Patrick Comerford
This year marks the 1700th anniversary of the First Ecumenical Council of Nicaea – the church council that led ultimately to the adoption of the Nicene Creed. The Council of Nicaea in 325 was called shortly after the legalisation of Christianity in the Empire, East and West, and it played a critical role in overcoming the heresy of Arianism and shaping the theological foundations and unity of Christianity.
The council was called shortly after the legalisation of Christianity in the Empire, East and West, and it played a critical role in overcoming the heresy of Arianism and shaping the theological foundations and unity of Christianity. The council in Nicaea was the first ecumenical council in the life of the Church, and the creed it produced was completed at the First Council of Constantinople in 381.
The Nicene Creed remains one of the most enduring statements of faith, uniting us with believers down the centuries and around the world. A year of events is marking the anniversary of this turning point in Christian history, with conferences, publications, exhibitions, pilgrimages, special events and liturgical celebrations.
We Believe is a new, full-colour booklet with 24 short reflections that explore each line of the Creed in turn, drawing us deeper into its meaning and significance for everyday life. The booklet is accompanied by a range of downloadable resources and a series of Everyday Faith reflections starting on Trinity Sunday (16 June) to mark 1,700 years since the Creed’s development.
The Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) has produced We Believe, a six-session study guide inviting parishes and church groups to explore the Nicene Creed, which has united Christians worldwide for centuries.
Contributors from the Philippines to the Middle East discuss key elements of the Creed, including the nature of Jesus, the Resurrection and the power of the Holy Spirit. The questions and prayers encourage discussions around unity, diversity, and how to live out Christ’s message of love and justice in the world today.
‘We Believe, We Belong?’ is also the theme of USPG’s annual conference this year at the Hayes Conference Centre in Swanwick, Derbyshire, from Tuesday 1 July to Thursday 3 July, with an option to attend for the day on Wednesday 2 July.
The conference is designed to reflect on the Nicene Creed not simply as a statement of belief, but as a declaration that forms and transforms the body of Christ and to ask how Christian unity can go hand-in-hand with the celebration of Christian diversity. The organisers are taking inspiration from Ephesians 4:16, reflecting on how the Church grows in love when every part is recognised, valued, and does its part.
The conference includes talks, interactive workshops, worship, Bible studies and reflections on how to deepen the expressions in the Nicene Creed of fellowship and commitment to each other across the diversity of cultures, contexts and languages within the Anglican Communion.
The critical topics being examined include whether all people feel they belong within the Church, especially when it comes to the key areas of championing justice – gender, economic, environmental and race.
The speakers this year include Bishop Vicentia Kgabe of Lesotho, a diocese in the Anglican Church of Southern Africa. Dr Kgabe is one of the ‘Africa Six’ female bishops. She was the Rector of the College of the Transfiguration, the provincial seminary, from 2014 until she became Bishop of Lesotho in 2021.
Bishop Philip Wright has been the Bishop of Belize since 2005, and later became the senior bishop in the Church in the Province of the West Indies. He was elected the World Council of Churches Regional President for the Caribbean and Latin America in 2022.
Canon Wadie Far, who is leading the Bible Studies at the conference, is canon pastor to the Arabic-speaking congregation in Saint George’s Cathedral, Jerusalem, and Vicar of Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Jerusalem.
The anniversary was also marked recently with a conference at the Ecumenical Institute in Bossey, Switzerland. Over three days, over 40 papers discussed the council’s contribution to ecumenical dialogue, its relationship to interfaith dialogue, the part played by women at Nicaea, gender justice, and the relationship between Christian faith and empire.
‘The deep concern at Nicaea to be faithful to the unity of God and to the unifying love of God is still a powerful and inspiring witness,’ the World Council of Churches President from Europe, the Revd Dr Susan Durber, said in one of the six keynote addresses.
The Council of Nicaea also agreed on a common date for Easter, although the use of different calendars now meant that Easter did not always coincide in East and West. The coming decade offers an opportunity to agree once again on a common Easter date.
A Study Day on the document, Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour: The 1700th Anniversary of the Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (325-2025) takes place next Tuesday (20 May 2025) in the Pontifical Urban University in Rome.
The Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain is celebrating the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea with a festival of holy icons, sacred music, talks and pilgrimages in May and June.
The celebration is hosted by the Greek Orthodox Parish of the 318 God-bearing Holy Fathers in Shrewsbury, Shropshire. The church, on an Anglo-Saxon site, is the only church in Britain – and possibly in Western Europe – dedicated to the 318 bishops who defended the faith at the council in 325 CE.
The celebrations include an exhibition in Saint Julian’s Church, Shrewsbury, of icons by leading contemporary British icon writers (24 May 24 to 6 June), and a concert of ancient sacred music (Sunday 25 May), with performances by the Chronos Ensemble and the Mosaic Choir. Lectures include talks by the master icon painter Aidan Hart during the icon.
An international symposium in Saint Julian’s Church, ‘Celebrating the First Ecumenical Council’, include the patristics scholar Father John Behr, Regius Professor at the University of Aberdeen (Saturday 21 June).
‘The Voices of Nicaea’ concert is a once-in-a-lifetime musical event, bringing back to life forgotten sounds of early and mediaeval Christianity. The programme includes compositions rediscovered in the ancient library of Saint Catherine’s Monastery on Mount Sinai and rare Byzantine kontakia dedicated to the Holy Fathers of the First Council of Nicaea, the earliest notated versions of the Nicene Creed, and the rediscovered sticheraria.
Other events include a pilgrimage to Saint Melangell’s Shrine, at Pennant Melangell, Llangynog, Powys (Bank Holiday Monday 26 May); an open day and services at the Church of the 318 Holy Fathers in Shrewsbury (Saturday 31 May); and a reception at Shrewsbury Town Football Club (Sunday 1 June). Archbishop Nikitas will preside over ceremonial services and celebrations in Shrewsbury on 31 May and 1 June.
Further information about these Nicaea 2025 celebration events are available HERE.
The year’s international activities culminate in the Sixth World Conference on Faith and Order in October near Alexandria in Egypt on the theme ‘Where now for visible unity?’ But there is speculation in many circles that during the year Pope Leo XIV may visit the Ecumenical Patriarch, Patriarch Bartholomew, in a significant ecumenical gesture.
The Council of Nicaea was convened by the first Christian Roman Emperor, Constantine the Great, who called for bishops to settle major divisions within the Church, chiefly the Arian heresy, which claimed that Jesus Christ was a created being and not fully God.
The council brought together 318 bishops, from across the empire, in May 325 CE, in the ancient city of Nicaea, now in modern Turkey. It was a defining moment for the Church and the first major event after the legalisation of Christianity as the Church faced a critical theological crisis and the response was decisive.
The Council affirmed the Apostolic Faith and that Christ is ‘Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, of one essence with the Father’. These words in the Nicene Creed settled Christ’s divinity, the cornerstone of the faith.
The faith that the Council of Nicaea witnesses to and hands on is the truth of a God who, being Love, is Trinity, and who, out of love, becomes one of us in hi Son. The Nicene stands at the heart of the Church’s faith as a wellspring of living water to be drawn upon also today.
Significantly, it was at Nicaea that the Church’s unity and mission were first expressed emblematically at a universal level.
The anniversary coincides with the common celebration of Easter by Christians of both East and West this year. I was in Greece last month for the Holy Week and Easter celebrations this year. Many people are hoping any visit by Pope Leo to Patriarch Bartholomew could open the possibility of agreement between East and West about returning to a shared common date for Easter, the most important date in the Church Calendar.
