Headline

 Kairos, not Chronos:

 What were the founders of the United Church of Christ thinking? Or not thinking? Imagine choosing a year like 1957 as your birth date! It's not even an even number-let alone a decimal number. And, besides, it's the Fifties.... Conservatism, conformity, and consumerism. Give us a break!

It's true. The men and women who formed the United Church of Christ fifty years ago weren't thinking about the time of day or the date of the month or even the year. That's chronos, quantitative, measurable time. No, when representatives of the Evangelical and Reformed Church and the Congregational Christian Churches joined hands in Cleveland half century ago, they seized a moment when conditions were right for something decisive to happen. That's kairos qualitative, non-metric time. It's the appointed time in the purpose of God, such as the instant when Jesus proclaimed the good news in Galilee saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near" (Mark 1:15a).

From where we stand fifty years later we can appreciate more than ever what a miracle that moment really was. After all, if bringing together two separate and very distinct  branches of Protestantism was so easy, why hadn't it been done before? And why hasn't it happened since?

Human history is full of conflict and discord. Indeed, division is so common in the church that there is a special word for it: schism. Those kinds of events come around again and again. That's chronos. But when leaders in two denominations set their minds and hearts on reconciliation and then carry through on the promise it's a once-in-a-lifetime event. That's kairos.

Our founders didn't necessarily see it that way. They hoped to multiply the miracle with other denominational mergers. It hasn't turned out that way so far. Instead, alas, there have been more schisms and rumors of schisms in Protestantism since 1957 including the schism within the Congregational Christian Churches which lead to the formation of the NACCC.

The NACCC was formed in opposition to the UCC.  When the UCC was formed, 90% of all Congregational churches joined the UCC.  The other 10% were those who somehow felt that the merger would create unwieldy bureaucracies that might impinge upon the historic freedom of the local congregation.  These concerns drove activists, beginning after World War II when talks between the national entities of the two churches reached the point of preliminary organization planning, to persuade local Congregational Christian churches to refuse their support to this movement. These clergy and lay people first organized at a meeting in Evanston, Ill. in 1947 to express their concerns about not only the possible loss of autonomy on behalf of individual churches, but also their contentions that the General Council of the CC Churches possessed no authority to enter its churches into any legal union with another denomination. Other related issues were control over missionary funds and a possible diversion of some of them into ministerial pension annuities; fears of imposition of creeds, confessions, and neo-orthodox theology onto their ministers (who generally favored a 19th-century liberal, tolerant outlook); and ownership of church property in cases of congregations withdrawing from the proposed UCC.

When the CC national General Council adopted a "Basis of Union" with the E&R Church in 1948, the dissenters organized into two groups: the Committee for the Continuation of Congregational Christian Churches, formed by the pastor of Los Angeles' First Congregational Church; and the League to Uphold Congregational Principles, led by a Hartford, Ct. pastor, Henry Gray. These two groups conducted, with the assistance of Dr. Malcolm K. Burton of Maine's Bangor Theological Seminary, an extensive pamphlet and church-meeting campaign to forestall the merger process, despite the General Council's and the E&R General Synod's revision of the Basis in favor of explicit congregational autonomy.

When these efforts only produced a small minority of sympathizers, some "continuing" clergy and lay people in a Brooklyn congregation decided to take legal action, suing CC moderator Helen Kenyon in 1949, in order to place a legal restraint on the process. Some years later, after appellate courts reversed the lower court's finding in favor of the merger opponents, the activists turned instead to forming a new fellowship, with no legal claims to any portion of the assets of the majority; all Congregational-heritage colleges but one approved the UCC merger as well, which finally took place in 1957.

The NACCC has cordial relationships with a number of state and regional Congregational associations. These, however, are independent of the National Association, and the NA is likewise independent of them. Many Congregational Christian Churches choose to belong to both the NA and a state or regional association, but they are not required to belong to either. While not required to join the NACCC, our church joined the NACCC in 2007, so that Reverend Eaton could retain his position as editor of the Congregationalist magazine. Yet, Reverend Eaton was still dismissed as editor the following year.

As a united and uniting church, we pray also that the churches of the NACCC will follow our lead and join the UCC, so that we may "All be One."

Only the Still-speaking God knows if the next fifty years will bring another kairos moment in our life as the United Church of Christ. But we know what a difference that first one made, and we give thanks for it.

For the United Church of Christ/Congregational Family Tree, Click Here.