Misinterpreting the Creeds

I was recently made aware that there may be many of the Roman Catholic faith, that believe that the Catholic church is the "Church" as it was from the beginning. I was very curious where this viewpoint could have come from, as the bible does not give any indication that there was a Pope, or that anyone was told that they were to pray to saints and the Virgin Mary for intercession. In fact, in God's Holy Word, it says just the opposite. It states very clearly that Jesus is the only Mediator, (see 1 Timothy 2:5 and Romans 8:34, just for two such instances) and that we are to have no false idols.

Now, as you know, I like to play detective, so I just had to find out where this mindset could have come from, if not from the Bible itself. I found it. There are 3 (or 4, depending on who you ask) ancient creeds that the early church recognized as belief statements for the early church. One is the Apostles Creed, another is the Nicene Creed, the third is the Athanasian Creed, and the last is the Creed of Aquileia.

It is in these four Creeds that the word catholic is found in relation to the early church. Now, to clear up a misconception, for those that don't know: the word "catholic" means "universal". These creeds are NOT referencing the Roman Catholic faith. They are referencing the entire church, as God's universal Church body.

While I was looking into this, another question came up, that I just happened to be able to find the reason for, by looking in the same place- right back at these ancient Creeds. I was able to find the answer by looking in the Bible. The question was this: Is it true that Jesus descended into Hell for three days when He died? There is no biblical support for this. What there is support for is the fact that He descended into "Hadas" (this is the word that we get our English form of "Hades" from.) The only time that Hell itself is referenced in the bible, is when we are told that Hades and all that are damned for eternity will be cast into Hell and/ or the Lake of Fire. Jesus descended into Hadas, because prior to His sacrifice, this was the "holding place" of those that died. Because there was no sacrifice sufficient for them, before Jesus, they could not go to Heaven, regardless of their righteousness- none were righteous enough. In fact, the Apostles Creed (the one most agree is the earliest of the Creeds) did not originally have the phrase "decended into Hell" in the text, but was only later added after the the Creed of Aquileia came about in the 4th century.

So, there you have it. The Roman Catholic faith, was not what the early church was, and Jesus did not descend into Hell. Just thought I would clear that up, for those of you that may have been curious, as I was. Blessings to you.