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Have you ever read a
bedtime story to a four year old? Now, all of us know that every story
must have a beginning, a middle, and an end. But, when reading that
bedtime story to a four year old, if you don’t start at the very
beginning of the story, if you skip the middle of the story, or if you
don’t read all of the way to the end of the story, the four year old
will tell you to go back and start from the beginning or wherever it was
that you left off.
The story of our faith
has a beginning, middle, and an end, too. Last Sunday, for example, the
Church celebrated the birth of the Church by the coming of the Holy
Spirit. But, our celebration of Pentecost was not simply to celebrate
past events, the beginning of the story of our faith. No, our
celebration of Pentecost was the prelude to and foreshadowing of that
day when the Holy Spirit first came into our lives at Baptism and
Confirmation as we would live as Jesus’
disciples as members of the Church.
Today, we celebrate
middle of the story of our faith: the Solemnity of the Most Holy
Trinity. Jesus first expressed this fundamental doctrine when he came
forward and addressed his disciples using the words we heard in today’s
gospel:
“Full authority has
been given to me both in heaven and on earth; go, therefore, and make
disciples of all the nations. Baptize them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
The doctrine of the
Trinity specifies that the one God we believe in is revealed in three
different persons, namely, the Father—who created us, the Son—who redeemed
us, and the Holy Spirit—who
sanctifies us. “Three persons in one being,” is the way we talk about
this fundamental and very mysterious doctrine, attempting to explain how
it is that, despite three persons co-existing in the Godhead, Christians
really are monotheists who really and truly do believe in one God.
But, when we press
ourselves to think a bit about this doctrine, it becomes very difficult
to conceptualize just how three distinct persons can exist in one
being. Part of this difficulty has to do with how, in our culture, we
tend to think of a person as a distinct individual and as we categorize
or identify other persons by their distinctive “personality” or
“character.” Perhaps that’s why it’s easy for us to conceptualize the
Father as “the Creator,” the Son as “the Savior,” and the Holy Spirit as
“the Sanctifier” yet it is so difficult for us to reconcile how these
three persons can form the one Godhead.
I think it particularly
important to note that when we view the doctrine of the Trinity in this
way, it challenges our understanding of “person” as being entirely too
individualistic. After all, as the poet John Dunne noted, no one of us
is “an island.” That is, none of us is an entirely discrete, absolutely
individual center of consciousness, a person who can exist, develop, and
mature in isolation from other human beings. Try as we might, we’re
simply not “hotwired” to subsist as individuals. And that’s why, when
we conceptualize the distinctive modes of being present in the Trinity
as three persons, we run the risk of committing the ancient heresy of
“Modalism” because we forget the other very important aspect of this
fundamental doctrine, namely, how these distinct persons are
interrelated so that there is but one God.
The Trinity is not
three individual persons nor is the Trinity a singular being. Instead,
the Trinity is a communion of Divine Persons each of whom reaches out to
the others in creating, redeeming, and sanctifying to the point that
they are no longer three but one; and yet, in their unity, they remain
three distinct persons.
Now all of this is very
abstract, the stuff that theologians like to debate and, frankly, I find
terribly intriguing. But, for many of us, the abstract idea of the
Trinity really seems to have so very little to do with daily life for
real people in ream marriages and real families and who live and work in
the real world.
Or does it?
As
a human person, each of us is instinctively relational and we know it
because we don’t like very much to be alone. In fact, the Book of
Genesis reminds us that God said “It is not good for man to be alone”
and created a helpmate for Adam, whom he named “Eve.”
In creating us, God has stamped His divine image upon us and, whether we
like it or not, we have been begotten from a relationship involving the
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are also begotten from a relationship
involving our God, our father, and our mother. Created from
relationships, we are created for relationships.
The innate desire that
resides so deeply within us to relate with others and to enjoy
relationships characterized by mutuality is the living presence of the
Trinity—the
Godhead—“hotwired” into the fiber of our being as a person. Believe it or not,
the instinctive impulse each of us has to engage others in relationships—whether
that be with a spouse, a child, a sibling, a relative, friend, fellow
co-worker or a beloved—and to abide in those relationships without diminishing our own
individuality or the other’s individuality is nothing other than God’s
presence moving and acting within us at the deepest core of our being.
And, we cannot bring our individuality to perfection without having
these relationships characterized by mutuality with others.
As Moses told the
Israelites in today’s first reading, God has called each of us into a
special relationship and has confirmed that relationship through various
signs and wonders. Not the least of these signs—and, perhaps, the most underestimated—is
that God reveals His divine presence to us in our relationships with one
another.
Building upon Moses’
counsel to the ancient Israelites, the Second Vatican Council defined
the Church as a “People of God,” that is, a community formed through its
members’ relationships. In this sense, the Church is a people who
individually and collectively are in communion with the Trinity—the community of faith established by Jesus Christ—to be a sacrament at work in the world. In this way, the Church—through
its members union in God—is the image of the Trinity at work in the world making disciples of all
nations.
That is why the
doctrine of the Trinity isn’t so much an abstract idea as it is a very
concrete way of daily life for Jesus’
disciples.
How might this be so?
I believe the most
concrete application of this fundamental doctrine is that the Church is
not the building where we worship week after week but is, instead, the
Church is the people we relate with through faith in God and with whom
we work together to build the reality of God’s kingdom in this world.
For example, what could
be more concrete than the relationships between spouses and family
members?
For those who are
spouses, think about the quality of your relationships. Is the original
impulse to relate with one another as husband and wife that brought you
together—the
presence of Trinitarian life in each of you as individuals—weakening
self interest and egoism in favor of greater self giving and mutuality?
If it is, you are the Church, an image of the Trinity showing not only
your family and friends but also the entire world what it truly means to
be “People of God” who are in truly in love with one another. This is
how, as Jesus’ disciples, we make disciples of all nations.
This Church is also the
“domestic Church,” that is, the home. A family isn’t a bunch of
individuals who just happen to be related to one another by virtue of
some biological impulse. No, a family is a community of persons
each of whom is a distinctive person begotten by God and yet all of whom
are united through their relationships in love. In your home, then,
what is the quality of your relationships? Is there a focus upon the
relationships that family members have with one another and the need for
greater mutuality? If they are, the family is an image of the Trinity
showing to one another and the world as well what it means to be “People
of God.” This is how we make disciples of all nations.
Fundamental doctrines
of the faith are powerful ideas that challenge us to consider how we are
living our lives day in and day out. It’s very easy to complain about
being “lonely” or the “quality” of our relationships and to point the
finger of blame everywhere else. As Catholics, however, our faith—and
especially today as we recall the doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity—challenges
us to look at the fundamental relationships characterizing our lives
and, where necessary, to see what we need to do and to do it, that is,
if we are to become more perfectly a Trinitarian “People of God”
who make disciples of all nations.
The fundamental
doctrine of the Trinity teaches us that the dignity of our nature as a
person is not that we possess great minds and sometimes have great
thoughts. No, this doctrine reminds us that we are “hotwired” for
relationships with other persons. Furthermore, because of this
innate need, we discover our deepest and most abiding joy as we relate
to others and become one with them in mutuality and in love “who is
God,” as St. John reminds us.
Yes, as Catholics, we
need to be very concerned about our relationships. But, our concern
must stem from the fact that God has created us in His Divine image and
likeness, that is, a community of three Divine Persons. Thus, through
community—and especially the community of marriage and of the family—we model in our daily lives the image and likeness of God and become a
reflection of the Trinity present and active in the world, making
disciples of all nations.
As Catholics, that’s
the end of the story. Now, you can fall asleep! |
HOMILY
