Tiber River Cafe-Nicene Creed, What We Believe

Hello, and welcome to the Tiber River Café.  My name is Dean Humphreys and today’s topic is the Nicene Creed.

Every group, no matter how big or small, has a set of beliefs, ideals, and convictions; a set of core values by which they will define themselves.  If someone does not believe these core beliefs, then they will not be a member of that group.  These core beliefs are what define the group, it helps to express the identity of the group; these beliefs are what make the members who they are. 

Catholic Christians have a set of foundational beliefs and these beliefs are summarized in our Creed which we recite at each Sunday at Mass.  These are the basic beliefs that make a Catholic a Catholic, it is our faith put into words.  The Creed is not the total deposit of our faith, but rather a summary of what the Church, of what we, believe.

We stand and declare our beliefs every Sunday at Mass after the homily.  The Creed becomes the summit of the Liturgy of the Word.  During the Liturgy of the Word we hear God’s message to us, we hear the readings from the Old Testament, the Psalms, the New Testament and the Gospel.  In the Gospel of Mark, chapter 9 verse 24 we read of the father begging Jesus to heal his son; the original writings use the Greek word “credo—I believe” when Jesus asks the father if he believes Jesus can heal his son, the little boy’s father says to Jesus “I do believe, help my unbelief!”  We also say that we believe but the mystery of the Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, one God in three persons—it’s very difficult to understand this truth, we believe but we continue to pray for help with our unbelief.  The Creed helps us to understand the mystery of the Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

There are two creeds that have taken significant precedence in the Catholic Church—the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed.  The Apostles’ Creed takes its name from the tradition that it originated from the Twelve Apostles themselves.  The creed that we recite every Sunday at Mass is the more detailed Nicene Creed, which is named after the ancient city of Nicaea.  The present form of the creed that we say every Sunday was originally defined by over 300 bishops from all over the world when they gathered, first in the year 325 at the Council of Nicaea and then again in 381 at the Council of Constantinople, at which time the creed was fully adopted and authorized.  

Our Creed, which is an explanation of the Church’s teachings about the Trinity, was written in response to the heresy of Arianism, a philosophy that denied Jesus was fully divine, fully God.  Our Creed is an ancient declaration and summary of faith, a statement of faith which was written even before the Church made a determination of which books would be included in the New Testament. 

In the early Church before the New Testament was written, the apostles would summarize the basic beliefs and teachings of Christianity—easy to remember and to pass along.  Jesus instructed us to evangelize; in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 28 verse 19 Jesus said, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit”.  The Creed was fundamental to evangelization and initiation in the early Church, and 2000 years later we continue to stand and profess our faith.

So now let’s turn our attention to some aspects of the Creed.  There are five basic themes of the Nicene Creed: 

One--God is the creator of everything; through God’s word everything was made, heaven and earth, everything that can be seen and everything that cannot be seen. 

Two—Jesus was and is completely one with God, that Jesus is fully divine and is of one substance with God.  The word used in the Fourth Century, at the time of the Council of Nicaea, is consubstantial, the same word we use today.  Consubstantial means that God the Father and Jesus the Son are of the same substance, they are one; just like Jesus said in the Gospel of John chapter 10 verse 30, “The Father and I are one. 

Three—In the person of Jesus, God took on human form and became one of us, God lived amongst us.  And that Jesus was executed by crucifixion, and that God raised him up, what we call the Resurrection, so that we can know that all that Jesus taught us about God is true.  God entered into our world, God revealed himself to us.  God chose a people and entered into covenant with that people.

Four—the Holy Spirit remains with us, the Holy Spirit  is teaching us, and the Holy Spirit is guiding us and the Church, encouraging us to live out the message of Jesus Christ every day.

Five—we are encouraged to live out our faith as a community of believers, that we are catholic (which means universal), and apostolic (which means we are to follow the teachings and traditions of the Apostles).  These are the four distinguishing marks or characteristics of the Catholic Church, that we are one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.  We are one, yet within the Church there are over a billion unique individuals.

The Creed reflects these unshakeable beliefs we share as Catholics, the rock-solid beliefs that shape our very existence as Catholics.  So much so that every Christian is baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Notice that we say the singular ‘name’ and not the plural ‘names’ because the Trinity is one.  We do not confess 3 separate Gods, but one God in 3 persons.  Each of them, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is God whole and entire, but each is fully distinct from one another.  The Trinity is the central mystery of our Christian faith, the most fundamental and essential teaching of the Church.

The word ‘creed’ comes from the Latin word credo, which means “I believe”.   The Nicene Creed begins with these words, ‘I believe’.  Although we are a social community of believers, for we are social by nature, we are still unique individual beings.  The Creed is ultimately an individual statement of belief, “I believe”, but at the same time the Creed expresses the collective beliefs of the Church, our collective statement of faith.  We are a people gathered in prayer in a particular place and time, but we are united with other Catholic believers around the world.  We gather together and we stand together at Mass to express our faith. 

Catholics all over the world are united as the people of God when we hear the same readings from Scripture, when we offer our prayers to our God, and we also believe that by stating our beliefs about God, our public declaration, around the world each week, that this makes us stronger in our faith and brings us closer together as a Christian community.

We can also look at the Nicene Creed in 3 parts:  the first part of the Creed regards the divine person, the father and creator.  When we stand at Mass to profess our faith we are saying we believe in the Trinity, in the Trinitarian God; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  We are claiming that we believe in one God.  Jesus frequently called God ‘Father’, and that means our God is a loving God who cares for his children, our God protects us, our God guides us, and our God loves us.

The second part of the Creed regards the divine person, the Son, Jesus of Nazareth.  When we recite our Creed we are confirming our belief that Jesus is the only Son of God, that Jesus is fully divine, that Jesus is fully God; just as God is eternal so Jesus is eternal.  Jesus is distinct from the Father yet is not divided from the Father.  We proclaim that God the Father and God the Son are equally divine, united in substance, of one substance and one will, consubstantial.  We acknowledge that God created all things. 

We state that Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary through the Holy Spirit, that God became human in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, that Jesus was a real human being, fully human and fully divine.  We recite that Jesus suffered and died on a cross.  That Jesus was buried in a tomb, and that on the third day he rose again.  We understand that Jesus experienced his first ‘rising’ at his birth and then ‘rose again on the third day’ at his Resurrection.  We state that Jesus is in heaven, sharing authority with the Father.  We anticipate that Jesus will come again and that his kingdom will be never ending. 

The third part of the Creed regards the divine person, the Holy Spirit.  We proclaim that the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity, sustains our lives as Christians, and that the Holy Spirit, with the Father and the Son, is fully divine and fully God, worthy of the same worship and adoration.  The Holy Spirit inspired the prophets, the human authors of Scripture, and the Holy Spirit inspires the Church today and presides over humanity.  Again, not 3 separate Gods, but one God in 3 persons; Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

We profess that the Church is truly catholic, that it is world-wide and universal, that ours is an ancient faith going back 2000 years to the Apostles; that the Church was built upon the witness of the Apostles, that the Apostles appointed leaders who themselves appointed leaders after them, a continuing process to this day.  We confirm that the Church has remained holy for the past 2000 years in spite of its members, for we are all sinners, our Church is truly a hospital for the sick.  Then through the waters of baptism God forgives our sins, and we are born again.  We affirm both the existence of heaven and the later resurrection of the dead when we will be with Jesus in heaven for eternity. 

And then we overwhelmingly confirm this statement of faith with a resounding ‘Amen’.

When it comes down to it, the Trinity is a mystery, and we are simply not able to fully comprehend this mystery.  But we keep trying.  An example that helps me to better understand the Trinity is a musical chord.  Think of a chord; the three notes are all distinct notes, each beautiful and poetic in their own right, but when joined together as a chord the sound becomes richer and more dynamic, and then if one note is absent the sound is lacking, it’s not complete.   But when the 3 notes become one the result is symphonic.

So, there it is, a simple explanation of the Nicene Creed.  When we stand at Mass as the people of God and say the Creed, when we say “I believe”, we are pledging ourselves to these beliefs.  And when we truly believe this statement of faith, it must change how we see ourselves and our neighbor, it must change who we are at a foundational level.  This is our Catholic faith. 

Something to think about next Sunday at Mass.

Well, thanks for stopping by the Tiber River Café, where there is always plenty of room at the banquet table.  I hope to see you next time.  Peace be with you.