TEC Rewrites The Nicene Creed

And You'll Never Guess What Happens Next

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:First_Council_of_Nicea-stavropoleos_church.JPG

A day or two ago Matt said I should “blog about the war,” an idea that appalled and shocked me, as what on earth would I say about it? Instead I slogged through state-testing my three remaining homeschooled children, a number that is now reduced to two. Oh my word! Congratulate me! I have yet another high school graduate! Two more to go and they’re both in high school, so pretty soon I will be eating bonbons and lying on a beach somewhere with literally nothing to do. Where was I?

Oh yes! I don’t have anything to say about “the war” especially since apparently it is now over. Instead, let’s go look at something truly repulsive. The Episcopal Church is always trying to make better liturgies for itself instead of just sticking with what works, and they’ve taken it upon themselves to rewrite the Nicene Creed for some reason. I confess, the decision to do this, even in a so-called “experimental liturgy,” is baffling, for when I was growing up, it was at least something to be able to say, “we all believe the Nicene Creed,” or “he can say the creed without crossing his fingers.” My favorite (and perhaps this is apocryphal, but I don’t care) was the man who went to church with his wife and, not believing in God himself, but being a genial and friendly sort of person, would heartily join in with, “She believes in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth” etc. etc.

Indeed, I have the recollection of often being lectured by people who don’t want matters of sexuality of be first order troubles that “we can all say the creed” so what’s your problem. How funny that, having thrown orthodox Christian teaching on human sexuality into the dustbin of history, it is now actually time to rewrite the Creed. It is almost as if—and follow me closely here, for what I am about to say will probably blow your tiny mind—what God says about himself is ineffably related to what he says about us, and that if you throw away one, you are inexorably bound to throw away the other. Ah well, how sad life is.

Still, to delay the inevitable tearing of the wall paper (we wanted to paint over it but it is too damaged, tragically) let us look at this theological dumpster fire of the vanities. If you go look at the whole thing, you will see they have made a lot of alterations. I believe they have, at least since I was in seminary, been trying out lots of different ways of addressing God, but haven’t landed on anything appealing. This is new to me:

Blessed be God! — Almighty Creator, incarnate Word, abiding Spirit.

[or] Creator, Messiah, Comforter.

[or] Maker, Savior, Grace.

[or] The One, the Word, and the lifegiving Spirit.

And blessed be God's presence, now and forever.

I guess the ‘ors’ indicate that you may pick what you like. I will be sticking with “Blessed by God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,” because I am not unhinged from reality, but you may pick whatever you like.

They also changed the very elegant, “The Lord be with you. And with your Spirit” to this depressing greeting:

God be with you.

And within you.

Anyway, let us press on to the calamity before us. This liturgical effort is apparently called “The Nicene Creed” but I think that is too generous. It should be called, “The Wreck of the Nicene Creed” or “A Time When A Group Of People Say Some Things” or “The Point In The Weekly Gathering Where We, For Reasons We Don’t Remember, Feel We Ought To Make Some Kind Of Public Statement In The Direction Of The Universe Which Hopefully Has Our Back.” I will go line by line and compare it to the real thing:

We believe— In the One God: Source of all, ruler of all, maker of heaven and earth: of all things seen or unseen.

When I first read this, I was so disoriented that I couldn’t remember the original of which the first line goes like this: “We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, visible and invisible.” What, we must ask ourselves, is wrong with that? Why capitalize the word “One?” Is it to indicate some sort of Brahman like essence? Except that God is not merely a “source” like essence that emanates things in an undirected way. He’s the Creator. And his preferred pronouns are He Him because he is “the Father, the Almighty.” He isn’t a man, for he does not have a body like us, and we can’t see him, and so Amy whatshername who wrote that Gender of God book doesn’t need work herself into a wroth, but we do have to call him what he himself says we must call him. Also, why say “seen or unseen” when God is the maker of everything visible and invisible? I bet a committee got a hold of this, that’s what I bet.