What is the Trinity and is it relevant at all?
Perhaps we can begin with what we are familiar with rather than chime in with the usual statement that Trinity Sunday is often regarded as a preacher’s nightmare. The Blessed Trinity is not alien to who we are and what we do. It is the central mystery of Christian life and faith because Christians are baptised in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. In fact, we trace the Sign of the Cross most unreflectively each time we enter the Church while muttering the formula “In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”. Mind you, in both instances of baptism and tracing of the Cross, no one is baptised in the nameS of the Three Persons and neither do we sign ourselves in their nameS.
Perhaps the Trinity is not really a nightmare as it is our forgotten geography because it is has become too familiar that we seemed to have taken it for granted. Until we are asked how we can square a belief in One God who is a Trinity of Persons. Such a query is relevant because we share a characteristic with two other religions who believe in one God. We belong to the three great monotheistic religions. Islam, Judaism and Christianity, each claims to believe in One God. What confounds Islam most especially is the fact that coming after Christianity, it find itself grappling with the doctrine of the Blessed Trinity.
The first clarification we need to make is that we have not invented the Trinity. Instead, the Trinity is how God has chosen to reveal Himself. We could never have known that God is a Trinity of Persons without Jesus’ personal revelation. He spoke constantly of His relationship with the Father and the Spirit.
Two questions can help us clarify the concept of the Trinity. First, “Who” is this One God and second, “What” is He?
From the earliest times, the Church was aware that she needed precision when describing how one God can also be three distinct Persons. Each Person is God and yet we have not three gods. How can that be?
The answer is that the Church was blessed enough that Christianity found its way through Greek philosophy which provided the early theologians the tool and the language to help describe God. What we need are four numbers to make sense of the Trinity. God is One in nature. Within the inner life of this One God there are two Processions which consist of Generation and Spiration. These two Procession produces four eternal relationships which constitute three distinct Persons. To further clarify, for all eternity, the inner life of God is such that even though there are four eternal reciprocal relationships, but there can only be three persons.
(1). The Father generates the Son. An analogy to describe generation is that the Father is the lover. In loving He generates.
(2). The Son is generated by the Father. The analogy to describe the Son is that He is the beloved. In being loved, He is generated.
(3). The Father and the Son together spirate (breathe out) the Spirit. Since the Father and the Son are already two distinct persons, that means that they cannot be added together to make yet another person. It does not make sense. The analogy is that the Father and the Son’s mutual love is so perfect that their love can be described of as the Spirit.
(4). Finally, the Spirit is the breath of the Father and the Son which in this case, constitutes the Spirit as a distinct Person.
There we have it, the four eternal relationships. One God but three Persons. The Father is not the Son and not the Holy Spirit. The Son is not the Father and not the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not the Father and not the Son. They are not different modes of being as if one day the God is Father and then another day the God is the Son and another day the God is the Spirit.
We do not worship three gods. Never. We worship One God. Now, those two questions asked earlier come into play. Anytime we ask this One God “Who are you?”, we will get Three answers and each one will be different, “I am the Father because I love my Son perfectly”. “I am the Son because I am loved by my Father perfectly”. “I am the Holy Spirit because I am the love of the Father and the Son”. And when we press them further, “What are you?”, We will get the same answer as the Father will reply, “I am God”, the Son will reply, “I am God” and Holy Spirit will reply “I am God”.
In short, God’s distinct differences are descriptions of the relationships between them. They are not distinct in their nature or essence which explains why each one of the three Persons possesses the same eternal and infinite divine nature. In essence or by nature, God is one. The mystery of God’s inner life is that He is three in Persons.
God’s inner life, composed of loving relationships, is the model for our communities. The Christian God is the God of love because the Trinity is a community of love. No other religion reveals God to be love except Christianity. In order that there be love (Spirit), there must be a beloved (Son). Hence, even before the beginning of time and space, God’s inner life was already a rich tapestry where the Father, the Son and the Spirit pour themselves out into each other in an infinite act of loving, serving and glorifying. It is to this dance of mutual love that Christians have been invited to be a part of that love.
That love poured itself out for each one of us through the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. He reveals to us that the core of our being is to reflect God by loving, serving and glorifying. The truth is we will always fall short of that vocation but our failure does not diminish the calling. As the Father sent the Son to save the souls and as the Son sent the Spirit to sanctify creation, all the more we want to love, to serve and to give glory by participating in the mission of redemption and sanctification. Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. Amen.
