The brawl over the Apostle's Creed
The descent clause in both the Apostle’s Creed and the Athanasian Creed declares that after being crucified, Jesus descended into the realm of the dead, from which he ascended on that first Easter morning . While the descent clause has fallen on hard times recently—well, ever since Calvin rejected it as a Roman Catholic hangover I suppose—I still hold to it . I think it represents biblical teaching, well attested in church history, and more importantly, because it intersects with so many other areas of theology, it’s probably best not to tinker with it. It is the kind of theological thread that when you pull it in one place, you find it snags in so many other unexpected places. This Easter, in particular, I was reminded of the importance of the doctrine of the descent of Christ . Of all Holy Saturdays I’ve experienced, this was the one closest to what the disciples went through on that first Saturday after the crucifixion. They were in lockdown mode . It was the Sabbat