Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Today is what we sometimes call “Trinity Sunday,” – the celebration of the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity.

The Trinity is one of the doctrines of Christianity it is not very easy to explain. What does it mean to say that “there are three Persons in one God”?  When I memorized that line in Catholic grade school, they showed up a picture of a shamrock.  I confess that in my head, what I heard when I thought of the Trinity was I “Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub.” (OK – my theology was not all that sophisticated in first and second grade.)

Michael Himes, who has a way of explaining difficult ideas very simply, suggests that the best way to understand the Trinity is by the statement in the First Letter of John that God is love. The love in John’s Letter is the Greek agape (as opposed to the other forms of the word love sometimes used in the Gospel – the Greek eros or phileo. Himes writes:

We say that God is the peculiar kind of love known as agape, perfect self-gift. To put this in other words, the First Letter of John claims that if one wants to know how to think about God, God is least wrongly thought of as a particular kind of relationship among persons, specifically the relationship of perfect self-gift. Now, that is a remakable claim: God is least wrongly to be thought of as a relationship, as what happens between and among persons.

St. Augustine speaks of the Trinity in similar terms, speaking of the Trinity in terms of God as Love, Beloved and the Love between them. The Trinity thus conveys the truth that God exists in a relationship of love.

Thus, when God the Trinity says in Genesis, “Let us make man in our image,” the image in which we are created is one of a community of love. We know God most fully, we are most fully who we were created to be, when we live in loving communion. And that, I think, helps explain why Michael Himes suggests that the Trinity “not one doctrine among others,” but “the whole of Christian doctrine.”

Blessings on this Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity.

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Trinity: An Explosion of Self-Gift

Today the Catholic Church celebrates the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity.

The Trinity is a doctrine that remains a puzzle for many. The whole “three Persons in one God” thing is a bit mystifying. Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub? A committee of 3?

Michael Himes in his The Mystery of Faith suggests that the best statement of the Trinity is found in the First Letter of John, when it says that “God is love.” Himes explains:

The Greek word for “love” used in this statement is agape…Agape is a very peculiar kind of love. It is a love which is completely centered on the one loved. It is centered on the other. To avoid confusing it with other meanings of “love” in English, I prefer to translate it as “self-gift.” So, according to 1 John 4:8 and 16, God is perfect self-gift, total giving of self to the other….

Some three centuries after the Fourth Gospel and the First Letter of John were written, Saint Augustine wrote that, while the language of “Father,” “Son” and “Spirit” is certainly present in the New Testament (Matthew 28:19), he did not find it the most helpful terminology for teaching about the Trinity. In his great work On the Trinity he examines other sets of terms. The best language he comes up with – and I think this is wonderful language – is to speak of God as Love, Beloved, and the Love between them. From all eternity God is the Love who gives Godself away perfectly; and the Beloved who accepts being loved and returns it perfectly; and the Love, the endless, perfect bond of mutual self-gift uniting the Lover and Beloved. From all eternity God is an enormous explosion of agape, self-gift, and it is that self-gift which grounds all that exists.

That understanding of the Trinity, of course, has implications. It is not enough to simply assert belief in the Trinity.

The God in whose image we are created is the triune God who is love. If we are to live in accordance with the God in whose image we are created, if we are to be like God, we are called to agapic love.

Three Persons in One God

Today is the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The Trinity is, at one and the same time, a fundamental doctrine of Christianity and an unappreciated one. Michael Himes suggests that the Trinity “not one doctrine among others,” but “the whole of Christian doctrine,” even as he laments that for many people, the Trinity is not a doctrine that makes a difference in their lives.

There is no question that it is difficult for people to intellectually apprehend exactly what it means to say there are three persons in one God. A number of Christian mystics have tried over the years to share their experience of the Trinity.

Here is Hildegard of Bingen’s description of a vision she had:

Then I saw a bright light, and in this light the figure of a man the color of sapphire, which was all blazing with a gentle glowing fire. And that bright light bathed the whole of the glowing fire, and the glowing fire bathed the bright light; and the bright light and the glowing fire poured over the whole human figure, so that the three were one light in one power of potential.

Having seen this, she heard what she called the Living Light explain to her:

Therefore you see a bright light, which without any flaw of illusion, deficiency, or deception designates the Father, and in this light the figure of a man the color of a sapphire, which without any flaw of obstinacy, envy, or iniquity designates the Son, who was begotten of the Father in Divinity before time began, and then within time was incarnate in the world in Humanity; which is all blazing with a gentle glowing fire, which fire without any flaw of aridity, mortality, or darkness designates the Holy Spirit, by whom the Only-Begotten of God was conceived in the flesh and born of the Virgin.

And with respect to the lights and figure bathing each other, Hildegard was told,

This means that the Father, who is Justice, is not without the Son or the Holy Spirit; and the Holy Spirit, who kindles the hearts of the faithful, is not without the Father or the Son; and the Son, who is the plenitude of fruition, is not without the Father or the Holy Spirit. They are inseparable in Divine Majesty.

Through this vision, Hildegard experienced in a real way God’s existence as Trinity. Father, Son and Holy Spirit, “inseparable in Divine Majesty.”

Here is Hildegard’s depiction of the image she saw:

Blessings on this Trinity Sunday.

Difference in Unity

One of the things I grabbed as I was on the way out of the door to St. Benedict’s last week was a pile of magazine clippings and other articles I had kept. I thought it would be a good thing to sort through when I needed a break from my writing. Sometimes when I go through such piles my reaction is on the order of “Now why did I think that was worth keeping?” Other times I remember what it was that struck me.

One of the things in that pile was an old column from an issue of America on the subject of how to raise children to be Catholic and catholic. The reason I had kept the piece, however, had nothing to do with childraising. Rather, what struck me was what I thought (and think) is a wonderfully simple yet meaningful way to understand what is a difficult concept for Christians – the Trinity. (It is easy to say “three persons in one God,” but understanding what that means is a different matter.) It seems a perfect thing to share on this Sunday, on which we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity.

Explaining what it means to view the world through a Trinitarian lens the author of the column wrote:

The divine dance of paradoxical difference-in-unity enables us to recognize creation as a reflection of its loving Creator: infinitely diverse and yet intimately connected, each part belonging to all and responsible to all.

Infinitely diverse and yet intimately connected. Despite the differences, each part belongs to all and is responsible for all.

The key is recognizing that the description is not just of God, but of us – we who are made in the image and likeness of (a Trinitarian) God. That means a lot of things, including, the need to “transcend[] the black-and-white thinking and loveless, angry, insider/outsider tribalism that so characterizes American public ‘discourse,’ whether secular or religious.”

We are diverse, but we are also part of one single whole and responsible for all.

Trinity Sunday

Today is the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The doctrine of the Trinity is not an easy one for many people. I remember in grade school being taught that there are three Persons in one God, which never really made a whole lot of sense to me or the other students at Sts. Simon and Jude Grammar School.

My friend Amy Uelmen, a member of the Focolare community and director of Fordham’s Institute of Religion, Law, and Lawyer’s Work, has written much about the Trinity. In a piece in America magazine, she once talked about the fact that the life of the Trinity “can serve as a model for social relationships in which ‘true openness does not mean loss of individual identity but profound interpenetration’… As Chiara Lubich described the dynamic, ‘I am myself not when I close myself off from the other, but rather when I give myself, when out of love I lose myself in the other.'”

We are made in the image of a Trinitarian God. Therefore, while we retain an individual identity, we are fundamentally interconnected with each other. We share a “profound interpenetration,” meaning that our relationship to each other is not incidental, but is integral to who we are.

When God the Trinity says in Genesis, “Let us make man in our image,” the image in which we are created is one of a community of love. We know God most fully, we are most fully who we were created to be, when we live in loving communion.

Happy Trinity Sunday.

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Today the Catholic Church celebrates the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The doctrine of the Trinity is one that sometimes confuses people – many Christians as well as non-Christians wonder what it really means that “there are three Persons in one God.”

Michael Himes once lamented that, for many people, the Trinity is not a doctrine that makes a difference in their lives, a lament occasioned by the reality that the Trinity “not one doctrine among others,” but “the whole of Christian doctrine.”

Himes suggests that the best way to understand the Trinity is by the statement in the First Letter of John that God is love. The love is John’s Letter is the Greek agape (as opposed to the other forms of the word love sometimes used in the Gospel – the Greek eros or phileo. Himes writes:

We say that God is the peculiar kind of love known as agape, perfect self-gift. To put this in other words, the First Letter of John claims that if one wants to know how to think about God, God is least wrongly thought of as a particular kind of relationship among persons, specifically the relationship of perfect self-gift. Now, that is a remakable claim: God is least wrongly to be thought of as a relationship, as what happens between and among persons.

St. Augustine speaks of the Trinity in similar terms, speaking of the Trinity in terms of God as Love, Beloved and the Love between them. The Trinity thus conveys the truth that God exists in a relationship of love.

Thus, when God the Trinity says in Genesis, “Let us make man in our image,” the image in which we are created is one of a community of love. We know God most fully, we are most fully who we were created to be, when we live in loving communion.

Happy Trinity Sunday.