Homily Given by Dcn. Michael Schlaack on the Sunday of the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council
This morning we commemorate the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council, which was held in the city of Nicaea in the year 325. The council was convened at the order of the emperor Constantine I to discuss an issue that threatening to tear apart his kingdom: the Arian heresy. At the center of Arius’ teaching was his claim that the Son of God was created, as with all of God the Father’s creations, and therefore “there was a time when the son was not.” Denying that the Son was co-eternal with the Father divided the understanding of the Holy Trinity into un-equal parts and threatened to divide the Christian Church along theological lines.
Studying the history of the Christian faith we find that that the Church was no stranger to controversy. Since the first century there has always been individuals, often priests and bishop who were expected to uphold the true faith, who pushed forward their own novel ideas regarding the nature of Christ. The sticheron from the Litya prescribed for the commemoration describes what the Holy Fathers were up against:
The holy Fathers are the renowned keepers of the Apostles’ tradition; They rightly taught that the Trinity was undivided, and their assembly dethroned Arius and those with him: the Macedonians who rejected the authority of the Church were convicted; Nestórius, Eutýchius, Dióscorus, Sabéllius, and Severus were judged. O Lord, deliver us from their error, we pray,// and preserve our lives in peace!
This sticheron refers to the several heretics who were condemned and anathematized by the Council for their refusal to accept the Orthodox teaching concerning the nature of the Son and the Holy Trinity. The council upheld the tradition of the nature of the Son and His place in the Holy Trinity. The result of the work of the 1st Ecumenical Council regarding to the nature of the second person of the Trinity became the foundation of the Nicaean-Constantinopolitan Creed that Orthodox Christians pronounce at each Divine Liturgy.
Of the roughly 318 clergy in attendance at Nicaea, some of the Fathers are well known to most of us today. As a deacon at the council, Athanasius of Alexandria would be remembered for his spirited defense of the Orthodox Christian faith, earning him the title, “St. Athanasius the Great.” We also remember St. Nicholas the Wonderworker of Myria in Lycia, who tradition holds slapped the unrepentant Arius across the face when he refused to recant his heretical teaching.
But as groundbreaking as was the work of the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council, history shows that the enemies of the Church never sleep for long. Less than 60 years later in 381 another Ecumenical Council was convened to again reaffirm the nature of the Son as well as the nature of the Holy Spirit. The Orthodox Church recognizes the first seven councils as being ecumenical, with the pronouncements of each having authority over all of Christianity.
While each of the seven Ecumenical Councils focused primarily on a specific heresy or issue threatening the Church at that time, one thing that all they all had in common was that the underlying issue causing the strife within the Church was either directly or indirectly related to the understanding of the person of Christ and His relationship with the other two members of the Holy Trinity. Whether the council debated the relationship of the Son to the Father, the Father and Son to the Holy Spirit, or the legitimacy of venerating icons, all these controversies had at their root the need to further define the understanding of the person of the Son. And it can still be said that even after all these centuries, and despite the volumes of proof produced by the greatest theological minds, many people are still uncertain today as to the nature of the Son and His relationship within the Holy Trinity.
Just as with the past centuries, the world’s understanding of the Son of God has been recast to be just about anything they want Him to be. He just may a great social reformer to some; or maybe a philosopher to others. Many may not even give the Son of God much thought at all. And still the question asked by Jesus to St. Peter is just as important to our understanding today as it was nearly two thousand years ago: “Who do you say that I am?” (Matt. 16:15) This question was at the heart of the 1st Ecumenical Council. To the Arians, the Son was a created being; divine, but created by the Father. Arius summed up his understanding of the Second Person of the Trinity when he stated: “There was a time when the Son was not.” Arius taught that the Son was created by the Father at some point in time as an agent for the purpose of bringing forth the entire created universe. The Son was thus reduced to a “demi-god,” divine but not of the same substance as the Father, creating a second tier within the Holy Trinity.
It is important to understand that the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council did not see themselves as creating some new definition of Son of God. Instead, their task was to uphold and defend the Orthodox understanding of the second person of the Holy Trinity in light of the tradition that was taught by the Apostles and the earlier Church Fathers. The pronouncements of 1st Ecumenical Council were a clarification of the faith as it was passed on since the time of Christ. The Creed is an attempt to put into human words that which is beyond human comprehension.
So why is it so important to our Christian faith to understand the theological nuances proclaimed by the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council? What difference does it make whether the Son was of the same or similar “essence” as the Father? Can’t we still be Christians in good standing and still believe as Arius taught, that the Son was simply another created being? According to the Fathers of the 1st Ecumenical Council, this subordination of the Son was counter to the teachings of the Apostles. Our Gospel reading from this morning bears witness to Christ’s divinity: “Father, the hour has come. Glorify Your Son, that Your Son also may glorify You, as You have given Him authority over all flesh, that Heshould give eternal life to as many as You have given Him. And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent” (John 17:1-3). Jesus defines eternal life as the proper knowledge of God the Father and Jesus Christ, His Son. Without the Apostolic understanding of relationship between the Father and the Son within the Holy Trinity, we are in effect worshipping a false God.
The question posed by Jesus to St. Peter needs to be the same question that we should be asking ourselves today: “Who do you say that I am?” Are we confessing the Jesus as the only begotten Son of the Father? Can we proclaim Him to be of one essence with Father? Our faith and worship as Christians are centered on the true—the Orthodox—understanding of the second Person of the Holy Trinity. Are we able to make the same statement as St. Peter: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16)? If we can make the same statement, then the wisdom revealed to St. Peter will also be revealed to us by our Father in Heaven.