United Church of Canada Creed

[Lifesong]

Hi all,

I am a Methodist coming into the Catholic Church at Easter Vigil next year. I start RCIA this Fall and so pumped!! Anyway, I still attend the contemporary service at the Methodist Church where I am still a member from time to time and attended today to support a friend going through the deat of a loved one. Long story short, I do not usually attend the traditional worship but always look at the bulletin to see how close the Bible readings are to the Mass readings as often they are the same (Methodists follow the same liturgical calendar, though they don’t always have the same readings). While doing so I saw a creed in the bulletin I had never heard of from the United Church of Canada in place of The Apostle’s Creed. Here is how it goes:

We are not alone,
we live in God’s world.

We believe in God:
who has created and is creating,
who has come in Jesus,
the Word made flesh,
to reconcile and make new,
who works in us and others
by the Spirit.

We trust in God.

We are called to be the Church:
to celebrate God’s presence,
to live with respect in Creation,
to love and serve others,
to seek justice and resist evil,
to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen,
our judge and our hope.

In life, in death, in life beyond death,
God is with us.
We are not alone.

Thanks be to God..

Well folks I was shocked as I had never seen this before though after some research apparently this has been in the hymnal for some time. I am not sure that I care for it much as it seems to be a pretty gutted creed in terms of core beliefs. Anyway, those more knowledgable than myself- is this a commonly used creed in the Methodist Church and I was just unaware and for what reason would this replace the Apostle’s Creed? I confess that as a Methodist I grew up in more traditional worship but for the past 20 years have been worshipping in a contemporary service until I started attending Mass a couple months ago after Easter so excuse my ignorance in advance.

In Christ,

Val

 

[achmafooma]

Greetings from another Methodist convert!

You are correct that the United Church of Canada version of the Creed has been in the UMC hymnal for a while. I know it has definitely been there since some time in the mid-1990’s, and probably much longer than that.

Whether it is used or not is completely up to the Pastor of the church in question. The Pastor at the UMC church where I spent most of my life used it in more contemporary services, and used the Apostles Creed in the more formal ones (the full Nicene Creed was used now-and-then, but it was pretty rare).

I visited many UMC churches throughout the Virginia Conference in my many years as a Methodist, and I would say that the United Church of Canada creed was pretty rarely-used overall. The Apostles Creed was definitely the ‘norm.’

God bless you! Welcome home (in advance) to the Catholic Church!

 

[Cor_ad_Cor]

The following comes from the United Methodist website (archives.umc.org/interior.asp?ptid=16&mid=5424):

The United Methodist Hymnal contains nine creeds or affirmations. Only two of these (Nicene and Apostles’) are strictly considered to be creeds because they are products of ecumenical councils.

The remaining affirmations are taken from Paul’s letters (Corinthians, Colossians, Romans and Timothy) along with affirmations from the United Church of Canada, the Korean Methodist Church and the United Methodist Social Affirmation.

United Methodists are not required to believe every word of the affirmations. Church founder, John Wesley himself did not agree with a historic (Athanasian) creed, because he disliked its emphasis on condemning people to hell.

This page is dated 1999.

 

[LoyalViews]

There’s a perfect example of a dumbed-down, feel-good creed. It’s horrible. :tsktsk:

 

[Lifesong]

Loyal Views I agree with you- maybe the Lord had me notice it in the program for the first time as affirmation that my coming swim across the Tiber is a good idea-LOL! Thanks all for the additional information! I learn so much from this forum!

Val