How many people here believe in orthodox/credal Christianity?
ChastMastr
Shipmate
in Purgatory
I’ve been noticing for a while that it seems like only a very small number of people here nowadays seem to believe in orthodox/traditional or credal (Nicene/Apostle’s/Athanasian/etc. Creed) Christianity. How many of us are there? Not that people have to believe this to be nice people or anything, but I feel like what used to be a lot more people who did on the Ship have been reduced to a tiny handful. Is this correct? Does anyone know what happened or why? (Obviously some older people have sadly passed away.)
Comments
I personally believe what is taught in the Nicene Creed. (There are things that many Christians would consider orthodox that I don't believe, but they're not in the Nicene Creed.)
This. I now regard myself as 'respectfully agnostic', if that makes any sense.
More important to me is communities and individuals living out loving God and being a good neighbour. With apologies to Rabbi Hillel, the rest of the Bible is commentary, giving insight and raising questions to consider for the life of our community and individually.
As a chaplain I value inclusivity and am disappointed with Christianities that are judgemental and exclusive.
Why the small “o”? Well, I remain a nonconformist when it comes to the visible church. I think the total membership of the holy, catholic and apostolic church is in the end known perfectly only to God. My ecumenism comes from having found Christians everywhere, across high, low and medium denominations. My finding may be fallible, but I’m sure God knows better!
At the same time, I feel we do need to develop more contemporize the statement of faith. One that I like is The New Creed that was developed by the United Church of Canada.
Yes, I go to a credal denomination.
Same here, though my original background was Anglican. The tradition I'm now in has always eschewed formal creeds although (a) I do sometimes use them when leading worship and (b) some Baptist churches (not ours!) have in recent years adopted detailed Statements of Faith, far longer than the historic creeds.
By the way do you mean credal in the sense ‘does use and assent to the creeds’ or ‘does assent to the creeds, even though not using them in public worship’?
I am unsure about whether there is a deity, if there is one it seems he only has a passing interest in humanity.
I would like to believe in judgment and accountability.
The "mostly" comes from the fact that I am agnostic about the historicity of the virgin birth.
I grew up in an FIEC baptist church but spent most of my adult life in the Ichthus network. Though since I moved home 7 years ago, I haven't found a church to call home. Did attend one online during lockdown but then they showed their highly conservative colours, whereas most of the other churches I looked at were more up front about it.
You might like this
https://gordonatkinson.net/lent/my-seen-creed
Not sure why you've tagged me in that, I can't make head nor tail of the link.
I would rather this thread was not about my unbelief, I am more interested in understanding more about the kinds of beliefs of believers.
There's also this from Not The Nine O'Clock News. The last line remains a bit too topical:
https://youtu.be/IUQcCvX2MKk?si=8gSE3Vx5zCH_UErB
Assent to, whether in public worship or not. Believe to be true.
I don’t believe in human asexual reproduction either – the Virgin Birth is not held to be normal but miraculous.
My personal journey led me a predominantly more orthodox understanding because I got this sense that Something Was Missing. I realised two things. Firstly that activism was getting in the way of contemplation. Secondly that study of the history of the church didn’t end with the Bible as properly understood with the help of the Reformation. In that journey I was helped a lot by a couple of good friends who were on a similar journey. It’s hardly been a straight line journey!
I love my local congo. Some are a lot less orthodox than me but it’s a kind and generous community, very good on local community support. They are individually and collectively on a journey and I’m very happy to journey with them. For well over half a century now.
To take just one example, what do we really mean by "and he will come to judge the living and the dead" (Apostles Creed) or "He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead" (Nicene Creed)? Do we still really believe that there will be a moment not that far away when Christ's return will end all time and earthly existence? How does that work in the universe that we now know exists?
These days, I am happier saying the simpler Apostles Creed than the Nicene. For me it is a recognition that we don't create faith afresh but stand on the foundations of countless generations of Christians. But we also now live in a very different world, and we have to reinterpret our faith accordingly, whilst trying to remain faithful to the core beliefs.
I'm also wary of how the Creeds can be used to exclude people: "you have to sign up to all of this to be a Proper Christian." There are many many people would struggle to agree to all the statements in the creeds, and yet their hearts are in the right place and their lives reflect something of the love, humility and forgiveness that Jesus talked so much about.
Apologies. Mea Culpa.
(It resonated with me because of my different understanding of what is important.)
"Not that far away" is rather load bearing here. In human lifespan terms? In terms of the lifetime of a species? Geological time? Cosmic time? The Creed doesn't project a timespan, only affirms that it will happen, presumably while humans (or perhaps fallen sapient beings in general) still exist. As to how it works: miraculously. Why should a final divine intervention obey any observed laws of the universe?
However, belief is a slippery word. Some there will say it because they mean "I belong to the Church, therefore I believe..." , some will mean "These are things I am prepared to dies for", some will mean "these are as true as the grass is green..." some will mean "I trust these to be true..." and it goes on. Who am I to judge them, a word is only as its usage.
“If all the copies of the Bible were destroyed, and all that remained was a fragment from the first letter of St John, that God is love, then the essence of our faith could be restored”.
If our understanding of the Creeds do not encourage us to follow Jesus on the journey of unselfish agape love, then something has gone seriously wrong.
Absolutely!
Actually, you've just proved my point. You've reinterpreted this belief to mean something other than what was originally meant. Even after the expectation of an imminent Parousia faded, the early Church held to the idea that Christ would return and then all would be judged and life as we know it would end. There would be Heaven and there would be Hell and that would be it. That this might be in billions of years time was unthinkable.
Will there be a moment of judgement for each of us when we stand in the presence of God? Yes - when we die. Will there be a moment when time and space is wrapped up and all who still living at that time are judged? That's far more problematic.
"Believe" is to me pretty much a synonym of "Think" - they're the same word in French and some Welsh dialects so I don't think I'm too left field there. "I believe Paris is the capital of France" to me is a statement exactly parallel to "I believe Jesus rose again on the third day".
For me it has nothing to do with belonging, except inasmuch as some groups require one hold certain beliefs to be a member of the group, but then it would be the belief enabling the membership, not membership driving the belief.
I can't make sense of your first paragraph I'm afraid. It's probably a limitation of the way my mind works but it just doesn't convey anything.
I partially agree, but it would leave us open to repeating all the disputations of the past.
I recall talking to an Anglican vicar once, noting that I was an evangelical background, and how we both differed. I said I liked the idea of "belonging before you believe" in contrast to the gatekeeping I saw in churches of my ilk, where orthodoxy was drummed into you before you could be a church member.
His response was that he actually liked the gatekeeping as he felt frustrated that a large part of his work was having to combat centuries old heresies that various members of the congregation held to, even if they weren't doing so in order to be heterodox, but just that they believed what they chose to believe without a huge amount of reference to a good understanding of biblical texts.
Interestingly, the Baptist Union of Great Britain itself only has a brief "Declaration of Principle". There was a recent attempt to mandate a much more detailed Statement of Faith, but it was then withdrawn.
The European Baptist Federation, to which BUGB is affiliated, goes in for more detail: https://www.teddingtonbaptist.org.uk/tbcbapt2.htm
Barnabas 62 opined: 'If our understanding of the Creeds do not encourage us to follow Jesus on the journey of unselfish agape love, then something has gone seriously wrong'.
Exactly! I would add, 'Do our 'beliefs', credal or otherwise, inspire and help to nurture the Fruits of the Spirit'?(Love, joy, peace, patience etc ....) if they do, there ain't much wrong with them, whatever they are.
Sorry if this doesn't make much sense. Having been a Christian for sixty years there's a lot of emotion here!
We do have confessional statements written over the last century, in addition to the Nicene and Apostles’ Creeds and Reformation-era confessional statements and catechisms.
I am now an Anglican but grew up in an evangelical FIEC church. I value the freedom not to have to sign on the dotted line or subscribe to certain stipulations. I value inclusivity rather than barriers which separate and divide.
The order of magnitude, perhaps, but given it had been 300 and counting by the time of the Council of Nicea it's not unreasonable to think that the gathered bishops new the end could come next week or a really long time from now. Scientific understanding may have expanded our idea of a really long time but the underlying principle is unchanged.
I do believe that Jesus will return, visibly, physically, tangibly--and I try not to put expectations on the timeframe, since he told us not to. But yeah, could be today, could be quite a long time from now. To the best of my understanding, the only hint we have from him is "And the gospel must first be proclaimed to all nations," Mark 13:10. So I cautiously take it that we have a little time left. But I may be wrong. (who knows exactly how he defines "nations"?)