The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
Sunday-6/3/2007
Mass Readings:
Proverbs 8:22-31
Romans 5:1-5
John 16:12-15
I remember a class in seminary that was hard, and that is an understatement. It was a follow up to a Christology class and it was on The Trinity. I think the true final exam was to see if any of us would break down during the exam and cry! It was tough. So, after a very trying semester, the prof looks at us and tells us that no matter what we wrote and no matter what we preach, The Trinity is a mystery. However, if we had written that as our exam answer we would have failed!
We cannot fully wrap our head around The Trinity. Our language is very limited and let's face it, God has not sat any of us down and explained all the mysteries of our faith. So how do we describe The Trinity? How do we express God as Three, Three is One? All the Greek, Latin and metaphysical inquiry of the ages cannot fully express the glory and mystery of The Trinity. However, there are many things we can understand that apply to our daily life.
In The Trinity we see that God is a God of relationship. God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit were, are and will be in relationship. God, the uncaused first cause, is relationship. The Trinity has always and will forever be in relationship. God so powerful that He is expressed as three in one, one in three. We use the word Persons and we capitalize person yet that is still not clear. God is not a human being. God the Son walked the earth in human and divine form and God the Holy Spirit is the very breath of God giving us life. Is that clear? Hmmm. Language just cannot grasp the mystery. And thank God it can't! It is the mystery that keeps us seeking to grow in understanding of God.
We see in The Trinity that God is relationship. We were not created because God had to create us. We were created to be in relationship with God and in turn with one another. We humans like to brag about our independence. We like to think that we are an island, so individual that we are alone. Please, we can't even turn on a light without being in community. It takes thousands of people to keep the electricity flowing and we become part of that community every time we hit the switch. Even alone in our houses we are not alone. We are always connected to one another in some way.
The Trinity is God expressed as community. Three in One, One in Three through eternity moving and flowing through creation. As a result, we are called to be in relationship with God and one another. Jesus even prays in the Gospels that we be one as Jesus is One with the Father and the Holy Spirit. That is a pretty big prayer. Jesus desires that we be as united with one another as The Trinity is united. That's big stuff!
We can leave Mass today assured of one thing that is clear. God is a God of relationship. We are God's children and so we are in relationship with God. We are the disciples of Christ and we are in relationship with the Lord. We are filled with the Holy Spirit and we are in relationship with the Holy Spirit. We are the Body of Christ and so we are in relationship with The Trinity, God as Three, Three in One is our God. Being in relationship with the Creator means that we are in relationship with one another. We cannot neglect that reality. We are to look to the prayer of Jesus that we be one as The Trinity is One. That means we have a lot of unification to get to work on.
No one is an island so let us live as one people.
