Every Sunday at Mass, we stand and say the Nicene Creed. It’s familiar — perhaps too familiar. This year, we are perhaps more attentive than usual as the Church prepares this very month for the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, which gave us the Creed. (Pope Francis was meant to travel to Turkey with Patriarch Bartholomew to mark the anniversary at the original spot. Perhaps his successor will make the trip.)
Anniversaries aside, we have said this creed every Sunday for our whole lives, which might mean we don't pay enough attention. Because buried in its ancient language is a battlefield of ideas, and one of the fiercest defenders of its truth was a young bishop from Egypt: St. Athanasius.
A 4th-century crisis
In the 4th century, the Church faced a theological crisis. A popular priest named Arius was teaching that Jesus, the Son of God, was created — divine in some way, but not fully God. This teaching spread rapidly, especially among bishops eager to maintain peace with the Roman Empire. The stakes weren’t academic. If Christ is not truly God, He cannot unite us to God. If He is less than God, then the cross cannot redeem the world.
Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, saw the danger early. He insisted that the Son is “of the same substance” (homoousios) with the Father — a claim the Church would later enshrine in the Nicene Creed. “He became what we are,” Athanasius wrote in On the Incarnation, “that He might make us what He is.” This was no metaphor. For salvation to be real, Jesus had to be truly divine and truly human.
Begotten, not made
The Council of Nicaea in 325 -- 1,700 years ago this very month -- affirmed Athanasius’ position, declaring that Jesus is “begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father.”
These phrases weren’t simply poetic — they were lines drawn against confusion and compromise. But long after the council closed, the conflict raged on. Arians still held power, especially within the imperial court. Athanasius was exiled five times. At one point, almost the entire episcopacy turned against him. And yet he held fast.
He wasn’t clinging to an abstract idea — he was defending the very possibility of God entering the world. Athanasius’ clarity and courage preserved not only doctrine, but the spiritual imagination of the Church. Without him, our understanding of the Incarnation, the Trinity, and the Eucharist might have been at risk.
Today, we still echo his victory every time we profess the Nicene Creed. Those words — so familiar we sometimes recite them automatically — were forged in the fires of controversy and exile. They are not relics. They are a lifeline, anchoring us to the faith that was handed down and fought for.
Altogether singular
The Catechism puts it plainly: “Jesus Christ is true God and true man” (CCC 464), and this truth is the “unique and altogether singular event” at the heart of our faith (CCC 470).
If that’s the case, then we owe more than we know to the bishop who wouldn’t yield.
Next Sunday, when you say, “consubstantial with the Father,” remember Athanasius. He may not be mentioned by name, but he’s there — in every word, every phrase, every syllable of a creed that has outlived emperors.
