wfn.org | Commentary: Meet new millennium through watch-night service

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Nov. 11, 1999 News media contact: Tim Tanton·(615)742-5470·Nashville, Tenn.
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A UMNS Commentary
By the Rev. Diedra Kriewald*

How shall we celebrate this very special New Year's Eve?   

There are family traditions already planned, air flights scheduled in
advance to take some of us to exciting places, and stay-at-home leisure for
those who worry about a Y2K glitch.  

Many of us will want to be in church. The last time humanity was on the cusp
of the millennium, in A.D.1000, many European Christians were in church
awaiting the coming apocalypse. We find it hard to envision the nearly
universal awe and fearfulness felt on the evening of New Year's 1000 as the
church prayed fervently about Christ's Second Coming. This time, our most
feared dread appears to be a technological problem that may make computers
read a two-digit year code as 1999 rather than 2000.  

The apocalypse may not be our main preoccupation at this millennium, but
there is much to be thankful for and plenty of problems to contemplate.
Even as we marvel at the rapid changes brought by the electronic revolution
in information processing, we shudder at what Harvard University Professor
Stephen Jay Gould calls "the stagnation of morality," that is, "the other
all-too-human traits of selfishness, sloth, lack of imagination, fear of
innovation, moral venality and old-fashioned prejudice" that conspire to
overwhelm rationality and to preclude a genuine resolution of human problems
in our time.  

Alas, some aspects of the human condition remain the same.  

How do we best worship on this occasion? I suggest that members of the
historic Wesleyan communions gather together ecumenically to participate in
"a church vigil"(Latin "vigilia" means watch or wakefulness). A vigil has
been the traditional rite of the church on the evening before momentous
events on the Christian calendar. 

We observe Christmas Eve, for example, which is really a traditional vigil
service leading to "Christ's-Mass" on Dec. 25. The Great Vigil of Easter eve
is the prelude to Resurrection Day.  The eve of the New Year was a
traditional time for a vigil service, a gathering time for prayer and
watchful expectation through the night hours. The time of the service is
usually extended, and its limits depend on the expectation of the
congregation.   

United Methodists might use the watch-night service, the form of vigil that
we have inherited from British Methodism. The service is loosely constructed
with much singing, spontaneous prayers, readings -- both Scripture and
selections from throughout the millennium -- and includes the Covenant
Renewal service or simply "the covenant of grace," (see pages 288-294 in The
United Methodist Book of Worship). 

There may be preaching or not, and the ritual may conclude with a
candlelight procession from the church. Volunteers can take turns continuing
quiet prayer in the sanctuary until dawn.
	
The original watch-night services were spontaneous prayer services designed
to deepen the spiritual life of Methodists. The Methodist watch-night
services seem to have begun spontaneously at Kingswood in April 1742, when
converted miners, trying to stay out of the ale house and trouble, gathered
to spend the greater part of the night in prayer and praise. Busybodies
asked John Wesley to "put an end to it."  He responded that it was after the
practice of the ancient Christians and he could see no cause to forbid the
vigil.  

Watch-night prayers became a regular service in the Methodist centers of
Bristol, London and Newcastle. They were generally held between 8:30 p.m.
and 12:30 a.m. on the Friday nearest the full moon "so that participants
walked safely home through moonlit streets," as stated in Wesley's journal,
Dec. 31, 1777. Wesley linked the watch-night vigil liturgically with a
covenant of grace (an invitation to accept renewed obedience to Christ) in a
service on Aug. 11, 1775 -- 33 years after the first watch night. 

In North America, the first watch-night services were held at St. George's
parish in Philadelphia and at Wesley Chapel in New York City in November
1770. Methodists continued the practice of watch-night services on New
Year's Eve in the 19th century in both Britain and the United States.
Watch-night vigils, even for New Year's Eve, have been abandoned in much of
the 20th century. New Year's Eve 1999 is an excellent time to revive this
tradition in our own history.

The vigil service can begin at any time on New Year's Eve, but it should
last until the minutes beyond midnight. There should be periods of
reflective silence as well as cheerful singing. A congregational breakfast
or late-night brunch might follow the prayer service, especially if Holy
Communion is not celebrated.
# # #
*Kriewald is professor of teaching and formation at Wesley Theological
Seminary, Washington, D.C. This column originally appeared in UM Connection,
the newspaper of the Baltimore-Washington Annual Conference.

Commentaries provided by United Methodist News Service do not necessarily
represent the opinions or policies of UMNS or the United Methodist Church.

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