A new year is upon us.
A quick note about our bulletin—you will notice that our affirmation of faith
has changed. We will be using the
Nicene Creed with occasional weeks perhaps devoted to other ecumenical or
Reformed creeds and confessions.
It is good to give public confession to the faith. We are not mindlessly reciting
words. Rather, we are doing
something profound. We are giving
expression to that which defines us.
We are giving verbal allegiance to the truth that shapes the Church and
we are confessing our glad submission to it.
There may be one area that some may be concerned about and that
is the use of the word “catholic”—“we
believe in one holy catholic and
apostolic church.” We need to
remember that the word “catholic” simply means “universal” and is not
indicating the institutional structure of what we know today as the “Roman
Catholic Church.” The Roman
Catholic New Testament scholar Luke Timothy Johnson in his book The Creed: What Christians Believe and Why
It Matters recognizes this reality and has written some important words on
this issue:
Before examining the term [“catholic”] it may
be helpful to make the (I hope obvious) point that the creed does not say that
the church is “Roman Catholic.”
That term is, indeed, oxymoronic.
It combines the element of universality with a highly particular
adjective. The Roman Catholic
tradition (the reader will remember it is my own) may believe the Roman
tradition is all-encompassing, but that is simply mistaken.
So to confess our belief in the “catholic church” is simply
to recognize the universality of the church—it exists everywhere rather than
simply in one place. Part of our
praying for the church in other nations is to also give expression to this
catholic impulse. The church does
not exist centrally or primarily in the United States. Christ’s church exists around the
world. To be sure, this universal
church is not always equally pure in doctrine or life but it is, nonetheless,
the church purchased by the blood of Christ.
So when you confess your faith in the church’s catholicity
today, do not think of Rome, the Pope, or any such thing. Let your mind move to the universal
church—our brothers and sisters throughout the nations crying out to God in the
name of Jesus Christ. Rejoice in
the Savior’s love which is nourishing and sustaining the church around the
world!
