Council Day 3 Reflection

I am overjoyed by the cooperation demonstrated by the council in the final day of deciding the creed and I hope that it sets the precedence for councils to come and that they may forever reflect on the decisions we have made here. The agreed upon creed is representative of both factions and I feel that neither side could point out heresy in their views. I sided with the Alexandrian faction and I feel like we did, in fact win. However, I also feel as though the Arians won because each side is sufficiently represented. I also feel that the creed is acceptable to me, personally, because it is gender neutral in its references to God. I was extremely adamant about this throughout the creed because I believe it leaves our most holy religion inviting to those who believe that God is male and those who believe that God is female. This is so important to me because I want to emphasize that God’s gender is something that is an unknown factor. It is something so great that it is beyond our comprehension and we must not try to define or limit God and God’s abilities because labeling God as any gender could skew the way some people believe that God looks at the other gender. Furthermore, it is important to me that the council was able to unanimously, after deliberation, decide to support these thoughts of mine because it shows how easy it is for us to be in agreement when we choose to accept those things that do not directly contradict our own beliefs. I know that Arius was skeptical at first, but after we were able to express the importance of inclusion to him, he came around.