The original title for this service was - Helping Others and instead now it is entitled Are we the Pariahs of the Christian Church? So why such a radical change ? When the worship group met to work out services in Rogers absence I offered to contact a woman I have met quite often through my work, who coordinates a scheme which puts its members in touch with people in the community when they are in need of practical help. I thought our church might be interested in joining in this type of scheme and when I talked to Jackie the coordinator she was enthusiastic as they have a need for help in the Ponsonby area. The organisation is called Christian Love Link and it is based in Mt. Roskill so perhaps I should not have been too surprised when she called me back to cancel the following week. “ I’m sorry “she said “but when I met with the Christian Love Link Board and told them I was coming to speak to you they said you were not acceptable to join our organisation” “ They said you are not proper Christians because among other things you don’t follow the Nicene Creed and it is a rule of the organisation that you must” I felt quite sorry for Jackie as she was obviously embarrassed and at the same time I was quite taken aback. I’ve only come across this sort of response once before when I tried to book the church in to a camp out at Howick and was told we were not acceptable. Christian Love Link will help people of any faith apparently but you can’t be a helper if you don’t have the right beliefs. I felt a bit like the Jews must have felt in WW2 – unclean – unclean!! Maybe we should wear a special badge when we meet with other church groups so they can identify us immediately and keep away if we offend them? Well their exclusiveness is their problem and I guess they have their rules and must follow them but it’s a bit sad in this day and age that a possible offer of a helping hand should be so spurned. This got me thinking about the Nicene creed and why don’t we believe in it? Here is an abridged translation. recently done by the ecumenical English Language Liturgical Commission . It is said to be truer to the Greek original than other translations. We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all that is, seen and unseen. We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father, God from God, light from light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one Being with the Father; through him all things were made. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father [and the Son], who with the Father and the Son is worshiped and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets. So that in shortened version is the words of the Nicene creed. Here is a bit of history I found out about it about it…. The Nicene Creed was adopted in 325 C.E., at the partial instigation of the Roman Emperor Constantine, who acted as self appointed mediator at the synod. Until Constantine’s conversion, the early Christians had suffered persecution, and under anti-Christian laws many Christians had been forced to renounce their faith. The advent of Constantine, should have ensured universal toleration, but in fact, the early Christians turned out to be as intolerant of others as others had been of them, and in the end they proved to be even more intolerant of each other. When Constantine became head of the Roman Empire, there were many unsettled controversies surrounding who was orthodox and who was not. Before Constantine, these issues were not subject to final adjudication. With the ascension of Constantine, Christianity became the state religion and when this happened, theological problems became political problems. The church now had the power of the state, and it used it as a means of enforcing orthodoxy and quelling dissent, not always with success, but not for want of trying. Constantine wanted peace and harmony in the Church more than anything else, and he called the Council of Nicea in the hope of settling some of the doctrinal problems that were vexing the Church. Peace and harmony, however, would have required toleration of opposing views, and toleration, like humility, have historically not been prominent characteristics of Christianity. When the Council of Nicea decreed the doctrine of the Trinity - God as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost - they denounced all those who believed differently as heretics. So are we heretics? The dictionary today defines a heretic as “ a doctrinal view or belief at variance with the recognized standards or tenets of any established religious, philosophical, political or other system” Let’s have a look at the Nicene creed again. It begins......... We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty . Do Unitarians Universalists believe in God? To quote from the UU website “Some UU’s are nontheists and do not find language about God useful. The faith of other Unitarian Universalists in God may be profound, though among these, too, talk of God may be restrained” Mankind has too many Gods to suppose that his God is the God, yet most who talk of God talk as if they know where others do not. Unitarians usually suggest that no person knows who or what God is. We would invite anyone to come forward and present for consideration whatever their belief in God may be, but would consider it wrong to divide people off from one another because they reached different conclusions on the matter. The second part of the creed states “We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, eternally begotten of the Father. What do we Unitarians believe about Jesus? Again from the website… “Classically, Unitarian Universalist Christians have understood Jesus as a saviour because he was a God-filled human being, not a supernatural being. He was, and still is for many UUs, someone who has shown the way of redemptive love, in whose spirit anyone may live generously and abundantly. Among us, Jesus' very human life and teaching have been understood as products of, and in line with, the great Jewish tradition of prophets and teachers. He neither broke with that tradition nor superseded it.” Many of us honor Jesus, and many of us honor other master teachers of past or present generations, like Moses or the Buddha or Mother Theresa. The final part of the Nicene creed begins - “We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life…… Many Unitarians would speak of “reverence for life” as the force of life and inspiration within ourselves or (in the words of Albert Schweitzer, a Unitarian), the spirit of love or truth, the holy, or the gracious. Whatever our theological persuasion, Unitarian Universalists generally agree that the fruits of religious belief matter more than beliefs about religion-even about God. So we usually speak more of the fruits: gratitude for blessings, worthy aspirations, the renewal of hope, and service on behalf of justice. Christian Lovelink say we are not Christian. Are we? …. “Yes …. and no” From the website again….. Yes… some of us are Christian. Personal encounter with the spirit of Jesus as the Christ richly informs their religious lives. And No… UU’s are not Christian, if by Christian you mean those who think that acceptance of any creedal belief whatsoever is necessary for salvation. UU Christians are considered heretics by those orthodox Christians who claim none but Christians are "saved." (Fortunately, not all the orthodox make that claim.) But.. Yes UU’s are Christian in the sense that both Unitarian and Universalist history are part of Christian history. Our core principles and practices were first articulated and established by liberal Christians. And no… UU’s are not Christian. For though we may acknowledge the Christian history of our faith, Christian stories and symbols are no longer primary for us.We draw our personal faith from many sources: nature, intuition, other cultures, science, civil liberation movements, and so on.” Unitarians today look upon the Nicene creed as a formula invented in the fourth centrury CE in an effort to solve a difficult theological and political problem. We believe this not as a matter of theology but because history tell us so. the Nicene Creed is an historical document that has served it’s purpose and is no longer viable. You can see why there are no creeds in use in UU churches. Unitarians don’t think it matters whether you believe God exists in one person, as the Jews do, or in 3 as the Christians do. What does matter is that Christians divide themselves off from each other and from Non Christians on the basis of such theological opinions. For Christian Love Link, who still are bound by rules laid down in 325CE, perhaps a church where people think for themselves, ask questions and make up their own minds might seem to be a church full of heretics, social outcasts, pariahs. As a Unitarian Church, the idea of free thought i.e. heresy should hold no terror for us Maybe we are heretics, and for some other churches, but thankfully not most, we may be pariahs. Christian Love Link may not want our help because they don’t like what we believe but at the end of the day it isn’t what others think we are that matters, it’s what we ( and our God) know ourselves to be. In the words of Milton if he believes things simply because his pastor says so, or the assembly so determines, without knowing other reason: though his belief be true yet the very truth he holds becomes his heresy. Or to finish on a lighter note in the words of UU minister Leonard Mason And hear our heretical views: You were not born in sin So lift up your chin, You have only your dogmas to lose Sue Radics 20th July 03 |