Church might not be the first place many people think of when it comes to New Year's Eve celebrations, but fans of "Watch Night" services wouldn't welcome 2005 any other way.
Usually lasting past the stroke of midnight on New Year's Eve, Watch Night church services have long been popular, primarily among African-American Christian congregations. The services are seen as a time to reflect and give thanks for the last year and pray for the future, a spiritual way of celebrating a largely secular holiday.
But some worry that the real meaning of Watch Night -- the reason the tradition started in the black community nearly 150 years ago -- has been largely forgotten. Its roots date back to the Civil War, when blacks gathered in churches on the night of Dec. 31, 1862, waiting anxiously to see if President Abraham Lincoln would make good on his promise to enact the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863. The presidential order promised to free slaves in Confederate states, a move that would mark the beginning of the end of slavery.
"The disconnect is that it's taken on more of a Christian emphasis, and most people don't attach it to the historical significance of emancipation," said U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.).
'Freedom's Eve'
That's about to change at Salem Baptist Church of Chicago, which holds its popular Watch Night service at Christ Universal Temple on the South Side to accommodate the large turnout. The Rev. James T. Meeks said Salem's Watch Night services typically haven't acknowledged the link between the Emancipation Proclamation and Dec. 31, or "Freedom's Eve."
"Historically, we have not, but this year, we will," Meeks said.
It's a growing trend across the country for more black congregations to better recognize the connection between Watch Night and the emancipation of the slaves, said James Byrd, assistant dean of the divinity school at Vanderbilt University in Nashville.
Byrd and others point out, however, that Jan. 1, 1863, hardly meant "instant liberation" for the nation's slaves.
"Lincoln did not, in practical terms, free a single slave" when he signed the proclamation, said Richard Norton Smith, director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in Springfield.
Largely a symbolic gesture and military maneuver, the Emancipation Proclamation freed only those slaves in states that had left the Union -- states where Lincoln had no real power to enforce the measure. States that condoned slavery but hadn't seceded from the Union were exempt.
"It didn't end slavery, but it sounded the death knell for slavery," Smith said. The practice wouldn't be abolished until early 1865, with the enactment of the 13th Amendment.
Concept traced to Methodists
While Watch Night services became a tradition among blacks on that historic eve in 1862, the Watch Night concept can be traced back nearly a century earlier, to the Methodists. They basically "kept watch" on New Year's Eve, praying overnight and renewing their covenant with God, according to Ted Campbell, president of Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston.
Some Methodist churches still hold Watch Night services, but they've become far more popular among African-American congregations. The Rev. Jesse Jackson wants more people to remember how the New Year's Eve tradition got started -- and the importance of the day that follows.
"To make it a day for collard greens and black-eyed peas and ballgames is to completely miss America's highest moral moment," Jackson said. "It's the moment slavery ended."