Second Sunday of Epiphany

Tomorrow the inauguration of Donald Trump as the 47th president of the United States will see a performance by The Village People, who have spoken about the importance of unity. ‘Our song YMCA is a global anthem that hopefully helps bring the country together after a tumultuous and divided campaign’.

I love the crazy idea that a disco song with well known dance moves, could be just what a divided country needs to find its unity. And who knows what is now needed in Israel and Gaza, following the very welcome ceasefire, to enable a shared future for divided peoples equally rooted in the same geographical territory.

The week of prayer for Christian unity offers an annual opportunity to reflect on the search for greater unity in both church and world. This year the focus is on the seventeen hundredth anniversary of the Nicene creed, which we will say together later in this service. A creed which emerged from the Council of Nicaea in the year 325; an international gathering called to settle doctrinal disputes, particularly about the way the person of Jesus Christ should be characterised and understood.

This may sound a little dry and academic, but in fact the Council, meeting in what is now modern day Turkey, was a lively, contentious, and sometimes chaotic gathering of strong personalities trying to resolve profound questions about the faith. Some of the stories that emerged may lean more towards legend than fact, but they give a flavour that has truth to it. One of the most famous stories involves St Nicholas of Myra—the inspiration for Father Christmas — slapping another delegate in the face. The Emperor Constantine, who had converted to Christianity, ending the frequently violent persecution of Christian communities, was personally present. When presented with a pile of theological complaints that the bishops had written against each other, Constantine is said to have thrown them into a fire, advising a focus not on grievance, but on achieving unity.

Many of those present, from all over the Christian world, bore physical scars from earlier persecutions under Roman emperors like Diocletian. These bishops, with missing eyes, maimed hands, or disfigured faces, reportedly argued vehemently, often resorting to fiery speeches, sharp insults, and dramatic gestures.

Amazingly, out of all this emerged a text of lasting value, one thousand seven hundred years and still going strong; a creed to unite around, taking the place of earlier summaries of the faith. A key element in the development of these texts were the questions asked of those to be baptised, about the beliefs they were now owning and inhabiting.

Cyril, consecrated Bishop of Jerusalem twenty five years after Nicaea, described the creed as comprising the ‘whole doctrine of the faith in a few lines… it consists of the most important points collected out of scripture.’ So what scripture says at length, the creed says briefly. Shorter even than the biblical readings we have heard today, ending with John’s account of the wedding at Cana, about which more later.

Every Sunday, in this Cathedral Church, our worship at eight and eleven includes a saying together of the Nicene Creed. ‘We believe…’, it begins. I wonder what you make of this ancient text, and specifically whether or not you think of it as a list, or as a story? A list of beliefs, strung together one after the other, to which one might potentially add further beliefs? Or on the other hand do you see the creed more as a single story; an account of the overarching Christian narrative, to which we do not so much add things, as rather elaborate on and enlarge?

I encourage you to view the creed not as a list, but as a story - and indeed as autobiography. It does not say what someone else believes, but what we believe. It does not simply say where the world comes from (‘God, maker of heaven and earth’) where it is going (‘the resurrection of the dead and the live of the world to come’) in general terms. Rather it says where I/we come from, and where we hope to go. It also tells us where we are right now, in the midst of the story. We are part of the ‘one holy catholic and apostolic church’, inspired by the Holy Spirit, ‘the giver of life’, as we seek to follow in the steps of Jesus Christ, who along with the Father are ‘worshipped and glorified.’

The longest section of the creed concerns the person of Christ. As I indicated earlier, so much of the passion and intensity at Nicaea was about how he should be understood. Was Jesus really a human being just like the rest of us? And was it really the case that his life could fully reveal the presence and mystery of the divine? These are the kinds of question, settled at Nicaea, that emerge from the stories of Jesus told in Scripture, as - say - in today’s account of the Wedding at Cana.

That story comes in the second chapter of John’s Gospel. In recent weeks we’ve heard the first chapter often enough, including the astounding message that,‘The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father’. The danger for us is that the notion of the glory of God seen in the face of Christ has become a familiar piety. The danger for John’s first readers and hearers was the reverse, that it might seem an outrageous innovation. There would have been questions aplenty: The glory of God, which not even Moses was allowed to see, the glory that filled the temple in the year King Uzziah died – present in Jesus of Nazareth? Could this really be so?

Well, says St John, we didn’t understand this all at once; this truth emerged gradually, step by step. Most of the time it wasn’t obvious, and we didn’t always grasp it at the time. The first hint we had of it was at a wedding in Cana of Galilee...

In fact, John’s Gospel as a whole tells of the gradual unveiling of the glory of God in Jesus Christ; it tells the story of how it seeped out, bit by bit, until the full meaning of it was made plain at last. The first sign of it, says John, was when he took water and made it wine; he took human failure and miscalculation, and turned it all to something extraordinary: a glimpse of glory emerging at a village wedding; and those who had the eyes to see - his own disciples - took note and put a new faith in him.

But it’s not plain sailing after that. More signs follow, more hints of glory: Jesus cures a young man at the point of death, and heals an invalid at the pool of Bethesda. But then comes the fourth sign: the crowds are fed in the desert, and Jesus speaks to them of the bread of life which comes down from heaven, and what is the result of that? Offence, indignation, controversy; many people who had followed him thus far, turning and leaving him and going home. Only the inner band of disciples stay with him. The disciples are faithful; but their faith is tested; there’s something unpredictable and disturbing, about this glory they keep glimpsing in Jesus Christ.

And at last, how was the glory of God fully and finally unveiled? Not, as you might expect, at the Resurrection, though that was a glorious moment. No, says St John, it was on the cross that the glory of God was fully seen. Jesus himself announces it to his disciples: ‘W shall I say? Father, save me from this hour? No, for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify thy name’. Back at Cana in Galilee, Jesus told his mother his hour had not yet come; but now it has come; his hour, the moment of glory, paradoxically seen in Jesus’s perfect solidarity with human, pain, suffering and death.

The glory of God is life-giving, life-enhancing, life-affirming. But the fullest expression of the love of God is when God reaches to the very heart of human death, establishing life and hope even there. And at that moment, the glory of God breaks out in all its fullness. Yes, Jesus is a human being just like the rest of us, suffering and dying as we do, but so too does he fully reveal the mystery of the divine.

This truth is at the heart of the Nicene creed, that hard won text that still expresses Christian unity today, giving a shape to our lives, telling us where we have come from and where we are going, and the resources we have for the journey ahead.

Constantine told the bishops to focus not on grievance but on unity. That is surely a message applicable to the contemporary church, to Israeli and Palestinian, to the United States as a new president is inaugurated, and indeed to our own nation. And the Nicene creed tells us that a key element in achieving that unity is a shared story pointing to a shared future. I pray for ourselves, and for every place of division, that that those bearing the wounds and the scars may come together, and out of that common suffering such a shared way forward may emerge. Christ has shown us the way, by the glory and grace of God all things are possible. AMEN