Faith & the Creeds 

          Faith is a supernatural gift received and infused within our soul at our Baptism. The exercising of faith requires humility and courage, because without these two virtues we cannot live with an undivided heart and mind, will and intellect, in relationship with God. Faith is relatio actuosa, real and active relationship with God. It is through an act of faith that we courageously and humbly profess the existence of God and trust in His Divine Providence for our salvation. And, it is with faith that we then live, responsibly and with accountability, the reality of that relationship of faith, hope and love with God.
 
            As is the case in any relationship, their are guidelines for the sustaining of that relationship in a healthy manner. These guidelines are derived from God’s revelation through sacred Tradition and sacred Scripture, from faith and reason in harmony, and they are beautiful because they express authentic active, real relationship with Jesus in love. To not live the entirety of the faith in humble obedience to the teachings of the Church that Jesus Christ Himself founded, in all its beauty and glory, loving its traditions and customs, embracing the rituals and prayers, and zealously professing it to all people, is to not yet fully witness to a real and active relationship of love for Jesus. We must seize the sacred time that God has given us to more perfectly become faithful disciples of Christ.
 
            Faith is not and cannot be a private matter. Faith is necessarily public, communal. Our faith cannot be compartmentalized. Faith is not lived in a box. Faith is our real and active expression of love for God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit, because faith is active, real relationship with God. This communal active expression of our faith is most perfectly expressed at Mass and in the other sacred liturgies, but it is not meant to remain merely in church and/or on Sundays. We are sent forth from Mass to proclaim, with fervent zeal, the faith that we have received, and have had purified, illuminated and perfected in us while at Mass. Our faith is meant to be lived, publicly, and to serve our brothers and sisters in Christ because "Faith without works is dead. (James 2: 26)"
 
           We profess the same one faith as Catholics and we unite ourselves not merely with all the other more than one and a half billion Catholics throughout the world today, but we unite ourselves with all the billions of Catholics that ever were and ever will be. It is the fact that our faith never has, never will and never can change, that we are able to mystically unite ourselves, by the same one faith, with all Christians throughout all time. One Faith, One Church, One Lord. The same Christ: yesterday, today and tomorrow!

Creeds

            Creeds were derived from formularies of faith that identified true Christians in the early Church, akin to a password. Those who knew these formularies of faith were granted admittance to sacred worship. The profession of faith has its origin in the Rite of Baptism, where the catechumen was questioned concerning the faith and had to profess belief in the Trinity, in Jesus Christ and other elements of the faith before they were allowed to be baptized.

          The profession of faith known as the "Apostle's Creed" is said to have originated at the hands of the Apostles during the Council of Jerusalem, each Apostle having contributed one article to this profession of faith. It was mentioned by St. Ambrose of Milan and was also used at the Council of Milan in 390 A.D. Yet, the Apostle's Creed did not enjoy universal usage in the Catholic Church until the Emperor Charlemagne (800-814) had imposed upon the churches in the Holy Roman Empire after which it gained usage in Rome.

         The first creed to be used in the sacred liturgy and developed by the Church to strengthen the communion of faith was the Nicene Creed coming from the First Ecumenical Council of Nicea in 325 and which addressed the Arian heresy which denied the divinity of Jesus. Yet, the Arian heresey did not end with the teachings coming from the Council of Nicea. Other heresies such as Nestorianism, which denied the full humanity of Jesus, had also arisen. In 381, the First Council of Constantinople was called and addressed these remaining issues effecting orthodox faith in the Trinity and Jesus Christ. From these two Ecumenical Councils we have the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed. The "filioque" was added to this creed in 1014 by Pope Benedict VIII to strengthen our understanding concerning the unity of the Trinity and that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. This was one of the debated acts, since it was derived from papal authority alone and not an ecumenical council, that led to the Great East - West Schism of 1054 creating the current day Catholic Church and Orthodox Church.

        The Creed of the People of God comes from a long tradition of each Ecumenical Council developing a profession of faith that includes that of Nicea and Constantinople while also addressing the specific issues of that council. After the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, 1962-1965, Pope St. Paul VI authored the "Creed for the People of God" to provide us all with a clear formula of faith derived from the Second Vatican Council in continuity with the faith professed throughout the ages. It is this creed that Pope Benedict XVI also commended us to learn and profess during the "Year of Faith" in 2012-2013.