Do Church Goers Lie During the Apostles' Creed



The majority of Christians who attend services each week recite what is called in the faith, The Apostles' Creed. President Trump and Melania did not read along when it was recited at the Bush funeral. Some branches of the faith do not recite it, United Church of Christ for example.

The creed is like a pledge of allegiance. It says among other things that the person reciting it "believes" in God. But then it requires the reciter to say he/she believes certain historical claims which many people may not believe. People may not believe them because they are incredulous.

The reciter reading along with others the pledge says he/she believes there is a Jesus who was dead and buried but came back to life in three days and now sits somewhere in heaven to the right of God. The Creed does not say the reciter believes these things MIGHT have happened but believes they did happen. Technically then, anyone who pledges to believe they DID happen but only thinks they might have happened is in violation of one of the Ten Commandments, Thou Shalt Not Lie. No doubt many who recite the Creed don't believe they happened at all.

There are solutions to this problem. Church goers who do not believe these events actually happens could softly insert the word "not" before the word "believe". They would no longer be lying and most others wouldn't hear the "not." Probably most such folks do what the Trumps did, do not recite it.

Another solution would be for denominations to replace the words, "I believe", to "our tradition claims.." ( Jesus died and came back to life three days later, etc. etc.). This would be a true statement and would not require church goers who doubt these things happened to lie.

Churches would help themselves if they made some kind of allowance for doubters in the pews.

Comments

  1. tsmDecember 8, 2018 at 1:39 PM

    I am sure that there are many doubters/atheists/non-Christians in the pews, especially at an event such as the Bush funeral. And, to the extent that they consciously don't believe in what they are saying, they are liars, lying both to themselves and lying to the public (the false face must hide what the false heart doth know). Then again, maybe they are just being polite, doing in Rome what the Romans do. Or maybe they simply don't give a damn. It's just something one does, no moral issue whatsoever. In any case, changing a we to and I, would not change much of anything. BTW the Trumper appears to be honest, having nothing to do with the whole business.

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