Learning the Creed by Heart

Duomo Milan by *clairity* on flickr

"Not without reason, Christians in the early centuries were required to learn the creed from memory. It served them as a daily prayer not to forget the commitment they had undertaken in baptism. With words rich in meaning, Saint Augustine speaks of this in a homily on the redditio symboli, the handing over of the creed: 'the symbol of the holy mystery that you have all received together and that today you have recited one by one, are the words on which the faith of Mother Church is firmly built above the stable foundation that is Christ the Lord. You have received it and recited it, but in your minds and hearts you must keep it ever present, you must repeat it in your beds, recall it in the public squares and not forget it during meals: even when your body is asleep, you must watch over it with your hearts'" (Porta Fidei, 9).

One of my tasks this Lent will be to take this concrete recommendation seriously and to re-learn the Apostle's Creed:

I believe in God, the Father almighty,
Creator of heaven and earth,
and in Jesus Christ, his only Son,
our Lord,
who was conceived
by the Holy Spirit,
born of the Virgin Mary,
suffered under Pontius Pilate,
was crucified, died and was buried;
he descended into hell;
on the third day he rose again
from the dead;
he ascended into heaven,
and is seated at the right hand
of God the Father almighty;
from there he will come to judge
the living and the dead.
I believe in the Holy Spirit,
the holy catholic Church,
the communion of saints,
the forgiveness of sins,
the resurrection of the body,
and life everlasting. Amen.

Also, after listening to some other singers, I saw that The Morning Prayer Post recommended this video of Barbara Bonney singing Mozart's Et incarnatus est.


This is not merely a beautiful song, but the proclamation of a fact: The Word by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary,and became man. Mozart's arrangement and the work of the orchestra and singer are an attempt to proclaim this fact in a form that does justice to it. By listening to this proclamation, we beg that this fact in all its beauty may pierce our hearts and to become decisive for our lives.