In my experience it boils down to the limits we all have in our human psyche with respect to the number of people we can keep in contact with and the relative depth of our intimate relationships with them. This is well illustrated by the "circles of intimacy" diagrams, based on the research of Dr Robin Dunbar who postulated the argument that we have natural cognitive limits on the numbers of people with whom we can keep in touch with varied degrees of intimacy. This inbuilt limit is fundamental to the way any healthy human society organises itself.
Consider the diagram below;
Crudely this tends to fit the way we all relate to people in our various social circles, in our family, our neighbourhood, at work and leisure.
We generally have three or four intimate "soul friends", our inner circle and then about twelve to twenty people with whom we have regular day to day contact, conversation and cooperation. Around this we have a much larger group of about one hundred to two hundred people whose life-story we can hold in our head and pick up with at any time. generally these are the people we meet week by week rather than those with whom we have daily contact. Beyond that is a much larger group made up of the names in our personal mental address book. These are people we know by sight and name, but who we meet less frequently and with whom a conversation of "catch up on the news" is needed to reestablish up to date familiarity.
This pattern is very deeply ingrained in us and goes back at least as far as humanities early days as hunter gatherer tribes or early settled farming communities. Universally human culture has evolved often subconsciously influenced by these natural connections of intimacy. Family and community life grow from them, the military and business organisation is shaped by them right up to the present day.
From the earliest days Christian communities structured themselves in this way too. Across the centuries this pattern re-emerges in monastic and cathedral chapters, Methodist "classes", prayer triplets, house/cell groups, deaneries (clusters of leadership coordination and administration for blocks of about 20 congregations) and dioceses etc..
The re-reading of the New Testament period demonstrates patterns of human interaction that also expresses this natural tendency. If we think of the ministry of Jesus, he had his closest three, Peter, James and John and beyond that were the twelve disciples and the women who supported their ministry, about twenty in all. In the Acts of the Apostles when all the believers are together awaiting the gift of the Holy Spirit, they number about one hundred and twenty, right within that third band of social connection that allows a strong group identity. When three thousand were added to their number in the revival that the Spirit inaugurated the disciples - now apostles - are tested beyond their limit to cope with the same degree of intimate connection they could have with the original one hundred and twenty. They had to reorganise the fledgling church and divide tasks out so they could concentrate on teaching and others, Stephen for example, the first known deacon be set aside to administer the pastoral care.
A reading of the Acts of the Apostles and St Paul's letters also demonstrates how these great heroes of faith wrestled with the same limits of their psychological capacity for engagement at depth with numbers of people that we might experience in similar circumstances today. Paul usually traveled with a small retinue with him and had to adapt in order to maintain contact with an ever expanding number of Christian congregations spread across the Eastern Mediterranean. He resorted to communicating with the leadership of these new fellowships by letter and personal courier/representatives sent out from his circle of regular contacts. These were people he could trust to get the message across, who would know his mind and be able to communicate his wisdom readily because they were up to speed with his current thinking as it developed in the face of the new challenges Christianity was coming up against as it expanded into the Roman world. This method, relying on the authority of the letter and courier or ambassador for Paul's point of view allowed him, working with a small group numbering in the teens to keep in touch with a great many people who he had met, often briefly if significantly for them and indirectly foster cohesion within Christian fellowships spread over a wide area.
Such patterns of response to social change are shaped by our human responses and the need for belonging and certainty within a well structured and intimate community. Solutions based on these natural community relationships are commonplace throughout he history of the church's mission. The Franciscans for example, founded in the early 13th Century had great difficulty in adapting to their early success. A small band of dedicated followers living in simplicity rapidly became a universal European wide movement. The formation of Orders (different expressions of vocation) and area chapters allowed something of the deep and personal contact of Francis's first small band of brothers to be maintained. To this day Franciscan chapters will divide if their number exceeds twenty-five.
This vital element of their tradition, reordered to meet circumstances of rapid growth, gave and still gives members the joy of the support of small groups and guardians to help them continue to grow in faith and maturity. By being sensitive to their own needs, looking to the heart of their humanity and spirituality, these early brothers and sisters took the key elements in Francis's revival of Christian faith and its down to earth approach and reworked them for the many to allow them also to experience the support and encouragement needed to keep faith while working through the challenges of life.
The church has, throughout the ages organised and reformed itself along a "parish" or community based on human need, reflected in a system that reflects pattern of the circles of intimacy. In rural contexts this amounted to he church and the community being one and the same circle of one or two hundred souls, administered by a small council of a dozen or so people, led by a priest/minister appointed by the bishop/area superintendent and generally two wardens/deacons elected by the local community. In expanding towns, especially during times of industrial revolution the outer circles of occasional contact expand to such a great extent that new congregational groupings form to fill the vacuum that the established churches can not fill e.g Methodism expanding into the unchurched areas of newly industrialised Britain in the early 19th Century. For both traditional and new forms of "free church" congregational size and leadership structure tend to fit the pattern of intimacy and contact that allow a congregation to maintain a distinct identity and healthy internal dynamic within the wider community.
Having tempted you with the idea that church organisation and dynamic are strongly influenced by our natural ability to maintain differing levels of engagement with different circles of personal connection, my next posting will look at the how this dynamic relates to church leadership and members expectations. It will also contain a commercial break of a recipe or two!
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