Diocesan News

Reflecting on the Legacy of the Nicene Creed 1,700 Years Later

St. Athanasius was only in his mid-20s when he championed the truth of the Holy Trinity during the Council of Nicaea. 

MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS — By today’s terminology, Athanasius of Alexandria might be called a “boy genius” or a prodigy. But back in 325 A.D., in his mid-20s, he was a church deacon known for his intellect and oratory. That year, he accompanied his bishop, Alexander of Alexandria, to Nicaea (in what is now Turkey) to assist at a council convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine.

A dozen years earlier, Constantine became the first emperor to convert to Christianity. In doing so, he legalized religious freedom, which put a stop to three centuries of violent persecution against anyone who dared follow the carpenter, Jesus of Nazareth. But with religious freedom came infighting over the concept of the Holy Trinity. A presbyter named Arius, also from Alexandria, argued that Jesus and God did not share co-eternal natures and that God alone was supreme.

At Nicaea, young Athanasius, who became a saint, emerged as an outspoken defender of the Holy Trinity. A majority of bishops concurred, resulting in the drafting of a doctrine: the Nicene Creed. It remains the unifying declaration of faith that binds various denominations of the Universal Church, including Roman Catholicism.

“To bring bishops representing the whole Catholic Orthodox world together to agree on a formula for affirming the divinity of Christ was an enormous achievement,” Diocese of Brooklyn Auxiliary Bishop James Massa said. He made the comments on Jan. 19 during a special Evensong service celebrating the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea and the Nicene Creed.

The service was held at the historic Cathedral of St. John the Divine, which is part of the Episcopal Diocese of New York and located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. Bishop Massa noted that despite the breakthrough at Nicaea, “the whole thing began to unravel” within a few years. Although Arius did not sway the council, and he was forced into exile, he still had followers who preached “Arianism” for many decades.

“They continued to preach a kind of an Arian gospel,” Bishop Massa said, “and that continued well into the next 50-60 years until the Council of Constantinople in 381.” About 200 parishioners and clergy of various denominations attended the prayer
service despite an early-evening blast of snow and arctic temperatures hitting New York City. The event also celebrated the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, which was founded in 1908 and coordinated by the World Council of Churches (WCC).

Joining Bishop Massa in prayers for unity were Bishop Mesrop Parsamyan of the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Church (representing Oriental Orthodox churches) and Bishop Paul Egensteiner of the Metropolitan New York Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (representing Protestant churches).

Bishop Massa, rector of St. Joseph Seminary and College at Dunwoodie, Yonkers, has been an authority on Christian unity since 2005 when he became executive director of the office for Ecumenical and Interreligious Dialogue for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Three years later, Pope Benedict XVI made him a consultor to the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue and a member of the Joint Working Group between the Holy See and the WCC.

Bishop Massa said Pope Francis has already made statements connecting the creed to Easter this year, which has the
unusual coincidence of occurring on the same date (April 20) for both the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches. According to the Vatican, Pope Francis plans to visit Turkey for the 1,700th anniversary if his health permits. No specific travel plans have yet been announced.

Auxiliary Bishop James Massa led a prayer for Christian unity during a celebration of the 1,700th anniversary of the creation of the Nicene Creed. (Photo: Bill Miller)

Father Michael Lynch, vicar for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs in the Diocese of Brooklyn, suggested that this visit could signal a resolution of centuries-old disputes between the two churches. He noted that Pope Francis and the Eastern Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew have voiced a willingness to find common ground and permanently celebrate Easter Sunday on the same day.

The “Great Schism” began in 1054 as the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches could not agree on a wide range of issues. Differences intensified in 1582, when the Gregorian calendar, named after Pope Gregory XIII, was devised to address questions about the Julian calendar, which Emperor Julius Caesar had commissioned.

The West still follows the Gregorian calendar while Orthodox Christians use the Julian. Hence, the two churches usually calculate different dates for Easter. This is counter to the position championed by St. Athanasius 1,257 years earlier at Nicaea — that Christians should all celebrate Easter on the same date.

Father Lynch is also pastor of St. Athanasius Parish in Bensonhurst, so he has a special appreciation for the patron saint,
and his work at Nicaea. “One of the things that helped bring the bishops together was the fact that we had to celebrate the resurrected Christ together,” Father Lynch said.

Bishop Massa said the quest for Christian unity — which is as old as the Church itself — will likely continue until “the re-
turn of our Lord.” Still, he noted, the Nicene Creed has helped sustain Christianity’s basic tenets despite numerous other “schisms” and “reformations,” including Protestant and Roman Catholic.

“What that teaches us is that Christian unity is something that has to be constantly worked on,” Bishop Massa said. “It’s never simply achieved all at once. It has to be nourished and fed constantly by efforts at finding reconciliation.”