Creeds Are Essential

In Episcopal Life, somebody wrote:

"...The Council of Nicea's purpose was to institutionalize Roman power and authority. We are Episcopalians and have been open to the Holy Spirit to help us in the evolution of our worship from the beginning. In the Nag Hammadi discoveries, we are now fortunate to have the gospels of Thomas, Philip and Mary Magdalene to read. None of the four original Gospels nor these new findings contain the creed..."

Honestly, when will it stop? When will people in a supposedly educated denomination actually do some historical reading? These statements are sophomoric and reflect a lack of any historical depth or sense. Yet, sadly, I hear and see this all the time.

The Nag Hammadi texts, while fascinating, were junked for a reason far more basic than 'imperial oppression of alternative Christianities.' They were junked because they're just not that great. Interesting to be sure - and worthy of preservation - for no books should be burned. But, truly, the far better case for equality and the inclusion of all human beings into the Kingdom and a better society can be made from the canonical Scriptures and the faith of the Nicene creed, than the jumble of thought and ancient weirdness that is to be found in the Nag Hammadi library.

The domination of biblical interpretation by status quo preserving males aside, the Bible itself is the key to true justice for all people. To be quite specific, the Nag Hammadi library are about as sexist as anything anywhere anytime - and more anti-semitic - more anti-creational - than most.

It wasn't Dan Brown of Da Vinci Code nonsense, but somebody has created a sound-bite and it just won't go away - and here it is:

"The Roman empire foisted the Nicene Creed and Canon of Scripture on the world to enforce imperial values and facilitate dominion over the hearts and minds of the Roman world."

Sorry, that's simply not a verifiable historical construction. Rome did plenty of damage - and the Constantinian arrangement indeed hurt the Gospel in my view.

BUT,

First of all, as regards 'ending controversy' and promoting catholic Christianity as an imperial decree, Constantine was likely an Arian. Since Nicea the imperial force within the Church often was opposed to the Nicene faith, with 'Nicene' theologians like Gregory Nazianzen doing their most to resist the imperial efforts - and often failing. Moreover, Gregory and the Cappadocians took the lead of Macrina the Elder (and also later the Younger) in defending the 'catholic' faith. As regards the role of women, many took an incredibly powerful role in the synthesis between Church and Empire by virtue of their high-rank - see Helena, Olympias.

The problem with this dime-novel version of 'progressive Christianity' as put forth in books like the Da Vinci Code, and the work of Pagels, et. al., is that it belies the real truths of history, while conceding Nicene Christianity to those of the most conservative and anti-egalitarian mindset. Far from 'saving Christianity from fundamentalists' it actually hands over the catholic faith of the Creeds to them - and offers instead a non-historical, fantasy, New Age version to 'progressives.'

No, contrary to what these anti-Nicene folks think must be the case, the Nicene faith - the faith of the Creeds, of the Book of Common Prayer, of the Episcopal Church's formularies - is no small faith. It belongs to the saints of the ages, and carries forth the good apostolic message. The Nicene faith is the faith of Egeria, Melania, Julian, Helena, Macrina the Elder, the Cappadocians, the Eastern sages, the Irish monks, and the Christian leaders of the civil rights movement in the American South, and the anti-apartheid evil in South Africa.

Friends, please, the full baptismal covenant (which is built upon the faith of the Apostles Creed) is what we say we're all about - and not just a sentence or two.

Thanks be to God, the progressive catholic tradition so strongly witnessed to in the Book of Common Prayer, the Hymnal 1982, has social justice, equality between all human beings, and the desire to make a better world always in its heart, while at the same time fully affirming and cherishing the faith of the historic faith - attested to so well in Scripture, Nicene and Apostle's Creeds, dominical sacraments, and historic episcopate.

Ironically, in a world to which the Episcopal Church matters largely not a fig - those Episcopal ministries which are growing, vibrant and alive tend to be the ones that have remained intentional in the traditional elements of the faith, while also working for justice and a better world in which women, gay people, the poor, the marginal, the oppressed, and those with hearts beaten and broken can find full membership and joy in life in Christ in eucharistic community shaped by the biblical witness, the apostolic tradition, and the Nicene boundaries of essential theological proclamation.