THE CREED

RCIA Basilica of St. Mary

October 2, 2023
Fr. Noah Morey (slides adapted from Br. Cornelius Avaritt, O.P.)
• FAITH AND REASON

• SCRIPTURE, TRADITION, &

MAGESTERIUM

• SALVATION HISTORY
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 THE NECESSITY OF FAITH
By natural reason man can know God with certainty, on the
basis of his works. But there is another order of knowledge,
which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the
order of divine Revelation. Through an utterly free decision,
God has revealed himself and given himself to man. This he
does by revealing the mystery, his plan of loving goodness,
formed from all eternity in Christ, for the benefit of all men.
God has fully revealed this plan by sending us his beloved
Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit (CCC, 50)

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 •What is the purpose or
HOW ARE THESE end of the Christian Life?
CONNECTED •How do we attain this
end?
•Perfection and Beatitude

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I.The life of man - to know and love God
I. God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself, in a plan of
sheer goodness freely created man to make him share in his
own blessed life. For this reason, at every time and in every
place, God draws close to man. He calls man to seek him, to
know him, to love him with all his strength. He calls together
all men, scattered and divided by sin, into the unity of his
family, the Church. To accomplish this, when the fullness of
time had come, God sent his Son as Redeemer and Saviour. In
his Son and through him, he invites men to become, in the
Holy Spirit, his adopted children and thus heirs of his blessed
life (CCC, 1) 5
 FOUNDATIONAL
PRINCIPLES
GOD IS GOD
WE ARE NOT
•Creator vs. Creation
•Unity and Simplicity
•Order and hierarchy
•Causality
•Truth and Goodness
THESE HELP US UNDERSTAND THE
WORLD WE LIVE IN 6
 GOD AND US
We are made in the image and likeness of God. We are related to God, but God is not
related to us.

Man God
• Body and Soul (Composite) • Simple
• Contingent • Necessary
• Eternal/Infinite
• Finite • Universal Truth
• Particular Truth • Universal Good
• Particular Good • WHO HE IS AND THAT HE IS ARE
THE SAME
• WHO WE ARE AND THAT WE ARE,
ARE DISTINCT
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 St. Thomas Aquinas
• All creatures proceed from
God
THE JOURNEY TO
GOD • All creatures return to God

• FROM THIS WE
UNDERSTAND THAT GOD
IS THE FIRST CAUSE AND
FINAL END FOR ALL OF
CREATION
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 MAN'S CAPACITY FOR GOD
I. The Desire for God
The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man
is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw
man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and
happiness he never stops searching for: The dignity of man
rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with
God. This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man
as soon as he comes into being. For if man exists it is because
God has created him through love, and through love continues
to hold him in existence. He cannot live fully according to truth
unless he freely acknowledges that love and entrusts himself
to his creator (CCC, 27)
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 FAITH
An act of the Intellect and the Will

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• The Role of our intellect

• The Role of our will

THE ACT
OF FAITH
• What is believed in the Act of Faith

• What are the preambles of Faith

• What are the Articles of Faith

• Why profess a Creed?

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 THE ACT OF FAITH

By his Revelation, "the invisible God, from the fullness of his

love, addresses men as his friends, and moves among them,
in order to invite and receive them into his own
company." The adequate response to this invitation is faith
(CCC, 142).
By faith, man completely submits his intellect and his will to
God. With his whole being man gives his assent to God the
revealer. Sacred Scripture calls this human response to
God, the author of revelation, "the obedience of faith”(CCC,
143).
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THE ROLE OF THE INTELLECT AND WILL

The Intellect seeks truth

The will pursues the good

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THE PREAMBLES OF FAITH
Propositions, revealed by God, that human
reason could in principle come to knowledge
of without the aid of revelation. E.g. God is
eternal, God is good, God is One

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 MYSTERIES OF FAITH
Propositions, revealed by God, that human
reason could not even in principle come to
knowledge of without the aid of revelation. E.g. The
Incarnation, Trinity, The Descent of the Holy Spirit

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 DEFINITION OF FAITH
Faith is first of all a personal adherence of man to
God. At the same time, and inseparably, it is a free
assent to the whole truth that God has revealed. As
personal adherence to God and assent to his truth,
Christian faith differs from our faith in any human
person. It is right and just to entrust oneself wholly
to God and to believe absolutely what he says. It
would be futile and false to place such faith in a
creature (CCC, 150).
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 FAITH IS A HUMAN ACT
Believing is possible only by grace and the interior helps of the Holy Spirit. But it is
no less true that believing is an authentically human act. Trusting in God and
cleaving to the truths he has revealed is contrary neither to human freedom nor to
human reason. Even in human relations it is not contrary to our dignity to believe
what other persons tell us about themselves and their intentions, or to trust their
promises (for example, when a man and a woman marry) to share a communion of
life with one another. If this is so, still less is it contrary to our dignity to "yield by
faith the full submission of... intellect and will to God who reveals", and to share in
an interior communion with him (CCC, 154).

In faith, the human intellect and will co-operate with divine grace: "Believing is an
act of the intellect assenting to the divine truth by command of the will moved by
God through grace” (CCC, 155).
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CREDO
I BELIEVE/WE BELIEVE
• Whoever says "I believe" says "I pledge myself to what we
believe." Communion in faith needs a common language
of faith, normative for all and uniting all in the same
confession of faith (CCC, 185)

• 186 From the beginning, the apostolic Church expressed

and handed on her faith in brief formulae normative for
all. But already very early on, the Church also wanted to
gather the essential elements of her faith into organic
and articulated summaries, intended especially for
candidates for Baptism:

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 WHAT IS A CREED?
They are called "creeds" on account of what is
usually their first word in Latin: credo ("I believe").
They are also called "symbols of faith“ (CCC, 187)

A sign of recognition and communion between

believers; a summary of the principle truths of the
faith (CCC, 188).

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IMPORTANT DISTINCTION BETWEEN
WORDS AND REALITY
We do not believe in formulae, but in those realities they
express, which faith allows us to touch. "The believer's act [of
faith] does not terminate in the propositions, but in the
realities [which they express]."56 All the same, we do
approach these realities with the help of formulations of the
faith which permit us to express the faith and to hand it on,
to celebrate it in community, to assimilate and live on it more
and more (CCC, 170).

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 THE APOSTLE’S CREED
Father
I believe in God,
the Father almighty,
Creator of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,

who was conceived by the Holy Spirit,

born of the Virgin Mary,

Son
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died and was buried;
he descended into hell;
on the third day he rose again from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty;
from there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

Holy Spirit I believe in the Holy Spirit,

the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and life everlasting.
Amen.

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 THE NICENE CREED
Father
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,
born of the Father before all ages.
God from God, Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father;
through him all things were made.

Son
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate,
he suffered death and was buried,
and rose again on the third day
in accordance with the Scriptures.
He ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory
to judge the living and the dead

Holy Spirit
and his kingdom will have no end.
I 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 adored and glorified,
who has spoken through the prophets.
I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church.
I confess one Baptism for the forgiveness of sins
and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead
and the life of the world to come. Amen.

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 FATHER
I believe in one God,
the Father almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all things visible and invisible.

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 SON
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages. God from God, Light from
Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made,
consubstantial with the Father; through him all things were
made. For us men and for our salvation he came down from
heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius
Pilate, he suffered death and was buried, and rose again on the
third day in accordance with the Scriptures. He ascended into
heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will
come again in glory to judge the living and the dead
and his kingdom will have no end.
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 HOLY SPIRIT
I 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
adored and glorified, who has spoken through
the prophets.

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 I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ,
the Only Begotten Son of God,
Council of Nicaea born of the Father [before all ages].
God from God, Light from Light,
(325 AD) true God from true God,
begotten, not made, consubstantial
with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us men and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
 Council of I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the
giver of life, who proceeds from the
Constantinople Father and the Son, who with the
(381 AD) Father and the Son is adored and
glorified, who has spoken through the
prophets.
 GOD REVEALING HIMSELF AS
ONE
Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God
of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his
name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”
14 God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the

Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’”

15 God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The LORD, the God of your

fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has
sent me to you.’
“This is my name forever, the name you shall call me from generation to
generation (Exodus 3:13-15)

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 GOD AS THREE (TRINITY)

• FATHER

• SON

• HOLY SPIRIT

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 TRINITARIAN BAPTISM
"I baptize you in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.“

THE SIGN OF THE CROSS

In the name of the Father and of the Son and
of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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 CONCLUDING POINTS
• God is distinct from creation.

• God created the world out of love

• Man is called to know and love God as his final end

• This is impossible without Faith

• The profession of the Creed perfects our Act of Faith

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 HERESY
From the Greek hairesis/Latin haeresis – act of choosing
“Incredulity is the neglect of revealed truth or the willful refusal to assent to it.
Heresy is the obstinate post-baptismal denial of some truth which must be believed with divine and
Catholic faith, or it is likewise an obstinate doubt concerning the same; apostasy is the total
repudiation of the Christian faith; schism is the refusal of submission to the Roman Pontiff or of
communion with the members of the Church subject to him” (CCC 2089).

To commit heresy, one must refuse to be corrected. A person who is ready to be corrected or
who is unaware that what he has been saying is against Church teaching is not a heretic.
A person must be baptized to commit heresy. This means that movements that have split off from
or been influenced by Christianity, but that do not practice baptism (or valid baptism), are not
heresies, but separate religions. Examples include Muslims, who do not practice baptism, and
Jehovah’s Witnesses, who do not practice valid baptism.
Finally, the doubt or denial involved in heresy must concern a matter that has been revealed by
God and solemnly defined by the Church (the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Real Presence of Christ
in the Eucharist, the sacrifice of the Mass, the pope’s infallibility, or the Immaculate Conception and
ADD A FOOTER Assumption of Mary). Adapted
33 from Catholic Answers
 HELPFUL RESOURCES
• CATHOLIC ANSWERS

• THOMISTIC INSTITUTE

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DISCUSSION
QUESTIONS

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 ACT OF FAITH
O my God, I firmly believe that you are one God in
three divine persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. I
believe that your divine Son became man and
died for our sins, and that he will come to judge
the living and the dead. I believe these and all the
truths which the holy catholic Church teaches,
because in revealing them you can neither
deceive nor be deceived.

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