Nicaea and the Creed: The Liturgical Transmission in Eucharistic and Baptismal Rites of the Churches

It is well known that the Council of Nicaea influenced the subsequent liturgical development of the churches. While some churches have even dedicated a specific commemoration in their liturgical calendar to the Fathers of the Council, its primary legacy lies in the use of the Nicene (N) and Nicene-constantinopolitan (C) creeds. The latter, in particular – usually regarded by the churhes as an evolution and development of N, despite philological studies demonstrating the inaccuracy of this interpretation – has played a significant role in church life. This paper examines the liturgical transmission of the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, a transmission intertwined with its canonical and synodal reception, though not solely determined by it. The aim is to highlight a pivotal transition that occurred in the 6th century when the Creed was incorporated into the Eucharistic celebration, definitively establishing it as a liturgical reference point for many churches. This development, extensively analyzed by John Norman Davidson Kelly in his volume on Early Christian Creeds, initiated a long-term process that has, in recent times, been reversed in favor of a “de-canonization” of the Creed in liturgical practice.
The reform undertaken by the Second Vatican Council led to a rediscovery of liturgical pluralism within Catholic worship, including the practice of the profession of faith. Until the publication of national editions of the Roman Missal after 1970, the Ordo Missae mandated a single formula: the Nicene-constantinopolitan Creed, to be sung or recited on Sundays and feasts. However, from that point onward, the so-called Apostles’ Creed – traditionally regarded by the Church of Rome as its baptismal creed – was also permitted in the Eucharistic celebration. This change opened new perspectives within Catholic liturgical practice, aligning it more closely with the traditions of Reformation churches and certain Eastern Orthodox ones.
A historical analysis of the Creed’s liturgical transmission reveals that the turning point occurred in Constantinople in the 6th century when the “monophysite” Patriarch Timothy introduced it into the Divine Liturgy to affirm his orthodoxy. Until then, as demonstrated by Wolfram Kinzig in his History of Early Christian Creeds, C had primarily served as the baptismal creed of the Church of Constantinople. Its use had thus been confined to a specific geographic area, where it was transmitted through the traditio and redditio symboli. With Timothy’s innovation, however, the Nicene-constantinopolitan Creed entered a broader spectrum of liturgical traditions. Notably, the eastern liturgical families remained largely outside this process, preserving either N or its variants, usually transmitted as the “faith of Nicaea”, alongside local creeds such as that of Theodore of Mopsuestia. Outside the constantinopolitan and imperial domain, these churches maintained distinctive liturgical traditions in this respect, as in others.
From Constantinople, the practice of incorporating a creed into the Eucharistic celebration spread to other regions, beginning with Egypt, where the non-chalcedonian Church coexisted with a Melkite minority. Parchment sources suggest an initial Eucharistic use of N, which was soon replaced by C. In the West, this practice was first adopted in the Iberian Peninsula, following the conversion of the Visigothic king Reccared to Nicene doctrine at the Council of Toledo (589) and the subsequent inclusion of the Creed in the Eucharistic anaphora. The Hispanic liturgical tradition later influenced Ireland, the British Isles, and, through Alcuin of York, the Carolingian court. The Carolingian reform further contributed to the consolidation of this practice, which was officially adopted in Rome by the eleventh century.
Throughout this intricate historical and liturgical trajectory, certain constants remain: first, the predominance of other creedal formulas for baptism, such as the Apostles’ Creed in the West and the Nicene Creed or other local texts in the East (except in Constantinople); second, the fact that C gained prominence through its Eucharistic rather than baptismal use; and third, the enduring reality of liturgical pluralism.
Although the Nicene-constantinopolitan Creed has become a key reference point in ecumenical dialogue – it has been even incorporated into the 1982 Lima Liturgy prepared by Faith & Order – Karl Rahner, in his Foundations of Christian Faith, has argued for the necessity of developing new creedal formulas for contemporary faith transmission. He identified the liturgy itself, rather than the Creed as a fixed text, as the primary vehicle for conveying faith. From the historical perspective adopted in this paper, what remains significant is the central role of liturgy in shaping the churches’ self-representation and in offering valuable insights into the history and reception of the Council of Nicaea, as mediated through the transmission of a Creed that the churches regard as an enduring legacy of that event.