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{{Short description|American Christian movement}}
{{about|the historical Christian movement|the dating agency|Christian Connection (website)}}
{{More footnotes|date=July 2009}}
{{Infobox Christian denomination
| name = Christian Connection
| image = 
| caption = 
| main_classification = [[Protestantism|Protestant]] [[Restoration Movement|Restorationist]]
| orientation = [[Evangelicalism|Evangelical]]
| polity = [[Connectionalism|Connectional]]
| founder = [[Abner Jones]], [[Elias Smith]], [[James O'Kelly]] and [[Barton Stone]]
| founded_date = 1792 as Republican Methodist Church<br/>1810 as Christian Connection
| founded_place = 
| separated_from = [[Baptists]], [[Congregationalists]], [[Presbyterians]], and [[Methodists]]
| separations =[[Christian churches and churches of Christ]] 
|merged_into=[[Congregational Christian Churches]]| fellowships =
| associations =
| area =
|defunct=1931| congregations = 
| members = 
| footnotes = 
}}

The '''Christian Connection''' was a [[Christianity|Christian]] movement in the United States of America that developed in several places during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, composed of members who withdrew from other Christian denominations. It was influenced by settling the frontier as well as the formation of the new United States and its separation from Great Britain. The Christian Connection professed  no [[creed]], instead relying strictly on the [[Bible]].

In practice, members coalesced around shared theological concepts such as an [[Arminianism|Arminian]] [[theological anthropology]] (doctrine of human nature), a rejection of the [[Calvinist]] [[doctrine of election]], and an autonomous church government. The Connection's periodical, the ''Herald of Gospel Liberty'' (first published on September 1, 1808), was among the first religious journals published in the United States.<ref>Mark Fackler and Charles H. Lippy, eds., ''Popular Religious Magazines of the United States'' (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1995), 263-268.</ref>

==Predecessor groups==
[[Image:JamesOKelly.jpg|thumb|left|[[James O'Kelly]]]]
[[James O'Kelly]] was an early advocate of seeking unity through a return to New Testament Christianity.<ref name="McFadden, 2006">Jeff McFadden, ''One Baptism'', published by Lulu.com, 2006, {{ISBN|1-84728-381-0}}, {{ISBN|978-1-84728-381-8}}.</ref>{{rp|216}} In 1792, dissatisfied with the role of bishops in the [[Methodist Episcopal Church]], he separated from that body. O'Kelly's movement, centering in [[Virginia]] and [[North Carolina]], was originally called the Republican Methodist Church. In 1794 they adopted the name Christian Church<!-- Do not link "Christian churches and churches of Christ". -->.<ref>Thomas H. Olbricht, [https://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/who.html "Who Are the Churches of Christ?] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120111205307/https://www.mun.ca/rels/restmov/who.html|date=2012-01-11}}.</ref>

During the same period, [[Elias Smith]] of [[Vermont]] and [[Abner Jones]] of [[New Hampshire]] led a movement espousing views similar to those of O’Kelly.<ref name="Allen & Hughes 1988" />{{rp|68}}<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection">Douglas Allen Foster and Anthony L. Dunnavant, ''The Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Christian Churches/Churches of Christ, Churches of Christ'', Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2004, {{ISBN|0-8028-3898-7}}, {{ISBN|978-0-8028-3898-8}}, entry on ''Christian Connection.''</ref>{{rp|190}} They believed that members could, by looking to scripture alone, simply be Christians without being bound to human traditions and the denominations that had been brought over from Europe.<ref name="Allen & Hughes 1988" />{{rp|68}}<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}}  Working independently at first, Jones and Smith joined together in their efforts and began exclusively using the name ''Christian''.

In 1801, the [[Cane Ridge Revival]] led by [[Barton W. Stone]] in [[Kentucky]] would plant the seed for a movement in [[Kentucky]] and the [[Ohio River]] valley to disassociate from denominationalism. Stone and five other ministers published ''The Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery'' in 1804, giving up denominational ties to the [[Presbyterian Church in the United States of America|Presbyterian Church]] and preferring to be known simply as ''Christians''. Stone was influenced by his earlier involvement with O'Kelly and knew of the Republican Methodist practice of simply using the name ''Christian''.

Ideologically, the New England movement displayed an extreme form of republicanism. Convinced that the American Revolution demanded a thorough and utter break with European modes of operation, members tended to demand radical reform of politics, the legal system, medicine and religion. Elias Smith's career particularly emphasized medical and spiritual reform. All visible forms of church government were to be rejected, he argued, because they were inherently “British”. The movement's nativist approach to theology and church polity imparted a unique flavor to the movement, placing them distinctly on the fringe of early nineteenth-century North American spirituality.

==Formation==
[[File:Elias Smith.jpg|thumb|right|[[Elias Smith]]]]
Elias Smith had heard of the Stone movement by 1804, and the O'Kelly movement by 1808.<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}} Although not formally merged, the three groups were cooperating and fellowshiping by 1810.<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}} At that time the combined movement had a membership of approximately 20,000.<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}} This loose fellowship of churches was called by the names "Christian Connection/Connexion" or "Christian Church."<ref name="Allen & Hughes 1988">C. Leonard Allen and Richard T. Hughes, ''Discovering Our Roots: The Ancestry of the Churches of Christ,'' Abilene Christian University Press, 1988, {{ISBN|0-89112-006-8}}.</ref>{{rp|68}}<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}}

By 1808, O'Kelly's followers and the Smith/Jones movement were cooperating closely, and Stone's Christians in Kentucky would soon follow suit.  Adherents' anti-organizational commitments prevent one from referring to “union” per se, at least before the middle of the century. Stone's concept of unity grew from a belief that Christians could extract the Bible's truths by reason, if they approached it without presuppositions. These truths, in turn, would displace human forms of order, leading to the inevitable result that Christians would start “flowing together” and others would come to faith because of the model of unity.<ref>''[[Christian Messenger]]'' Vol. I, #1, 25 December 1825, pp. 4–5.</ref>

The Connection soon became international, with churches planted in [[New Brunswick]], [[Nova Scotia]], [[Quebec]] (1811) and [[Ontario]] (1821). In each case, the missions were extensions of preaching tours from neighboring American states. Thus all of the Canadian congregations were related to the New England movement. The failed [[Rebellions of 1837]] (led principally by [[Louis-Joseph Papineau]] and [[William Lyon Mackenzie]]) severely undercut the Connection's Canadian wings. Churches survived solely in Ontario, and mostly north and east of [[Toronto]]. Conflict between the Connection and the Disciples of Christ also disrupted the former's Canadian growth.

Smith proved to be a controversial figure in the Christian Connection, leaving the denomination for several years to become a [[Christian Universalism|Universalist]]. He publicly renounced Universalism in 1823, but was not well received and reverted to it for a couple of years. Smith tried to re-enter the Connection in 1827 by repudiating Universalism. His brethren were understandably hesitant to accept him, but his home congregation of Portsmouth, New Hampshire received him back in fellowship in 1840.<ref>Smith, Elias. ''The Life, Conversion, Preaching, Travels and Sufferings of Elias Smith,'' pp. 360–1.</ref>

==Separation of the "Christians"==
[[File:Stonebw01.jpg|thumb|left|[[Barton W. Stone]]]]
In 1832, many of the [[Christians (Stone Movement)|Christian Churches]] in Kentucky and [[Tennessee]] led by Stone united with the [[Disciples of Christ (Campbell Movement)|churches]] led by [[Alexander Campbell (clergyman)|Alexander Campbell]]. A minority continued to operate within the orbit of the Connection. Of the majority of churches that aligned with the Stone-Campbell movement, many continued to use the name Christian Church, even though they no longer considered themselves part of the Christian Connection. The confusion over names which this created continues. Much of the historiography of this period is driven by the current needs and issues of the successor denominations.
[[File:Alexander Campbell Age 65.jpg|thumb|right|[[Alexander Campbell (clergyman)|Alexander Campbell]]]]
When Stone and [[Alexander Campbell (clergyman)|Alexander Campbell]]'s Reformers (also known as Disciples and Christian Baptists) united in 1832, only a minority of Christians from the Smith/Jones and O'Kelly movements participated.<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection"/>{{rp|190}} Those who did were from congregations west of the [[Appalachian Mountains]] that had come into contact with the Stone movement.<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}} The eastern members had several key differences with the Stone and Campbell group: an emphasis on conversion experience, quarterly observance of [[Eucharist|communion]], and [[nontrinitarianism]].<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|190}}

==Organizational development==
Through the 1830s and 1840s, practical difficulties associated with the movement's attempt at radical reform led to an erosion of the anti-organizational principles developed by Jones, Smith and others. David Millard and Joseph Badger provided leadership towards a more stable form of inter-congregational relationship. Both, at differing times, were editors of the ''Christian Palladium'', a New York State-based religious newspaper that vied with the ''Herald of Gospel Liberty'' as the movement's leading periodical.{{citation needed|date=November 2013}}  Many of the movement's publications were produced by the [[Graphic Arts Building (Dayton, Ohio)|Christian Publishing Association]], based in [[Dayton, Ohio]].<ref>Drury, A.W.  ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=hhObs4HhLlEC History of the City of Dayton and Montgomery County, Ohio]''.  Vol. 1.  [[Chicago]] and [[Dayton, Ohio|Dayton]]: Clarke, 1900, 414.</ref>

A disproportionate number of Christian Connection preachers in New England were involved in the eschatological stir fueled by speculations of [[William Miller (preacher)|William Miller]]. No fewer than seven of the 16 signatories to the 1840 call for an Adventist general conference were Connection preachers. Many members left the Connection in the mid-1840s, populating emerging denominations such as the [[Seventh-day Adventist Church|Seventh-day Adventists]] and the [[Advent Christians]].

In 1850, the General Convention of the Christian Church passed a resolution calling for the establishment of [[Antioch College]]. The college opened in 1852. Notable for its time, the Christian Connection decided that the college "shall afford equal privileges to students of both sexes." The Christian Connection sect wanted the new college to be sectarian, but the planning committee decided otherwise. Antioch College was one of the nation's first colleges to offer the same curriculum to men and women, as well as to admit blacks and operate on a non-sectarian basis.

==Mainstream and merger==
For the second half of the nineteenth-century, leaders of the Connection pursued a policy of alignment with the mainstream. What had been birthed as a strident protest against staid religiosity was drifting back in that direction. The temperance movement, the Sunday School movement and the Bible societies all served as avenues of service through which Connection members could demonstrate to other denominations the many similarities this cluster of once fringe bodies now shared with the major religious organizations.

The Christian Church merged with the [[National Council of the Congregational Churches of the United States]] in 1931 to form the [[Congregational Christian Churches]].<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|191}} In 1957 after twenty years of discussion and work, the Congregational Christian Churches and the [[Evangelical and Reformed Church]], itself the product of the merger of two [[German-American]] denominations, forged the [[United Church of Christ]].<ref name="Encyclopedia of the Stone-Campbell Movement: Christian Connection" />{{rp|191}} In 1989, the UCC and [[Disciples of Christ]] agreed to participate in full communion with each other, while remaining separate denominations.

==See also==
*[[Restoration Movement]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist|35em}}

==References==
*''Centennial of Religious Journalism''  Dayton, Ohio:  Christian Publishing Association, 1908
*Fulop, Timothy Earl “Elias Smith and the Quest for Gospel Liberty:  Popular Religion and Democratic Radicalism in Early Nineteenth-Century New England.”  Unpublished Doctor of Philosophy thesis, Department of Religion, Princeton University, 1992
*Hammond, Gilbert Romine ''Album of Christian Ministers, churches and lay workers and colleges,''  Marshalltown, Iowa:  Acme Printing Co., 1915
*Hatch, Nathan O. ''The Democratization of American Christianity,'' New Haven and London:  Yale University Press, 1989
*Humphreys, E.W. ''Memoirs of Deceased Christian Ministers; or, Brief Sketches of the Lives and Labors of 975 Ministers, Who Died Between 1793 and 1880,''  Dayton, Ohio: Christian Publishing Association, 1880
*Jennings, Walter Wilson ''Origin and Early History of the Disciples of Christ,'' Cincinnati: Standard Publishing, 1919.
*Kenny, Michael G. ''The Passion of Ansel Bourne:  Multiple Personality in American Culture,''  Washington, District of Columbia:  Smithsonian Institution Press, 1986
*Kenny, Michael, G. ''The Perfect Law of Liberty:  Elias Smith and the Providential History of America,''  Washington and London:  Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994
*Kilgore, Charles Francis. ''The James O'Kelly Schism in the Methodist Episcopal Church,''  D.F. [Federal District], Mexico:  Casa Unida De Publicationes, 1963
*Morrill, Milo True.  ''History of the Christian Denomination in America,'' Dayton:  The Christian  Publishing Association, 1912.
*Murch, James DeForest ''Christians Only''.  Cincinnati: Standard Publishing, 1962.
*[http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-christian-churches.html A Short Course in UCC History: The Christian Churches] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130919132344/http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-christian-churches.html |date=2013-09-19 }}
*Steinacher, C. Mark ''An Aleatory Folk: An Historical-Theological Approach to the Transition of the Christian Church in Canada from Fringe to Mainstream 1792-1898,'' Unpublished Doctor of Theology thesis, Wycliffe College, University of Toronto, 1999

==External links==
{{Wikisourcepar|Last Will and Testament of The Springfield Presbytery}}
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20051222001336/http://www.ucc.org/ecumenical/partnership.htm UCC-Disciples Ecumenical Partnership]
*[http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-congregational-christian.html A Short Course in UCC History: The Congregational Christian Churches] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141119104545/http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-congregational-christian.html |date=2014-11-19 }}
*[http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-evangelical-and-reformed.html A Short Course in UCC History: The Evangelical and Reformed Church] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141030153104/http://www.ucc.org/about-us/short-course/the-evangelical-and-reformed.html |date=2014-10-30 }}
*{{Cite EB1911|wstitle=Christian Connection |short=x}}

{{Restoration Movement}}
{{Presbyterian Church in the United States of America}}
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[[Category:History of Christianity in the United States]]
[[Category:Religious organizations established in 1792]]
[[Category:Protestant denominations established in the 18th century]]
[[Category:United Church of Christ predecessor churches]]
[[Category:Arminian denominations]]
[[Category:Christian Connection]]
[[Category:Restoration Movement predecessors (pre-1832)]]
[[Category:Christian denominations founded in the United States]]