The Kitchen Sink
An occasional piece of paper
October 4, 2009
Vol. 12 no. 38

Everything But...

We do not do well with creeds in the United Church, except that we are surrounded by them. Our hymnal Voices United includes The Apostles’ Creed and The Nicene Creed, the two most familiar historical creeds, as well as The New Creed of the United Church of Canada. Yet, we say that we don’t like creeds.

The word comes from the Latin word “Credo” or “I believe” that begins many of these statements of faith. Creeds are intended to be a concise outline of the essentials ideas of the Christian faith. Many times the words and concepts become frozen and become a “test of faith.” Some traditions insist upon agreeing with every letter of the creed.

Years ago I thought of joining a certain Christian athletes group and was required to assent to a list of 16 statements of doctrines. The note at the bottom of the page indicated that they would blink if you had some hesitation about one or two of the statements. Frankly, there were only one or two that I could stretch and compromise myself to agree with! It was my first direct experience of why United Church folk resist creeds. Our faith keeps developing and growing and should never become absolutely static. If we must agree to the same words as a particular creed, then we tend to look around for loopholes in different ideas.

When we recite the various creeds in our worship, it is not a test of our orthodoxy, but as a centering of where our faith is developing. The Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds clarify the basic elements of the faith held by most of the church for most of these millennia. They are meant as places to begin, not as the final argument. With different words, all begin simply, “I believe in God.” That will be where we simply begin today.