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No One Church that was Catholic or Universal until 325 CE

The following is from Blasphemy: Verbal Offense against the Sacred from Moses to Salman Rushdie by Leonard W. Levy, page 32:

Until at least 325 CE, when the Council of Nicaea formulated the first creed (at least for the Eastern division of the Roman Empire), there were Christian churches but not a Christian church, not one that was catholic, or universal. Nor did Nicaea settle anything.

The dissident parties, who were condemned as blasphemers and heretics by the emperor and council, soon became dominant, won the support of the state, and controlled most of the churches. That reversed the definition of orthodoxy until another emperor made possible a reaffirmation of the Nicene Creed at the Council of Constantinople in the year 381.

The Trinitarian victory was not secure until confirmed by the council of Chalcedon in 451. Not until the fifth century did the Roman Catholic Church have the power to enforce its theology as orthodoxy.

The Council of Nicaea in 325 laid the memetic foundation upon which modern Christianity is built. Memes from the Nicene Creed are found in Belief Statements of churches and Belief Systems of Christians around the world today. It is also the place where the Power of the Emperor of the Roman Emperor and the Authority of the Roman Pope found common ground. The history of that relationship should be a good reminder of the importance of the separation of church and state.

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