected within the same denomination or not), it would act more and more like the Body of Christ.  Maybe that would make us more willing to speak out on behalf of our fellow Christians who aren't just seeing some form of secularism or cultural apathetic persecution, but actual life and death persecution.  And perhaps, on a night like tonight, if we aren't able to listen to each other, perhaps we'll listen (in good Methodist fashion) to the angels:

Hark! The herald angels sing,
“Glory to the newborn King;
Peace on earth, and mercy mild,
God and sinners reconciled!”
Joyful, all ye nations rise,
Join the triumph of the skies;
With th’angelic host proclaim,
“Christ is born in Bethlehem!”