I just finished teaching an Intro to Philosophy class with the University of Phoenix and the section on metaphysics spent a lot of time on the idea of proving God’s existence. What struck me was that all of the European philosophy about God and spirit was based on the concepts outlined in the Nicene Creed.
In the King Follett lectures Joseph Smith makes the comment that you need to start right! If you don’t start right you can never expect to find the truth. The main argument dealt with at Nicaea was the nature of God…which is a pretty good starting point. After many months of argument most of those attending agreed to the concept that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are the “Trinity” which is this mystical mixture of spirit and material that isn’t affected by passion. It is large enough to cover the whole earth and small enough to dwell in your heart. Part of the dignitaries left the convention and went back to the Eastern church where they proposed that God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit were separate beings, laying the groundwork for the Orthodox Greek and Russian churches.
For over 1,000 years most Europeans were taught the ideas agreed to at Nicaea, therefore all the philosophers who were trying to prove the existence of God were trying to prove the existence of the Trinity. Joseph Smith at age 14 gained a greater insight into the nature of God than all those scholars in AD 325. He saw God and Jesus as two separate, physical beings. Now by having the truth to start from, the restoration of the gospel could begin. The first Article of Faith is an answer to the false beliefs perpetrated since the council of Nicaea, “We believe in God the Eternal Father, and in his Son Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost” Articles of Faith 1:1