I believe in one God, Father Almighty, Creator of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all ages;

Light of Light, true God of true God, begotten, not created, of one essence with the Father through Whom all things were made.

Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven and was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary and became man.

He was crucified for us under Pontius Pilate, and suffered and was buried;

And He rose on the third day, according to the Scriptures.

He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father;

And He will come again with glory to judge the living and dead. His kingdom shall have no end.

And in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Creator of life, Who proceeds from the Father, Who together with the Father and the Son is worshipped and glorified, Who spoke through the prophets.

In one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.

I confess one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.

I look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the age to come.

Amen.

The Creed in its present form was adopted by the Second Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in 381. It is an expanded version of the Creed adopted by the First Ecumenical Council of Nicea in 325, hence it is called the Niceo-Constantinopolitan Creed.

It states that God is One — the Father. The Father is the Source of all: He gives birth to the Son, the Holy Spirit proceeds from Him, and He is the Creator of all. He also rules over all (in Greek, Pantokrator).

We also have One Lord — Jesus Christ, the only Son of the Father. The Son is God just like the Father is God, and so is the Holy Spirit. Hence we proclaim Three Persons, One God.

The Son is born of the Father, not made out of things that are not, like all creation. In fact, everything that was made, was made by the Father through the Son.

The Son is not only born of the Father as God, before all ages. He was also born as a child from the Virgin Mary by the miraculous action of the Holy Spirit. Thus He became man, live, suffered, and died for us on the Cross. He then rose from the dead, ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father, now both as God and as glorified man.

Christ will come again to judge both the living and the dead (who will be resurrected), and the righteous will live with Him forever.

The third person of the Holy Trinity is the mysterious, elusive Spirit of God - Holy, Lordly, Life-giving. He proceeds from the Father, through the Son, and into Creation, which is sanctified by Him. He always acts together with the Father and the Son - one Will, One Action. He too is of one being with the Father and the Son, hence we worship and glorify them as One God.

We confess the Church to be One, because it is the Mystical Body of Christ, and there is One Christ, not many.

The Church is Holy, because it is continuously sanctified by the Holy Spirit. When we participate in the Holy Mysteries, the grace of God is poured upon us, so that we too, as members of Christ’s Body, are made holy.

The Church is Catholic, because it has the katholon, the wholeness. It also embraces the whole world, it is universal.

The Church is Apostolic, because it still proclaims the faith that the apostles (the disciples that Christ sent into the world) preached. The bishops and the priests are in apostolic succession: they received ordination by laying of the hands in uninterrupted succession from the apostles themselves.

Death is not the end of our live, but a mere passing on into another realm, from which we will resurge by resurrection. After the general Resurrection at the Second Coming of Christ, a new age will begin, in which the righteous will be glorified and live with Christ forever.

Amen - So be it!