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I'm glad to see this thread is still going! Keep it going! 
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The Definition of the Third Council of Constantinople:
Following the five holy Ecumenical Councils and the holy and approved Fathers, with one voice defining that our Lord Jesus Christ must be confessed to be very God and very man, one of the holy and consubstantial and life-giving Trinity, perfect in Deity and perfect in humanity, very God and very man, of a reasonable soul and human body subsisting; consubstantial with the Father as touching his Godhead and consubstantial with us as touching his manhood; in all things like unto us, sin only excepted; begotten of his Father before all ages according to his Godhead, but in these last days for us men and for our salvation made man of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary, strictly and properly the Mother of God according to the flesh.
One and the same Christ our Lord the only-begotten Son of two natures unconfusedly, unchangeably, inseparably indivisibly to be recognized, the peculiarities of neither nature being lost by the union but rather the proprieties of each nature being preserved, concurring in one Person and in one subsistence, not parted or divided into two persons but one and the same only-begotten Son of God, the Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, according as the Prophets of old have taught us and as our Lord Jesus Christ himself hath instructed us, and the Creed of the holy Fathers hath delivered to us.
Defining all this we likewise declare that in him are two natural wills and two natural operations indivisibly, inconvertibly, inseparably, inconfusedly, according to the teaching of the holy Fathers. And these two natural wills are not contrary the one to the other (God forbid!) as the impious heretics assert, but his human will follows and that not as resisting and reluctant, but rather as subject to his divine and omnipotent will. For it was right that the flesh should be moved but subject to the divine will, according to the most wise Athanasius. For as his flesh is called and is the flesh of God the Word, so also the natural will of his flesh is called and is the proper will of God the Word, as he himself says: 'I came down from heaven, not that I might do mine own will but the will of the Father which sent me!' where he calls his own will the will of his flesh, inasmuch as his flesh was also his own.
For as his most holy and immaculate animated flesh was not destroyed because it was deified but continued in its own state and nature, so also his human will, although deified, was not suppressed, but was rather preserved according to the saying of Gregory the Theologian: 'His will is not contrary to God but altogether deified.'
We glorify two natural operations indivisibly, immutably, inconfusedly, inseparably in the same our Lord Jesus Christ our true God, that is to say a divine operation and a human operation, according to the divine preacher Leo, who most distinctly asserts as follows: 'For each form does in communion with the other what pertains properly to it, the Word, namely, doing that which pertains to the Word, and the flesh that which pertains to the flesh.'
For we will not admit one natural operation in God and in the creature, as we will not exalt into the divine essence what is created, nor will we bring down the glory of the divine nature to the place suited to the creature. We recognize the miracles and the sufferings as of one and the same, but of one or of the other nature of which he is and in which he exists, as Cyril admirably says.
Preserving therefore the inconfusedness and indivisibility, we make briefly this whole confession, believing our Lord Jesus Christ to be one of the Trinity and after the incarnation our true God, we say that his two natures shone forth in his one subsistence in which he both performed the miracles and endured the sufferings through the whole of his economic conversation, and that not in appearance only but in very deed, and this by reason of the difference of nature which must be recognized in the same Person, for although joined together yet each nature wills and does the things proper to it and that indivisibly and inconfusedly. Wherefore we confess two wills and two operations, concurring most fitly in him for the salvation of the human race.
I believe in one God,
the Father Almighty,
Maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the only-begotten Son of God,
begotten of the Father before all worlds;
God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God;
begotten, not made, being of one Substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.
Who, for us humans for our salvation, He came down from heaven,
and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary,
and was made man.
He was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate,
He suffered and was buried.
On the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father,
and He shall come again, with glory, to judge the living and the dead,
and whose kingdom shall have no end
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life;
who proceeds from the Father [and the Son];
who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken by the prophets.
And I believe One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church,
I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins,
and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.
Amen!![]()
Nope you're wrong! I agree 100%We all affirm the Creed. Although I would make one extremely important change to how you put it. I would affirm that we believe in one holy catholic and apostolic church since I don't believe in the RC Denomination. Otherwise - yup, I'm with ya!
And I think it is HELPFUL to always keep in mind not only the FAITH that unites us (our trust/reliance in Christ as our Savior) but also the enormous, significant corpus of DOCTRINE that we share! Christianity is not only the world's largest religion (yet) but also the world's most doctrinally united religion. We often forget that as we (naturally - perhaps also appropriately) discuss what has increasingly been used to divide us and used to condemn each other. There is an ENORMOUS corpus of agreement. Over the past 10 years, I have tried - repeatedly - to celebrate this at CF, starting threads to note what we SHARE and AGREE upon - but all these threads ended in a quick and unnoticed death.
When I left the RC Denomination, I met first with our pastor (a VERY loving man who I did - and do - enormously admire). As I poured out my heart, he cared.... and loved. When I told him that I agreed with at least 95% of what I had been taught, at least 95% of the 2865 points of the Catechism I had read and studied over and over, his comment was "Josiah - that's a whole lot better than most Catholics." And he was right. Although I MAY have a reputation around here for NOT agreeing with Catholics, the reality is we agree a LOT.... a LOT. And I would stress, what we AGREE on tends to be the stuff that counts.
Long ago, when I was an undergrad taking intro classes, I well recall a physics prof saying that Physics makes perfect sense - until you get to the edges, then it all gets WEIRD. Lol. I often think about that.... as it applies to Christian doctrine. There are the "edges" - those fringe groups - where things suddenly get "weird." But for the VAST MAJORITY of Christians, there is a VAST corpus of important doctrines we fully agree on.
But this is ignored at CF. And will be this post, lol.....
Thank you!
A blessed Holy Week to you and yours....
- Josiah
I affirm it, as well. It's certainly not affirmed by the site as a whole anymore.
It's here; http://www.christianforums.com/help/rules/Do you mean the collective membership or the site itself? I was just looking around and I couldn't find any SOF on here...
Too often, we see folks in certain areas post theology that is absolutely contrary to the statement of all Christian orthodoxy, the Nicene Creed.
A long time ago, when things were really bad, I did something I usually don't do: I started a thread. That thread was to be an opportunity for people to show visible support of that inspired Creed that unites all Christians...
ALL CHRISTIANS
In honor of this new forum, and in the spirit of its purposes, I'm going to repeat that thread. Please join me in saying the Great Symbol of the Christian faith; only repeat it, mean it, and boldly proclaim it in living faith, by word, thought, and deed; in things done and not done; by belief and by work:
I believe in one God,
the Father Almighty,
Maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the only-begotten Son of God,
begotten of the Father before all worlds;
God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God;
begotten, not made, being of one Substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.
Who, for us humans for our salvation, He came down from heaven,
and was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the virgin Mary,
and was made man.
He was crucified also for us under Pontius Pilate,
He suffered and was buried.
On the third day He rose again, according to the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven, and sits on the right hand of the Father,
and He shall come again, with glory, to judge the living and the dead,
and whose kingdom shall have no end
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of Life;
who proceeds from the Father [and the Son];
who with the Father and the Son together is worshiped and glorified.
He has spoken by the prophets.
And I believe One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church,
I acknowledge one baptism for the remission of sins,
and I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come.
Amen!![]()
Ja. Ich glaube.For flavor, auf Deutsch:
Wir glauben an den einen Gott,
den Vater, den Allmächtigen,
der alles geschaffen hat,
Himmel und Erde,
die sichtbare und die unsichtbare Welt.
Und an den einen Herrn Jesus Christus,
Gottes eingeborenen Sohn,
aus dem Vater geboren vor aller Zeit:
Gott von Gott,
Licht vom Licht,
wahrer Gott vom wahren Gott,
gezeugt, nicht geschaffen,
eines Wesens mit dem Vater;
durch ihn ist alles geschaffen.
Für uns Menschen und zu unserm Heil ist er vom Himmel gekommen,
hat Fleisch angenommen durch den Heiligen Geist
von der Jungfrau Maria und ist Mensch geworden.
Er wurde für uns gekreuzigt unter Pontius Pilatus,
hat gelitten und ist begraben worden,
ist am dritten Tage auferstanden nach der Schrift
und aufgefahren in den Himmel.
Er sitzt zur Rechten des Vaters
und wird wiederkommen in Herrlichkeit,
zu richten die Lebenden und die Toten;
seiner Herrschaft wird kein Ende sein.
Wir glauben an den Heiligen Geist,
der Herr ist und lebendig macht,
der aus dem Vater (und dem Sohn) hervorgeht,
der mit dem Vater und dem Sohn angebetet und verherrlicht wird,
der gesprochen hat durch die Propheten,
und die eine, heilige, christliche und apostolische Kirche.
Wir bekennen die eine Taufe zur Vergebung der Sünden.
Wir erwarten die Auferstehung der Toten
und das Leben der kommenden Welt.
Amen.
I was raised in areas where there were still a few scattered churches that celebrated the German liturgy. There is an old cassette tape of my great-grandfather, Emil, saying the Unser Vater and the Creed auf Deutsch. I like to occasionally visit the German liturgical texts, and I know enough to follow much of it.