“Blest be-ee the tie-ie that binds… our hear-arts in Chri-istian love”, I recall from an old hymn dating back to my childhood. “The fe-el-lowshi-ip of ki-indred minds is li-ike to tha-at above”, it goes. And not one word about Baptist minds, Methodist minds, Presbyterian, Episcopal, Catholic or Pentecostal minds… or any of that dividing denominational labeling.

The tie that binds in Christian love should exemplify the love in the True Church… the called-out body of Christ.  As a child I was taught to only have friends who were Baptists, as we were. Pity! I naively thought that even the Methodists in the little church down the road were bound for hell, and that members of our church alone were saved.  Parental admonitions to avoid Catholic children, “Holy Roller” children, Mexicans and Negroes, however, fell on deaf ears. My best friends in 6^th grade through Jr. high were Georgia with long, braided hair, whose family was strictly Pentecostal; Anita, clearly of Mexican descent and a Catholic; Darthia, a sweet Baptist girl whose skin was quite black, and Evangeline, who was very quiet and timid… and Mormon as I now recall.

I didn’t know what Mormon was until I met two vacationing girls from Salt Lake City, and even then it didn’t matter. We had lots of fun that summer with never a word about our churches.  I laugh thinking about this.  Talk about blurring the lines… my parents would have had a cat!  At the age of nine when I attended a neighborhood Lutheran school out of necessity I can remember sitting on the curb in front of our home, looking up at the majestic church steeple and asking God to tell me why, if all believed in Jesus, there were so many different kinds of churches (not having the experience or vocabulary to say ‘beliefs, creeds, or denominations). In answer came the very first 'vision' the Lord ever gave me.  An enormous feast table had been set; laden with every kind of food imaginable, and I was given to know that people of the earth partook of only those foods they liked, and avoided all else., and that those foods exemplified what they called their denomination or beliefs. On a few Sunday mornings I would attend services at that Lutheran church where people were kind, though quiet and dignified. They sang lofty and unfamiliar hymns to music played on a huge pipe organ that covered an entire wall.

In our own little Baptist church the music was plunked out on a small spinet piano, with hymns familiar all my life.  People there were warm and friendly, and some even laughed as they chatted before and after the service.  I was not too young, though, to feel the pain of a very quiet black woman who sat ignored and unassuming on the back pew.  I’d been told not to speak to her or shake her hand because she had to ‘keep her place’ if she was to be allowed to be there.  Any time that I could do it unnoticed, I’d sneak a friendly smile at her, nonetheless.  If God is love, I wanted to know… where is the love?

This was also the case in that same Baptist church during a Christmas party, when a lady came in to visit because her son was gone to war and she was alone.  Her graying black hair was very curly and her wrinkled skin far darker than my own fair and freckled face. Wanting to greet her I was stopped with the cruel whisper from one of my sisters, “Don’t touch that dirty Portagee!”  Again I wondered why we were taught “God is love” when only people like ourselves were welcome in “His” house”.

Many years went by and I visited a Methodist church with my children and their father, and recited along with the congregation The Apostle’s Creed, but wondered how in the world it could be worded…”I believe in the holy catholic church”… etc. No one I knew could explain that for my curiosity, until many years later , in my early forties I was living in a tiny town in northern New Mexico.  On a very snowy weekday morning I walked the few blocks to the Post Office, and found that I’d received a rather large box from a family member.  The snow came faster and thicker, and I thought to head home, but the Holy Spirit insisted that I go to a house behind the local Catholic church and visit the nun who lived there.  “But Lord!”, I protested as I’ve often done… “It’s snowing and this box is heavy, and I don’t even know the woman!”  “Go.” He said.  A path to her back door had been shoveled clean, so I headed that way, when there she stood, holding the door for me and bidding me enthusiastically to come in!  “But… my boots”… I apologized.  “This box”… I stammered.
 

“Get in here, child!”, she insisted!  She introduced herself and asked my name. Then she had a question for me about why some people in the village who had been raised in the Catholic church had left it and joined the Community church by the main street.  I was grateful for the opportunity to tell her about the personal relationship with Jesus that was offered there, and some of my own testimony, which she received kindly.  Then I said to her that I had a question I’d like answered also… about the Apostle’s Creed, and why, as protestants in some churches, we recited “I believe in the holy catholic church”, etc.

Very sweetly, Sylvia, as she’d told me to call her, explained that the line in the  Apostle’s Creed was not about the Catholic Church.. spelled with capital C’s, but that it was spelled with a lower-case ‘c’ and that ‘catholic’ in that case, meant ‘the universal body of Christ’, as believers in and followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God. At that I was delighted to say to her, “Then you and I are both ‘catholic’… that is, if you believe in Jesus the way I do.” to which she replied that she did indeed.

Some years later I was privileged to visit with a group of Catholic sisters in their home in Chicago, having a meeting with Spirit-filled believers of various denominations!  It was so sweet!  No caste system there.  No stiffly starched habits and condescending reference to their difference.  These friendly women were very casually dressed in T shirts and stretch slacks, and wearing sneakers!  We all simply worshiped the Lord together as one… and there was love…a meeting of members of the holy catholic church… the Universal Body of Christ.  No sign of division.  No sub-labels.  Aaah, that it could ever be so... as it shall be, when the Bride finally readies herself for the coming of her Bridegroom.