Last week, we began looking at the words of the Creed. Those simple words that begin the Creed, “I believe,” are words that unite us in faith as Christians. We must finish the sentence, though: What do I believe? The Creed is normally written in four sections. The first three focus on the three persons of the Trinity. The final section speaks of the Church. We believe, then, in the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and the Church. This week, we’ll look at the first section of the Creed and see what it tells us about our Father.

“in one God”

As Christians, we believe that there is one God, and only one God. The idea of there being more than one God is preposterous to many of us; however, when the Creed was written this was not the case. Christians were regarded by the Romans, for example, as atheists, because they did not believe in enough gods. Throughout history, he term “god” has not always been understood to mean the almighty, all-knowing, single creator of the universe. Western society, with its Christian heritage, for many centuries understood “god” to imply all these things. This can no longer be assumed, sadly. As our society becomes more detached from its roots and from the truth, paganism and other ancient religions are coming back. When we express our belief in one God as Christians, we are saying that there is only one who is worthy of our worship, and this one is the God we profess in the Creed, who the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

“the Father almighty”

God is three persons: Father, Son, and Spirit. God has shown to us that he wishes us to know him as our Father. This is how Christ taught us to pray to him, as “Our Father.” Our relationship with God is not to be a relationship based out of subjugation or out of fear, but a relationship based on the love between children and their father. We need reminded of this regularly, because this Father of ours is almighty. He can do all things. There is nothing beyond his power. We must not take this lightly. There is a reason that “fear of the Lord” is considered a gift of the Holy Spirit. It helps us to recognize our proper place in relationship to God. Yes, we are his children, but he has no need of us in any way: we must rely on him for all that we are and all that we have.

“maker of heaven and earth,”

Our almighty God and Father is the maker and source of all that is. We and everything around us depend on God to continue existing. The Church teaches that God creates from nothing. (“Ex nihilo”, if you prefer.) St. Thomas Aquinas helps us to understand that this means he creates “from nothing.” Nothing is a challenging concept to comprehend, because we have no lived experience of nothingness. Until I was in seminary, I never pondered how foreign the idea of “nothing” was to me.

“of all things visible and invisible.”

God created the heavens, the earth, the universe (or the multiverse if you think that’s a thing) and all that is in it. He created the angelic creatures, the forces that act on things, mathematics, language, everything. He also created time.

Next week, we’ll begin working through the next section of the Creed, which speaks about the Son of God.