A Life-Giving Theology
WHAT WE BELIEVE
Following Jesus into a loving, liberating and life-giving relationship with God, with each other, and with the earth.
The Episcopal Church
Christ Church Cathedral is part of the Episcopal Church, a denomination striving imperfectly and sincerely to offer Jesus’ radical hospitality to all. The Most Rev. Michael Bruce Curry is the Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church.
Episcopalians believe in a loving, liberating, and life-giving God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We believe that God formed all things in love, and that God loves you – no exceptions.
The Jesus Movement
The Jesus Movement is the ongoing community of people who center their lives on Jesus and following him into loving, liberating and life-giving relationship with God, each other and creation.
Together, we follow Jesus as we love God with our whole heart, soul and mind and love our neighbors as ourselves (Matthew 22:36-40), and restore each other and all of creation to unity with God in Christ (BCP, p. 855). Jesus launched this movement when he welcomed the first disciples to follow his loving, liberating, life-giving Way.
Today, we participate in his movement with our whole lives: our prayer, worship, teaching, preaching, gathering, healing, action, family, work, play, and rest. In all things, we seek to be loving, liberating and life-giving—just like the God who formed all things in love; liberates us all from prisons of mind, body and spirit; and gives life so we can participate in the resurrection and healing of God’s world.
Just as God wants to enter into our lives and meet us where we are, so God desires for us to enter into God’s space, together, and be present there.
The Bible
The Bible is of extraordinary importance to Episcopal worship
The 39 Articles, a 1536 foundational document of Anglican theology, relates that “Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation.” The Scriptures, comprised of the Old and New Testament, as well as some apocryphal texts, were written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
During a Sunday morning service, the congregation will usually hear at least three readings from Scripture, and much of the liturgy from The Book of Common Prayer is based explicitly on the Biblical texts. According to the Catechism, “We understand the meaning of the Bible by the help of the Holy Spirit, who guides the Church in the true interpretation of the Scriptures” (p. 853-4)
There is more. Discover the full breadth of what the Episcopal Church believes here.
Authorized Bible Versions
- King James or Authorized Version (the historic Bible of The Episcopal Church)
- English Revision (1881)
- American Revision (1901)
- Revised Standard Version (1952)
- Jerusalem Bible (1966)
- New English Bible with the Apocrypha (1970)
- Good News Bible / Today’s English Version (1976)
- New American Bible (1970)
- Revised Standard Version, an Ecumenical Edition (1973)
- New International Version (1978)
- New Jerusalem Bible (1987)
- Revised English Bible (1989)
- New Revised Standard Version (1990)
Common English Bible (2012)
LQBTQIA+ Inclusion
Christ Church Cathedral is a welcoming and affirming church. We have long welcomed and embraced our brothers and sisters who are a part of the LGBTQIA+ community. We believe God’s love is for everyone.
The Episcopal Church has a legacy of inclusion, aspiring to tell and exemplify God’s love for every human being; women and men serve as bishops, priests, and deacons in our church. Laypeople and clergy cooperate as leaders at all levels of our church. Leadership is a gift from God and can be expressed by all people in our church, regardless of gender, sexual identity or orientation.
What does it mean to be an affirming church?
Justice
From the 5000 Club food ministry, since 2006, to The Native American Ministry Council of Christ Church Cathedral, active since 1984, the Cathedral funds grants and supports organizations that help and lift up all people, without exceptions.
Our vision is to empower people of peace to reconcile, liberate, heal, and serve the world by living out the way of love. Working together, we seek to bring equity into our world and make Cincinnati a more just and equitable place – one neighborhood, one person, one moment at a time.
Bringing Transformative Acts of Love Into Our Neighborhoods
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