Joint statement on wording of Nicaean Creed marks major step towards healing centuries of division
(LWI) - Three little words (just one in the original Latin) that have divided the East and Western churches for centuries, are at the heart of a new, ground-breaking agreement that its authors hope could usher in a new era of reconciliation and mark a significant step on the road towards Christian unity.
At a May meeting in Cairo, Egypt, of the International Lutheran-Orthodox Joint Theological Commission between the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) and the Orthodox Church, both sides revisited a sixth century rewording of the Nicene Creed and agreed that the use of the original Greek text should be encouraged in all churches.
Using the dialogue process of ‘differentiated consensus’, they drew up a joint statement that revealed “a fundamental rapprochement on the concept of the relationship between the Son and the Spirit.” The decision was agreed upon “in the hope that this will contribute to the healing of age-old divisions between our communities and enable us to confess together the faith of the Ecumenical Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople.”
Renewed reflection on the Trinity
The divisions centered on the addition by Western Church of the Latin word ‘filioque’ (in English ‘and the Son’) to the original text of the Creed describing the origin of the Holy Spirit. For the Orthodox Church, this addition represented a distortion of the doctrine of the Trinity. Despite attempts at reconciliation, the Eastern and Western churches broke apart in the schism of 1054 - a schism that remains in effect to this day.
In their Cairo meeting, participants noted that the churches of the Reformation inherited the Creed in the Western tradition without considering it problematic. Today, however, in light of the upcoming 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, participants agreed it is time to reconsider what the addition of those words implies and how a path towards reconciliation may be opened. The statement proposes that a renewed focus on the original wording of the Creed “may encourage renewed theological reflection on the Trinity and role of the Holy Spirit.”
