Solemnity of the Blessed Trinity, Year A.
Exodus 34:4-6, 8-9 – 2Cor 13:11-13 – John 3:16-18.
Today we celebrate the profound mystery of the Blessed Trinity – God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit – the three Persons in one Godhead. God is simultaneously One God (Deut 6:4) comprising three Persons in a single Godhead. Each of the three Persons has the whole of the substance (the essence of ‘Godness’) in Himself, the substance being indivisible. Furthermore, the three Persons are equal in power and in majesty, distinct in Person but indivisible in essence. At no time are they separated from each other as God. That is why we refer to the trinitarian Persons as ‘God’ in the context of their indivisible unity. Can you fathom this mystery? Theologically, a mystery is something that is true but impossible for our limited human understanding and perception to grasp fully. The mystery of the Trinity is way beyond our imagination and understanding. This is the mystery of God in whom we believe and trust. This is what our Lord Jesus Christ taught us about Who God Is and the nature of God.
In the New Testament, Jesus revealed God as Father along with His personal inseparability from God the Father. The gospel of John emphasised the relationship of God the Father to God the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, including their unity in Godhead (Jn 10:1) and volition (Jn 4:34; 6:40). Because there is a single divine will, the Son does not will anything differently from what the Father wills, and the Holy Spirit operates in accord with the divine will (Jn 16:13-15). All this can be rather confusing for us, but it is the reality about God.
Jesus taught us that God is a relational Trinity. The overt reference to the Blessed Trinity is found in Matthew’s gospel at the commissioning of the Apostles, when Jesus sent them out to baptise in the Name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Mt 28:19). In Mark’s gospel, a further reference to the Trinity is given at the Baptism of Jesus, when the Father’s voice was heard and the Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove upon Jesus the Son of God (Mk 1:11).
In the Old Testament, the genius of the perception of the Jews was that there is only one God, and that God is one in Himself. In Gen 1:1 the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters. Towards the end of His life on earth, Jesus aroused expectation of the Person of the Holy Spirit – the Spirit which later descended on the disciples in the Acts of the Apostles and has remained with the Church throughout the ages.
It could be argued that the Old Testament can be seen as the era of the Father, the Gospels as the era of the Son, and the Acts of the Apostles, the Epistles and the Magisterium through the history of the Church as the era of the Holy Spirit. Bear in mind Jesus’ teaching that the Holy Spirit will take from what is His and declare it to us (Jn 16:13-16) and that He will teach [us] all things and remind [us] of all He taught us (Jn 14:26). This action of the Holy Spirit continues to this day. Through the Holy Spirit, we have access to God, and can peep into and reflect fruitfully upon the union of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
Today’s readings prompt us to reflect on the Blessed Trinity as the God of love and mercy. They tell us about the affectionate love of God for humanity. In the book of Exodus, God introduced Himself as The Lord, a God of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger and rich in kindness and faithfulness. Yes, our God is not stony-hearted but gentle, loving and compassionate. This is how He has always been towards us, from the very beginning of Creation and throughout the history of our salvation; He wants us to relate to Him in our actions and in our prayer life in the same manner as He is towards us, because He cares about us even when we are sinners (Rom 5:8). If I may use a biological expression, as we are the children of God we must have inherited a ‘gene’ from our heavenly Father. The ‘gene’ of God’s sacrificial love should be part of our daily living, through our deep expression of love and compassion towards other people and the whole of Creation.
The sheer love of God for us and His Creation is so great as to be unquantifiable by the human mind. In the ‘blueprint’ of all His creatures is the love pre-existing in the unity of the Godhead. For us, the nature of God as Love is reflected in His unbridled and enduring affection for mankind. After humanity had gone astray, God didn’t want mankind to be lost and separated from Him, which is why He sent His only-begotten Son (Jn 3:16) to bring us back into the fold of our heavenly family and be saved through our acceptance and belief in Him. Without love, both human and divine, there can be neither unity nor salvation. We learn from the Blessed Trinity – the God of love – that when you love someone, you are willing to go the extra mile for them and be ready to give freely to the point of self-sacrifice on their behalf. Yes, God loves us so much that His Son Jesus accepted the punishment due to us for our sin, paid the price that it was impossible for us to pay for our sins, and offers each one of us today the new life He has purchased for us. Therefore neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all Creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ our Lord (Rom 8:38-39).
I conclude with the final words and greeting of St. Paul’s 2nd letter to the Corinthians, which we use at Holy Mass: May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen. God bless you.