Three Yet One

This Sunday we celebrate The Most Holy Trinity. In today’s second reading, Paul concludes his Second Letter to the Corinthians invoking the Trinity as he writes, “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.” We begin our prayers by invoking the Trinity with the Sign of the Cross. At Mass, the greeting I generally use after the Sign of the Cross comes from these words of Paul. The Trinity is three persons yet one God.

The three, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit form a perfect unity. It is a unity that we cannot fully understand, limited by our humanity. It is a mystery. Here are two slides from my presentation, Praying With the Trinity.

In our today’s first reading, God came down in a “cloud.” The cloud symbolizes mystery. We cannot fully comprehend God but we don’t need to. While we can be “a stiff-necked people,” God still chooses to receive us as his own. He gives us the faith to believe. He chooses to reveal himself to us. The question is are we willing to accept what God reveals to us.

Why does God receive us as his own? For the same reason He “gave his only Son.” Because “God so loved the world.” It is God’s very nature to love us. It is not that we earn his love. We can’t earn it and we don’t have to. God chooses to love us because “God is love” (1 John 4:8).

There is perfect intimacy between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Intimacy is not about physical relationship. Intimacy is to know one another’s innermost being and to be in union.

It is hard for us to understand this because, in our humanity, we are imperfect. Thus, unity between people is strained. God still calls us to unity. As Paul writes, “Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.” God wants us to be one. Knowing our imperfections, Paul starts with a call to mend our ways. We need to repent and ask God who is perfect to mend us.

Striving to come together, to “agree with one another” we need to “encourage one another.” When we agree with one another we begin to live in peace. The fullness of peace comes not from agreeing just with each other. It comes when we live in agreement with God, thy kingdom come, thy will be done.

Moses went up the mountain because that is what the LORD commanded him to do. Jesus was crucified in obedience to the Father (see Philippians 2:5-11). Why was Jesus willing to be obedient? Because his love for the Father was perfect. Jesus did not come to “condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him.”

The Trinity is a mystery but not a mystery to be solved. It is a mystery to be embraced in love.

We can trust God. He is a “merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity.” We can trust him. We ask him to make us one with him, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Peace,

Fr. Jeff