Another important part of the worship services at Minneapolis’ Westminster Presbyterian Church is the congregational unison recitation of an Affirmation of Faith. This is usually done on the second and third Sundays of each month.
There are many sources for such an affirmation: the Bible and confessions and statements of faith from the Book of Confessions of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and from other denominations.
Here are three examples of such affirmations.
On September 9, 2012, the following passage from Apostle Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians was used:
- “Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation; in him all things in heaven and on earth were created, things visible and invisible. All things have been created through him and for him. He himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn of the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross.” Amen. (Col. 1:15-20)
On September 16th we recited the following New Creed of 1968 from the United Church of Canada:[1]
- “We are not alone, we live in God’s world. We believe in God: who has created and is creating, who has come in Jesus, the Word made flesh, to reconcile and make new, who works in us and others by the Spirit. We trust in God. We are called to be the Church: to celebrate God’s presence, to live with respect in Creation, to love and serve others, to seek justice and resist evil, to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen, our judge and our hope. In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God.”
On October 14th we used the following passage from the 1983 Brief Statement of Faith of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.): [2]
- “In life and in death we belong to God. Through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit, we trust in the one triune God, the Holy One of Israel, whom alone we worship and serve. . . . With believers in every time and place, we rejoice that nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
[1] The United Church of Canada is the largest Protestant denomination in Canada with nearly three million people in over 3,500 congregations. The United Church was inaugurated on June 10, 1925 when the Methodist Church, Canada, the Congregational Union of Canada, 70 per cent of the Presbyterian Church of Canada and the General Council of Union Churches entered into an organic union.
[2] The Brief Statement of Faithwas prepared in 1983 at the time of the creation of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) by the merger of the United Presbyterian Church in the United States of America with congregations in every state and the Presbyterian Church in the United States, whose churches were in Southern and border states. The Brief Statement was intended to unite the new merged church with one agreed upon statement of faith.