The United Church of Christ, of which our church is a member, is made up of 4 tributaries, coming out of the Protestant Reformation:  The Evangelical and the Reform traditions – both of which were part of the European Continental Reformation, and the Congregational and Christian traditions that were a part of the English Reformation.

            In the 16^th and 17^th centuries, before they were known as “Congregationalists”, our church’s ancestors would have been known as Pilgrims or Puritans, and before that, they might have been called “Separatists”, in that they were perceived to be “separating” themselves from the established church, The Church of England.

            In Scrooby, England, a small town in the Northwest corner of England, separatists or pilgrims gathered together for worship in Postmaster William Brewster’s manor house.  With the bible recently translated into the vernacular, laity were able to read the bible for the first time, without the filters and sometimes the distortions of the priesthood, and so the Pilgrims felt that the only thing necessary to be a church was a group of people and the bible, perhaps best symbolized by a circle with the bible in the center.  With Scrooby being a small farming community, farmers would gather in William Brewster’s home for their simple worship services with their spiritual leader, John Robinson.

            When persecution of Pilgrims became intolerable, the congregation en mass transported themselves to Leyden, Holland in 1608 where for 12 years they enjoyed the freedom to worship as they chose.

            Learning about the possibility of establishing a colony in “New England”, the Pilgrims sailed on the Mayflower, landing at Plymouth Rock in 1620.  Before they left, John Robinson who was too elderly to travel with them, met them at the quay and said, “remember, there is always yet more truth and light to break forth from God’s holy word”, in other words, instructing them to be not only pilgrims traveling across the ocean, but also pilgrims of thought, always keeping their minds and hearts and bibles open for further revelation.

            Wanting to “purify” the church of its errors, the Puritans represented a different group than the Pilgrims.  They were not so much “separating” from the established church, but wanted to bring it back to its New Testament purity.  They came to the so-called “New World”  (we need to remember there was already an established indigenous civilization here in “New England) for the economic opportunities it provided.  As part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, they arrived on board the Arbella in 1630.  Their spiritual leader, John Winthrop, offered words of wisdom before the Puritans disembarked.  In his sermon entitled, “Model of Christian Charity”, he said, “ye shall be as a city set upon a hill.  The eyes of all people shall be upon you.  You must abridge yourself of your superfluities for the supply of others’ necessities.”

            Although the failure of this noble vision is well documented in the Salem Witch trials and the expulsion of Roger Williams, Anne Hutchinson and others who did not conform to its theocracy, it was because of this vision that many of the earliest congregational meetinghouses (what we call our houses of worship, an architectural reminder that the church is people and not a building) were built on top of a hill.

            Here in the 21^st century, that vision still inspires and sustains the work and ministry of our church.  We still endeavor to be that “Model of Christian Charity”, an example for the rest of the world on what it means to be a spiritual community.  No doubt we still fail in that noble vision, and so it is that we say in our “Welcome Statement”, “we invite you to help us become what we endeavor to be.” 

1st Congregational Church of Old Lyme
Last modified: 03/26/10