Happy Anniversary! This year, 2025 is the 1700th anniversary of the Nicene Creed.
In his proclamation to announce the Holy Year of 2025, Pope Francis reminds us 2025 is also the 1700th anniversary of the Nicene Creed. Since 325 A.D., this Creed has been professed by all Christians.
It had an initial post-conciliar rocky start, but it was later confirmed by the Council of Constantinople in 381. From that first gathering of bishops in the city of Nicaea (a Mediterranean city presently called Iznik found in Turkey) until last Sunday’s local parish gathering for Sunday Mass, we are united in that same Nicene faith, across the world and across the centuries.
What other text in human history can compete? Of non-biblical texts, the Nicene Creed is truly the most “catholic” of texts. This means the Creed came to be accepted by all local churches of the entire body of Christians spread from East to West. This same expression of faith in each local church was shared in the universal church and this faith of the universal church was grounded in all local churches. For this reason, we profess the church to be “a holy and catholic church.”
Why the creed? We received the basics of our Catholic faith from the preaching of the apostles. Their preaching was subsequently written down in what became our New Testament. The Scriptures needed to be understood, discussed and shared. Without words or explanation, it would be impossible to pass on the apostolic faith from generation to generation.
The question in Nicaea was basic. How are we to understand God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? All three are clearly present in the preaching of the apostles. These three are central to the earliest rite of baptism and to the prayer of the Eucharist.
The Nicene Creed likewise has a three-fold structure. It articulates our fundamental understanding of God “according to the Scriptures.” The Creed is our key context for understanding and proclaiming the Scriptures. It is also our shared response to the proclamation of the Gospel.
The first part of the Creed is the foundation of our Abrahamic faith: “I believe in one God the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible!” In the second and longest part, we profess how intimately God embraces us in our humanity: “true God from true God, begotten, not made…incarnate of the Virgin Mary and became man!” In the third part, we profess intimate communion with God: “the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life…in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.”
The Nicene Creed is about what God has done and does for us, not what we do for God. Therefore, with grateful and joyful confidence, our apostolic and catholic faith presses us forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.
