Not long ago a young man asked me if I could explain the mystery of the Holy Trinity to him in a couple of short paragraphs.
I said I couldn’t for this is the greatest and the most awesome of the divine mysteries. Some preachers fear this weekend, because they know they can’t explain the Holy Trinity in ten minutes of preaching- and I don’t think I can do much more in this short burst.
In our Creed at Mass, we proclaim and confess what we believe in Faith, and in what the Church teaches as Truth. We state our belief that there is only One God, but Three Divine Persons within that One Godhead. Elsewhere in scripture, especially in the epistles of St. John, we are told and we believe that the Life of the Trinity has everything to do with Love. And it is through love that we come closest to understanding the Holy Trinity. This is a profound Mystery, but God has left a "trail of fingerprints" all over his creation, a trail of love. So being only human, all we can do is "tell love stories" to try to give examples of the most profound mystery ever known to humanity. Let me use my own Deacon Community to give you an illustration.
The deacon communities all across this country have a formal programmes which welcome and introduces all of the new "aspirants" or "candidates" and their wives into the Diaconate. There are many ways we have used over the years to express and present the meaning of "diaconia" or "servanthood" to these couples. One method talks about Loving, Affirming, and Calling Forth. For me, this speaks to the very core of the life of the Most Holy Trinity, as I know it, in my feeble understanding of so great a mystery, - and it is this life of self-giving Love that every deacon couple, and every baptised Christian, is called to live and to pass on to others. That responsibility of every Christian to "pass along" God's love is terribly important to us today.
So it follows that we must "back up" our verbal expressions of love with daily actions by possibly supporting someone, because they are or have been a blessing to you. Maybe you called forth someone to grow in a gift they have, but cannot see without your help. If you have done these things then you have discovered the life of the Holy Trinity, which is a relationship of loving and self-giving.
I said I couldn’t for this is the greatest and the most awesome of the divine mysteries. Some preachers fear this weekend, because they know they can’t explain the Holy Trinity in ten minutes of preaching- and I don’t think I can do much more in this short burst.
In our Creed at Mass, we proclaim and confess what we believe in Faith, and in what the Church teaches as Truth. We state our belief that there is only One God, but Three Divine Persons within that One Godhead. Elsewhere in scripture, especially in the epistles of St. John, we are told and we believe that the Life of the Trinity has everything to do with Love. And it is through love that we come closest to understanding the Holy Trinity. This is a profound Mystery, but God has left a "trail of fingerprints" all over his creation, a trail of love. So being only human, all we can do is "tell love stories" to try to give examples of the most profound mystery ever known to humanity. Let me use my own Deacon Community to give you an illustration.
The deacon communities all across this country have a formal programmes which welcome and introduces all of the new "aspirants" or "candidates" and their wives into the Diaconate. There are many ways we have used over the years to express and present the meaning of "diaconia" or "servanthood" to these couples. One method talks about Loving, Affirming, and Calling Forth. For me, this speaks to the very core of the life of the Most Holy Trinity, as I know it, in my feeble understanding of so great a mystery, - and it is this life of self-giving Love that every deacon couple, and every baptised Christian, is called to live and to pass on to others. That responsibility of every Christian to "pass along" God's love is terribly important to us today.
So it follows that we must "back up" our verbal expressions of love with daily actions by possibly supporting someone, because they are or have been a blessing to you. Maybe you called forth someone to grow in a gift they have, but cannot see without your help. If you have done these things then you have discovered the life of the Holy Trinity, which is a relationship of loving and self-giving.
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