Yes.
MS has anticipated this. In SP2007 you can create UDC's Universal Data Connections.
With 2007 you can browse and select them.You can also convert existing DC to UDCs in designer.
You could use InfoPath 2007 to create a UDC library and then update your templates to use these.
Then all forms share data connections and they can be changed outside of the templates.
The Database Accelerator from www.qdabra.com might also be interesting to you. It allows all of your forms to be databased and has the tools that make migration and administration much easier. Once you get a lot of forms I am sure you understand the headaches.