He recalled the husband, who said when he became a father, he better understood the Trinity. When he and his wife had their son, they had evidence of their love for each other. There was the lover, the beloved, and the love, each distinct and yet one.
I enjoy the playful description of Daniel Durken of the Trinity. The Father played creator and was overjoyed that the world turned out so attractively. The Son played redeemer and put everything right again in the wounded world by stretching out His arms on a cross. The Spirit played sanctifier. He made room in the heart of each of us for the Trinity. "Today," says Durken, "the Trinity invites us to keep playing with them this delightful game of life and love." And why not? We have nothing to lose but our chains.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some Quotes:
3. Spirituality is how we LOVE God
Matter = mass + energy + motion.
Space = length + height + breadth.
Time = past + present + future
Thus the whole universe witnesses to the character of the God who made it (cf. Psalm 19:1).
Gospel Text: Matthew 28:16-20
Michel DeVerteuil
General Comments
This Sunday the liturgy invites us to celebrate the feast of the Trinity. In our church we tend to look at the Trinity as a doctrine. It is something we are meant to hold and believe; we learn about it with our minds and with our reason. But we add the proviso that we cannot understand it. “Understanding” is viewed as the important thing; if we can’t understand it we are not making much progress with it.
This is not, however, the best way to approach the doctrine of the Trinity. What we need to do is to retrace the journey made by the church. We enter into the spirituality of Jesus through the practice of lectio divina. Gradually we find that we experience the Trinity as a “mystery”. This is the liturgical sense of the word. It is something we celebrate because we know it makes us better human beings, as we follow ever more closely in the footsteps of Jesus.
If we base ourselves on the gospel texts we come to the Trinity as something we experience. Our model is Jesus himself: the Trinity for him was what he lived, it explains how he experienced himself, how he related with his Father and with the Spirit, with others and with the earth itself. The church, reflecting on his experience, was later – and only gradually – able to formulate the church doctrine of the Trinity. The gospel reading for this Year B is an excellent starting point for this journey.
Jesus saw that authority in the world was something that was “given” to him. It was a “gift” he had received from the Father. It was given to him by someone in Heaven, his Father who dwells in heaven. It was not a truth that he was able to discover for himself, nor one that he came to experience from his own decisions. It was always something he had “received.”
As Son he was able to exercise this gift. He had the authority to do this. He practiced the reality of the Trinity with personal power. He exercised this authority for himself and from his own observation. Having received it from outside himself, he put it into practice in the way he related with people.
Jesus therefore did not have to hold on to his authority. He took the decisions for himself, or it was decided for him in the name of the Father. In either case, he practiced it by handing over his authority to the care of his disciples. Since the authority was something “given” to him, he was able to give it over with no personal regrets.
Jesus lived his “Trinitarian spirituality” especially from the time he felt able to depart from the world. He had always been humble in how he handled his authority; now he could be totally confident in handing on to others everything he had accomplished. This was why he could say with full freedom that he could hand everything over to the Holy Spirit.
“All authority is given to me,” he told his disciples once he had decided to leave his mission in their hands. They could “go therefore” wherever they wanted, trusting that wherever they went, he would be alongside them, adding to what they believed in whatever he wanted for them to achieve.
We too, then, must be conscious of our authority as “given”. It is never possessed by us. We too can exercise it confidently and humbly and then willingly pass it on to others when the time comes. Evil qualities like jealousy or possessiveness or a fear of letting go are symptoms that the Trinity is not real for us. It means that we take authority as ours and not as “given”.
The things we can feel free to hand on to others include all forms of authority, especially that of our faith in Jesus. We must therefore take “baptizing in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” in a very wide sense. It does not merely refer to our church baptism; it includes the entire work of the church, the process of inviting people to experience authority as Jesus did.
We take the time to celebrate the many people who have shared this “baptism” with us. We pray that they too will have the grace to approach “all nations” with this wide and tolerant “Trinitarian Spirit.”
Prayer Reflection
Lord, we thank you for the various ways in which you reveal your presence to us:
there are times when we experience you as Father
through teachers, community leaders, members of our family, spiritual guides
to whom you have given authority in heaven and on earth,
so that we feel empowered spiritually
and can assume responsibility in our workplaces and in public life.
At other times we experience you as Son,
through the great people you send us as companions.
They do not talk down to us.
When we fail in some great enterprise and have to start again,
like the eleven disciples setting out disconsolately to return to Galilee,
they come up and speak to us as fellow pilgrims
who have themselves been defeated,
so that they can tell us now to go out confidently
and share our wisdom with all the nations.
At other times again, you are deep within us, like our breath,
so discreet that we do not even advert to your presence;
but you are the source of life and energy, always with us,
so that even when we feel lost and discouraged we can say,
yes, you will be there till the end of that time.
Thank you that we have been baptized
in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Lord, people in authority often cling to those in their charge.
We tend to do it as parents, teachers, ministers in the church, political leaders.
Help us to be more like Jesus when he met the apostles in Galilee,
free enough to know that our work is not limited to the here and now,
that if we have helped others in any way we can tell them to go,
because wherever they are we will be with them.
When we understand this, we are truly baptised in the name of Trinity.
“If there is any lover of God living on this earth who is continually kept from falling, I do not know about it, for it was not shown to me. But this was shown, that in falling and in rising we are always preciously kept in the same love.” … Julian of Norwich
Lord, we pray for those who are feeling discouraged at this moment
because they have committed some sin that has them feeling ashamed.
Remind them that you are with them always,
yes, even to the end of this time.
Lord, we pray for all of us who are called to exercise leadership
– in public life, in your church, in our homes and neighbourhoods,
on the world stage.
Help us to imitate Jesus; to be conscious, like he was,
that all authority in heaven and on earth is given to us for a time,
after which we commission those we have worked with
to go out into the world.
We are not afraid to move on
because we trust that whatever values they have learned from us
are like commands we have given them
which they will observe and will hand on in their turn,
so that we will be with them always, yes, to the end of time.
“Unity is taught by Moses; the prophets proclaim duality; in the gospels we meet the Trinity.” … St Epiphanus
Lord, you have created out human family in your image and likeness,
baptized us in the name of the Blessed Trinity.
As individuals and as cultures you have made us all different
so that each of us has been given a unique share in your universal authority
in heaven and on earth.
We exercise this authority, not as a personal possession,
but as a gift we have received from someone else in the family
and then shared with others,
so that even though we are here for a few short years and then move on,
wherever in the world your great command of love is observed
we are all present and will continue to be until the end of time.
Introduction to the Celebration
This feast is unique in that the focus of our celebration is not an aspect of the history of salvation, but reflection on the nature of God as we believe it has been revealed to us as Christians. Thus every Sunday is the Sunday of the Trinity, every feast, every action has a trinitarian dimension, and should any prayer be uttered or homily preached which does not include that core of faith – at least tacitly with a conclusion such as ‘through Christ our Lord’ – then we are apostates, and have ceased to be Christians and become some sort of vague deists or unitarians who value the ‘message of Jesus’. At the outset of the celebration it is worth reflecting that today’s focus is the very essence of Christian identity. We begin every liturgy by stating that we are acting ‘In the name of the Father …’ and that is a declaration of our basic faith, not just an opening formula. Our aim in today’s liturgy should be to become more sensitive to the trinitarian cues that run right through our religion.
Homily Notes
1. Go back through the second reading and note how Paul’s relationship with Jesus — Jesus is Lord — leads him to adopt a way of speaking of God as Father which Jesus had taught his followers. Moreover, Jesus had spoken of sending the Spirit and so the Spirit too is spoken of as ‘Lord’.
2. Paul is adopting a formula already in use within the churches, it is a formula that speaks of the relationship we Christians have with God: we live and move and have our being in God the Father, God the Son our Lord Jesus Christ, and God the Spirit.
3. We do not accept ‘the trinity’ within our minds in the way we accept other religious notions such as ‘God loves us.’ The mystery of the Father, Son and Spirit is the mystery of God and as such cannot be comprehended by a created mind. Rather, we accept this as part of the gracious revelation of God and respond in the way of Jesus: him we address as Lord; with him we call on the Father; from him we accept the Spirit.
***********************************
Sean Goan
Gospel
These are the closing verses of the gospel of Matthew and they illustrate very well the growing faith of the early church in what Jesus has revealed. The life, death and resurrection of Jesus witness to the activity of God the Father through him, and now at the end of the gospel
we see Jesus not leaving his disciples but promising to be with them until the end of time as they fulfil their mission of making disciples of all nations by baptising them and teaching them to observe his commands. This text is ideal for today as it is a reminder that faith in the Trinity brings with it a mission to let the whole world hear the good news about God.]
Reflection
It is a striking fact that in the ancient world those civilisations that were great in terms of conquest, building, literature and philosophy have left us little or nothing of their religious beliefs. On the other hand, a people who were considered of no particular significance from a small stretch of land in the eastern Mediterranean have passed on to us their enduring concept of God. This is not a god of pagan superstition nor even of the philosophers. This is Yahweh, the God of Israel, who became known to the people through the experience of their own history and who subsequently revealed himself in Jesus of Nazareth. Today we are not celebrating a mystery we are never destined to understand; rather we are contemplating the God in whose image we are made and whose name is Love.
Father, Son and Spirit
When we think of the word Spirit can we think of something lively? A sort of a flow of living water; a cycle race rather than a traffic jam. The flow of life in us rather than the ways we block life. It is the spirit of God whom we call Father, Son or Christ and Spirit. We live in that sort of love. The church is called to be that sort of community.
The trinity can make God totally distant. But that is not Jesus. He is the one who gets right into life, bringing God into humanity as one of us. Jesus talked so much about farming, weddings, death, illness, joys, trust, creation, nature, breakfasts, gardens, dinners; he is the God of the table more than the God of the temple. His spirit flows in all of creation, love, suffering and joy; He finds us in all things.
We need that big view of God. He makes everything sacred. Even the name Father, Son and spirit.
Our call is to flow with him, to go with the flow of God’s Spirit. We are the flow of God in the world.
We become what we receive – the love of the Trinity in the world. We become like Christ himself as we receive this bread of life, called to be his witnesses. By what we say and do, in all we are.
******
From Fr. Tony Kadavil1:
The mystery of the most Holy Trinity is a basic doctrine of faith in Christianity, understandable not with our heads but with our hearts. It teaches us that there are three distinct persons in one God, sharing the same divine nature. Our mind cannot grasp this doctrine which teaches that 1+ 1+ 1 = 1 and not 3. But we believe in this mystery because Jesus who is God taught it clearly, the evangelists recorded it, the Fathers of the Church tried to explain it and the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople defined it as a dogma of Christian faith.
In today's first reading from the book of Deuteronomy, Moses offers us a vision of God who goes all the way back to creation and then across history. Moses had led the people to the Promised Land and in his last words to the people, he speaks of God's fidelity and love. Other people had their gods but there is only one true God, the God who is creator, the God who revealed himself to his people; the God of Israel, who had bound himself to the chosen people. Moses reminds them of what a privilege it is to have this God revealing himself to them right through their journey to the Promised Land. Moses' advice to them was that they remember that their Lord is God and there is no other and that they show their fidelity by keeping his commandments.
**********
From Sermons.com
Epiphany
Lent
Holy Week
Easter
Pentecost
1: Simplified explanations by Ss. Patrick, Cyril
and John Maria Vianney: Since the Holy Trinity is a mystery, all
these examples are only the shadows of the shadows of the Truth. The shamrock,
a kind of clover, is a leguminous herb that grows in marshy places.
St. Patrick, the missionary patron saint of Ireland, used the shamrock to
explain the Holy Trinity. The story goes that one day his friends asked
Patrick to explain the Mystery of the Trinity. He looked at the ground
and saw shamrocks growing amid the grass at his feet. He picked one up
one of its trifoliate leaves and asked if it were one leaf or three.
Patrick’s friends couldn’t answer – the shamrock leaf looked like one
but it clearly had three parts. Patrick explained to them: “The mystery of
the Holy Trinity – one God in Three Persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit – is like this, but more complex and unintelligible.”
St. Cyril, the teacher of the Slavs, tried to explain the Mystery of the Most
Holy Trinity using sun as an example. He said, “God the Father is
that blazing sun. God the Son is its light and God the Holy Spirit is its heat
— but there is only one sun. So, there are three Persons in the Holy Trinity
but God is One and indivisible.” St. John Maria Vianney used to explain
Holy Trinity using lighted candles and roses on the altar and water in the
cruets. “The flame has color, warmth and shape. But these are expressions of
one flame. Similarly, the rose has color, fragrance and shape. But these are
expressions of one reality, namely, rose. Water, steam and ice are three
distinct expressions of one reality. In the same way one God revealed Himself
to us as Father, Son and the Holy Spirit.” Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQLfgaUoQCw&feature=player_detailpage (Fr.
Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/))
2: The Mystery of man created by a mysterious Triune God: How
complex and mind-boggling is our physical construction! Chemically, the body is
unequalled for complexity. Each one of its 30 trillion cells is a mini chemical
factory that performs about 10,000 chemical functions. With its 206 bones, 639
muscles, 4 million pain sensors in the skin, 750 million air sacs in the lungs,
16 million nerve cells and 30 trillion cells in total, the human body is
remarkably designed for life. And the brain! The human brain with the nervous
system is the most complex arrangement of matter anywhere in the universe. One
scientist estimated that our brain, on the average, processes over 10,000
thoughts and concepts each day. Three billion DNA pairs in a fertilized egg (a
child into whom God has already breathed an immortal, spiritual soul) control
all human activities, 30,000 genes making 90,000 proteins in the body. Bill
Bryson in his book, A Short History of Nearly Everything, says
it is a miracle that we even exist. Trillions of atoms come together for
approximately 650,000 hours (74 years calculated as the average span of human
life), and then begin to silently disassemble and go off to other things. There
never was something like us before and there never will be something like us
again. But for 650,000 hours the miracle or mystery that is uniquely us, exists.
One could spend years just dealing with the marvelous intricacies and majesty
of God’s creation. We are, as the Psalmist states “fearfully and wonderfully
made.” No wonder we cannot understand the mystery of the Triune God
Who created us! Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
3: The mystery of the magnitude of the universe: The
universe has around 100–1000 billion galaxies. Our galaxy is called the Milky
Way. The Milky Way contains 100–400 billion stars with their planets including
the sun and its planets and our earth is one of its tiny planets. This means
that our Sun is just one star among the hundreds of billions of stars in our
Milky Way Galaxy. The diameter of the observable universe is about 93
billion light years, and a light-year is a unit of length equal to
6 trillion miles. The number and size of galaxies and stars and planets in the
universe remain mind-baffling mysteries in spite of all our latest astronomical
discoveries and studies, and we have been able to send astronomers only to our
earth’s sole natural satellite, the moon. If the universe is so mysterious,
there is no wonder why the nature of the Triune God who created it, remains a
mystery and why we have to accept the mystery of the Triune God as
revealed by God Himself in the Holy Scripture!
( https://youtu.be/hTuJby2_97E)
(https://youtu.be/9Dsq-FrEJxo).
Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
4: “But that is impossible, my dear child:” There
is a very old and much-repeated story about St. Augustine, one of the
intellectual giants of the Church. He was walking by the seashore one
day, attempting to conceive of an intelligible explanation for the mystery of
the Trinity. As he walked along, he saw a small boy on the beach, pouring
seawater from a shell into a small hole in the sand. “What are you doing,
my child?” asked Augustine. “I am emptying the sea into this hole,” the
boy answered with an innocent smile. “But that is impossible, my dear
child,” said Augustine. The boy stood up, looked straight into the eyes
of Augustine and replied, “What you are trying to do – comprehend the immensity
of God with your small head – is even more impossible.” Then he vanished.
The child was an angel sent by God to teach Augustine a lesson.
Later, Augustine wrote: “You see the Trinity, if you see love.”
According to him, the Father is the lover, the Son is the loved one and
the Holy Spirit is the personification of the very act of loving. This means
that we can understand something of the Mystery of the Holy Trinity more
readily with the believing heart than with our feeble mind. Evagrius
of Pontus, a Greek monk of the 4th century who came from what is now Turkey
in Asia and later lived out his vocation in Egypt, said: “God cannot be grasped
by the mind. If God could be grasped, God would not be God.” Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
5. Trinitarian Love, the essence of family life: One
day, while he was walking with God in the Garden of Eden Adam said, “Excuse me
God, can I ask you a few questions?” God replied, “Go on Adam, but be quick.
I have a world to create.”
So, Adam says, “When you created Eve, why did you make her body so curved and
tender unlike mine?” “I did that, Adam, so that you could love her.” “Oh, well
then, why did you give her long, shiny, beautiful hair?” “I did that Adam so
that you could love her.” “Oh, well then, why did you make her so stupid?
Is that too because I should love her?” “Well, Adam, no. I did that so
that she could love you.”
6: Wisdom from child’s mouth: A priest went into
a second-grade classroom of the parish school and asked, “Who can tell me what the
Blessed Trinity means?” A little girl lisped, “The Blethed Twinity meanth there
are thwee perthonth in one God.” The priest, taken aback by the lisp, said,
“Would you say that again? I don’t understand what you said.” The little girl
answered, “Y’not thuppothed to underthtand; ‘t’th a mythtewy.”(Another
version: At confirmation, the Archbishop asked the children for a
definition of the Holy Trinity. A girl answered very softly – “The Holy
Trinity is three persons in one God.” The Archbishop, who was rather
old and almost deaf, replied, “I didn’t understand what you
said.” And the young theologian standing in front of him
replied: “Well, Your Excellency, you are not supposed to. The Trinity is a
mystery. Nobody understands it.)”
7: Trinitarian pastor: One parishioner said,
“The Trinitarian God is a lot like our pastor. I don’t see him through the
week, and I don’t understand him on Sunday.”
8. God Is Everywhere: A pastor was trying to
explain to a little Sunday school child that God is calling people everywhere
in the world to believe in him. “God is much bigger than we imagine him to be
and God can use all of us in lots of different ways to do his work everywhere,”
the pastor said. “God is everywhere!” “Everywhere?” asked the little boy.
“Everywhere!” said the pastor. The boy went home and told his mother, “God is
everywhere! The pastor said so.” “Yes, I know,” said the mother. “You mean He
is even in the cupboard?” “Yes,” said the mother. “In the refrigerator — even
when we close the door and the light goes out?” “Yes,” said the mother. “Even
in the sugar bowl?” the lad asked as he took the lid off. “Yes,” said the
mother, “even in the sugar bowl.” The boy slammed down the lid and said, “Now
I’ve got Him.”
28 Additional anecdotes:
1) Trinity prayer of Tolstoy’s hermits: Three
Russian monks lived on a faraway Island. Nobody ever went there. However, one
day their Bishop decided to make a pastoral visit to learn more about their
religious life. But when he arrived, he discovered that they did not know even
the Lord’s Prayer. So, he spent all his time and energy teaching them the Our
Father and then left them, satisfied with his pastoral visit. But when his
small ship had left the island and was back in the open sea, he suddenly noticed
the three monks walking on the water – in fact they were running after the
ship. When they approached it, they cried out, “Dear Bishop we have forgotten
the Lord’s Prayer you taught us. The Bishop, overwhelmed by what he was seeing
and hearing asked them, “But dear brothers, how then do you pray?” They
answered, “We just say, there are three of us and there are three of you, have
mercy on us.” The bishop, awestruck by their sanctity and simplicity said, “Go
back to your island and be at peace.” [Adapted from Leo Tolstoy- The
Three Hermits“ (Russian: Три Старца), a short story by Russian author Leo Tolstoy (Lev
Nikolayevich Tolstoy), was written in 1885 and first published in 1886 in the
weekly periodical Niva (нива).]
Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
2) The world’s biggest mysteries scientists still can’t
solve: Ghost ships, alien contact, and technology, all built thousands
of years before their time, still remain mysteries, unexplained by modern
science. Ten such mysteries are the 1) Baghdad, or Parthian, Battery, date ca.
2000 years ago, capable of generating electric charge. 2) Terrifying SOS
message about the death of all crew members from a from a Dutch freighter,
the SS Ourang Medan. 3) The Dancing Plague of 1518 which made 400
women hysterically dance themselves to death. 3) Man, with no identity: A man
who would soon adopt the name Benjaman Kyle woke up in 2004 outside of a Burger
King in Georgia without any clothes, any ID, or any memories. 4) The WOW!
Signal received by Jerry Ehman, a volunteer for SETI, the Search for
Extraterrestrial Intelligence from within the Sagittarius constellation near a
star called Tau Sagittarii, 120 light years away. 5) The Voynich Manuscript:
The writing is composed of over 170,000 characters written in patterns that
resemble natural language. The sections appear to describe different topics of
herbal, astronomical, biological, cosmological, and pharmaceutical nature. 6)
Oak Island Money Pit: Oak Island is the home of what is informally known as the
“Money Pit,” of Nova Scotia in eastern Canada. It is an incredibly deep hole of
incredibly elaborate construction discovered in 1795. 7) The Antikythera
mechanism is an incredibly intricate analogue computer found in a shipwreck
near Greece in the year 1900. The device was used to determine the positions of
celestial bodies using a mind-bogglingly complex series of bronze gears. 8)
“Sea Peoples” — a technologically inferior, unaffiliated group of seafaring
warriors who raided the lands and are often credited with the collapse of
once-great civilizations in the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean regions. 9)
Turkey’s Göbekli Tepe is composed of more than 200 pillars, up to 20 feet in
height and weighing up to 20 tonnes, arranged in roughly 20 circles, built more
than 13,000 years ago, predating Stonehenge by more than 8,000 years. 10) The
Confederate Treasury. The year was 1865, and the American Civil War was drawing
to a close. As the Union army marched the final path to victory, the
Confederate Secretary of the Treasury George Trenholm made one last effort to
preserve the South’s assets by liquefying all gold and silver and burying them
in untraceable places along with jewels. (http://www.news.com.au/technology/science/archaeology/the-worlds-biggest-mysteries-scientists-still-cant-solve/news-story/aac87ed0bc09d5cd4dfba0d49f613334) —
But these are no mysteries in comparison with the mystery of the Holy Trinity.
Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
3) Human mystery confronting divine mystery: The
story is told that Franklin D. Roosevelt and one of his close friends, Bernard
Baruch, talked late into the night one evening at the White House. At last,
President Roosevelt suggested that they go out into the Rose Garden and look at
the stars before going to bed. They went out and looked into the sky for
several minutes, peering at a nebula with thousands of stars. Then the
President said, “All right, I think we feel small enough now to go in and go to
sleep.” — The wonder of the power and wisdom of God puts things in perspective
for us humans. Creation was not an accident, but the result of a Divine Plan;
planets, stars, plants, birds, fish, and animals were all created by God. And
the climax of God’s creation was humanity. (Fr. Kayala). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
4)Aggressively selfish child: A report some
years ago, allegedly by the Minnesota Crime Commission, painted a dark picture
of human nature indeed, particularly with regard to small children. I quote:
“Every baby starts life as a little savage. He is completely selfish and
self-centered. He wants what he wants when he wants it – his bottle, his
mother’s attention, his playmate’s toy, his uncle’s watch. Deny him these once,
and he seethes with rage and aggressiveness, which would be murderous were he
not so helpless. He is, in fact dirty. He has no morals, no knowledge, no
skills. This means that all children not just certain children are born
delinquent. If permitted to continue in the self- centered world of his
infancy, given free rein to his impulsive actions to satisfy his wants, every
child would grow up a criminal a thief, a killer, or a rapist.” [Cited in R.
Scott Richards, Myths the World Taught Me (Nashville: Thomas
Nelson Publishers, 1991), p. 39.] — It is to transform this self-centered human
nature into a selfless, loving, God-centered one that the Second Person of the
Holy Trinity took human form as described in today’s Gospel. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
5) “You ask me a riddle?” Richard, Cardinal
Cushing (d. 11/2/1970; Archbishop of Boston, MA), told of an occasion when he
was administering last rites to a man who had collapsed in a general store.
Following his usual custom, he knelt by the man and asked, “Do you believe in
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit?” The Cardinal said the
man roused a little bit, opened an eye, looked at him and said, “Here I am,
dying, and you ask me a riddle?” — Call them riddles. Call them Mysteries.
There are things about life and Faith we do not understand, but I am not going
to suggest that you resign your effort to understand. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
6) “The undertaker!” There is an old story about
a henpecked husband who went to a psychologist. He was tired of being dominated
by his wife. The psychologist told him, “You do not have to accept your wife’s
bullying. You need to go home right now and let her know that you’re your own
boss.” The husband decided to take the doctor’s advice. He went home and
slammed the door on the way in. He confronted his wife and said, “From now on
you’ll do what I say. Get my supper, then go upstairs and lay out my clothes.
After I eat, I’m going out with the boys while you stay home. By the way, do
you know who is going to tie my tie for me?” “I sure do,” said his wife calmly,
“the undertaker!” — Some marriages are filled with conflict. So are some
offices. Unfortunately, some Churches are filled with conflict as well. The
feast of the Holy Trinity challenges us to cultivate the Trinitarian
relationship of love and unity in our families and offices, parishes, and
classrooms. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
7) “Bad things always come in threes.” An
old adage warns, “Bad things always come in threes.” Have you found this true
in your own experience? That bad things (and good things), like to happen in
community, in bunches? You say: we invent this connection by suddenly realizing
that we got a flat tire on the same day that a computer glitch devoured our
hard drive, shortly after our last contact lens just slid down the drain. I
say: there seems to be something significant about the power of three. – On
this Sunday, “Trinity Sunday,” the Church celebrates the Triune God, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit, affirming the Truth that good things also come in threes.
We recognize God as Creator (the Father), God as Redeemer (the Son), and God as
Sanctifier (the Holy Spirit). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
8) “But the machine can’t ask me about my arthritis.” This
true story is told of a woman named Mamie who made frequent trips to the branch
post office. One day she confronted a long line of people who were waiting for
service from the postal clerk. Mamie only needed stamps, so a helpful observer
asked her, “Why don’t you just use the stamp machine? You can get all the
stamps you need and you won’t have to wait in line.” Mamie said, “I know, but
the machine can’t ask me about my arthritis.” — That’s part of the wisdom of
Christ’s coming to our earth to live among us as described in John’s Gospel (Jn
3: 16-18). He can relate to us in all of our daily needs. As we try to
walk in Jesus’ steps, we might do well to pray the ancient Irish poem set to an
Irish ballad tune, which says,
Be Thou my Wisdom, and Thou my true Word;
I ever with Thee and Thou with me, Lord;
Heart of my own heart, whatever befall,
Still be my Vision, O Ruler of all. (Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
9) A dumb debate on God: The following imagined
debate for mute and deaf scholars is a warning to our pastors who think that
they have explained Holy Trinity well to their flock on Trinity Sunday.
The Jews and the Catholics are having a debate about God and decide that they
will each send one representative to prove that their side is right. The only
rule is that words are not allowed. They decide on their representatives. The
Vatican decides to send their best brain – Cardinal Ratzinger, the head of the
Congregation on Faith and Morals – while the Jews pick one of their best rabbis
to represent them. As a sign of respect, the Jews allow the debate to be held
at the local cathedral. The time for the debate comes and the rabbi walks into
the cathedral and up to the cardinal. The cardinal waves his hand towards the
sky. The rabbi responds by slamming his fist into his palm. The cardinal holds
up three fingers. The rabbi responds by holding up his middle finger. The
cardinal then pulls out bread and wine. The rabbi then reaches into a bag and
pulls out two fish. At this point the cardinal holds up his hands and walks
away.
After the debate the cardinal heads back to the Vatican to
talk it over with the pope and the other cardinals. “Man, those Jews have it
all figured out. First, I said to him, ‘God is everywhere,’ and he responded,
‘God is right here.’ I was taken aback. So, I held up three fingers
representing the Holy Trinity, and he responded, ‘We all worship the same one
God.’ I didn’t know what to do so I showed him bread and wine representing the
sacrifice of Jesus, and he responded with two fish, representing that Jesus
provides.
The Rabbi headed back to the synagogue to tell the others
his version what had happened. “Man, you wouldn’t believe those Catholics. The
moment I walked in this guy with a weird hat gestures at me ‘No Jews Allowed.’
I said ‘I’m staying right here.’ Then he said, ‘You have three minutes.’ I
said, ‘Get lost.’ Then he pulled out his lunch, so I showed him mine.” Fr.
Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
10) Why Isn’t the Whole West Coast Included? A
woman wrote to Reader’s Digest, about an experience that she
had when she took a young girl from India to Church with her. It was the
eleven-year-old girl’s first exposure to a Christian worship service. The young
lady’s parents were traveling on business and had left her in the care of their
American friends. The little Hindu girl decided on her own to go with the family
to Church one Sunday. After the service was over, they went out to lunch. The
little girl had some questions. She wondered, “I don’t understand why isn’t the
West Coast included, too?” Her Christian friends were puzzled and asked, “What
do you mean?” She responded, “You know. I kept hearing the people say, ‘In the
name of the Father, and the Son, and the whole East Coast.’” Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
11) God Is Everywhere: A pastor was trying to
explain to a little Sunday school child that God is calling people everywhere
in the world to believe in Him. “God is much bigger than we imagine Him to be,
and God can use all of us in lots of different ways to do His work everywhere,”
the pastor said. “God is everywhere!” “Everywhere?” asked the little boy.
“Everywhere!” said the pastor. The boy went home and told his mother, “God is
everywhere! The pastor said so.” “Yes, I know,” said the mother. “You mean He
is even in the cupboard?” “Yes,” said the mother. “In the refrigerator — even
when we close the door and the light goes out?” “Yes,” said the mother. “Even
in the sugar bowl?” the lad asked as he took the lid off. “Yes,” said the
mother, “even in the sugar bowl.” The boy slammed down the lid and said, “Now
I’ve got Him.” Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
12) “What?” Jesus said, “Who do men say that I
am?” And his disciples answered and said, “Some say you are John the Baptist
returned from the dead; others say Elijah, or other of the old prophets.” And
Jesus answered and said, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter answered
and said, “Thou art the Logos of the Father, the Son Whom the Father loved from
eternity and Whom the Holy Spirit, the eternal Personification of the love
between the Father and the Son, begot on the Virgin Mary.” And Jesus answering,
said, “What? Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
13) “I’m surprised at you!” An English teacher
of a 21-sophomore high school class put a small chalk dot on the blackboard. He
then asked the class what it was. A few seconds passed and then someone said,
“That is a chalk dot on the blackboard.” The rest of the class seemed relieved
that the obvious had been stated, and no one else had anything to say. “I’m
surprised at you,” the teacher told the class. “I did the same exercise
yesterday with a group of kindergartners and they thought of 50 different
things the chalk mark could be: an owl’s eye, a cigar butt, the top of a
telephone pole, a star, a pebble, a squashed bug, a rotten egg, a bird’s eye,
and so on.” — The older students had learned how to find a right answer but had
lost the ability to look for more than one right answer. The Holy Spirit helps
us, in His wonderful Wisdom, to see more than we might have seen by ourselves.
The Spirit’s vision allows us wonderful options for expansion and new
possibilities. It is the Spirit’s Wisdom that reveals the Word to us. It is the
Wisdom of the Spirit that shows us our sin, which guides us, which instructs
us, and which leads us in the way to Life Everlasting. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
14) Trinitarian design for medieval cathedrals: When
the architect and engineer Aldo Spirito was commissioned to design a cathedral
for the Archdiocese of Abidjan, Ivory Coast, West Africa, he used a number of
architectural elements, as was the tradition of the builders of the medieval
cathedrals, to reinforce the truths of our Faith. Among those elements is the
fact that the basic structure is triangular, so as to state dramatically the
fundamental truth of Christian Faith: God has revealed Himself as Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
15) The Sundial: A missionary from Africa, on
his home-leave, came across a beautiful sundial. He thought to himself, “That
sundial would be ideal for my villagers in Africa. I could use it to teach them
to tell the time of the day.” The missionary bought the sundial, crated it and
took it back to Africa. When the village chief saw it, he insisted that it be
set up in the centre of the village. The villagers were thrilled with the
sundial. They had never seen something so beautiful in their lives. They were
even more thrilled when they learned how it worked. The missionary was
delighted by everyone’s response to his sundial. He was totally unprepared for
what happened a few days later. The people of the village got together and
built a roof over the sundial to protect it from the rain and the sun! — Well,
I think the sundial is a lot like the Holy Trinity, and we Christians are a lot
like the African villagers. The most beautiful revelation of our Faith is the
teaching about the Holy Trinity, namely, the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit.
But instead of putting the teaching to work in our daily lives, we have built a
roof over it, just as the villagers did over their sundial. For many of us the
Trinity seems of little practical value, when it comes to our daily lives. We
treat it more like an ornament of our Faith. (Mark Link in Sunday
Homilies; quoted by Fr. Botelho). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
16) Jesus’ brother, Isukiri, died in Jesus’
place on the cross and Jesus went to Japan : While visiting one of the
members of one of the congregations I served some years ago I was offered a cup
of coffee, and while I sat in the lounge room waiting, I noticed something
unusual. On a table there was what appeared to be a shrine. Inside
was a Buddha statue with candles and flowers and food and other symbols.
As we sipped coffee, I asked about the display on the table expecting to hear a
story about an overseas trip and souvenirs. Instead, I heard a story about this
person’s involvement in the cultic Japanese religion Mahikari and how she felt
that what she was learning through this religion complimented and supported her
Christian Faith. She told me how it taught her about karma,
reincarnation, ancestor worship and making food offerings to the spirits of the
departed, and so on. She told me that Jesus’ brother, Isukiri, died in
Jesus’ place on the cross, that Jesus went to Japan when he was 37 and he died
there when he 106. The amazing thing about all this, is that this person saw no
conflict between what she confessed on Sunday mornings when she said the
Apostles’ Creed with us and what she did the rest of the week as she prayed
before the shrine in her lounge room. This reminds me of the young man
who asked if he could go into the Church to pray. Before the pastor could
respond, he quickly added, “By the way, what kind of Church is this? Not
that it makes any difference. I don’t follow any particular
religion. Whenever I pass a Church or a mosque, I go in say a prayer and
plug into the Divine. Any God will do!” —
“Plug into the Divine,” like it is magic, a kind of pill
that will keep us safe and sound! Today’s feast reminds us that our God
is a Triune God, one God in Three Persons. (Rev. Gerhardy). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
17) Exploring the mystery of Holy Trinity: Explorers
and the pioneer families did solve the mystery of what was out there beyond the
coastal strip. In fact, people have been exploring the mysteries of our world
on many fronts – medicine, technology, and what is out there in space. Where
there is any kind of a mystery, people will try to solve it. But there are some
Mysteries that will always be Mysteries. Today, Trinity Sunday, we come up
against one of those Mysteries – God. Who is God? Where is God? What is
God? I can’t touch Him. I can’t say how big He is. I can’t see Him. The early
Christians started talking about a Triune God. This wasn’t to make God more
logical and understandable and acceptable to human ways of thinking. In fact,
the idea of the Trinity intensified the Mystery and awesomeness of God. They
observed that Jesus had a unique relationship with the Father and that the Holy
Spirit had a unique relationship with the Father and the Son. Against all sorts
of odds, against all human logic, and in the face of mounting opposition, the
Church maintained that Jesus Christ is true God, equal with the Father, and
that the Holy Spirit is God, equal with the Father and the Son. Who is God? He
is our Heavenly Father Who made us, takes cares of us and calls us His dear
children. Who is God? He is Jesus Christ Who gave His life on the cross to
re-establish our relationship with God. He reveals the way to God and to
eternal life. Who is God? God is the Holy Spirit in you giving you Faith in God
and guiding you in your daily walk as a Christian. Faith in the Triune God
acknowledges the might and majesty of God but, at the same time, trusts in His
care and intimate knowledge of our needs and of what is happening in our
lives. O LORD, our Lord, the majesty of Your Name fills the earth! Your
glory is higher than the heavens. Let us make this our prayer: “Lord
God, in spite of our unbelief and lack of understanding of Who You are, show us
Your new way of living. Amen.” (Rev. Gerhardy). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
18) Holy Trinity prayer (Fr. De Mello version of
Tolstoy’s The Three Hermits): When the
Bishop’s ship stopped at a remote island for a day, he decided to use the time
as profitably as possible. He strolled along the seashore and came across three
fishermen mending their nets. In Pidgin English they explained to him that,
centuries ago, they had been Christianized by missionaries. “We, Christians!”
they said, proudly pointing to themselves. The bishop was impressed. Did they
know the Lord’s Prayer? They had never heard of
it. The bishop was shocked. How could these men claim to be Christians when
they did not know something as elementary as the Lord’s Prayer? “What do
you say, then, when you pray?” the bishop asked. “We lift eyes in
heaven. We pray, ‘We are three, You are three,
have mercy on us.’” The bishop was appalled at the primitive,
downright heretical nature of their prayer. So he spent the whole day teaching
them to say the Lord’s Prayer, and he succeeded although the fishermen were
poor learners.
Months later the bishop’s ship happened to pass by those
islands, and the bishop, as he paced the deck saying his evening prayers,
recalled with pleasure the fact that on that distant island were three
fishermen who were now able to pray correctly, thanks to his patient efforts.
While he was lost in thought he happened to look up and noticed a spot
of light in the east. The light kept approaching the
ship and, as the bishop gazed in wonder, he saw three figures walking on the
surface of the water towards the boat. The captain stopped the boat and all the
sailors leaned over the rails to see this amazing sight. When they were within
speaking distance, the bishop recognized his three friends, the fishermen.
“Bishop!” they exclaimed, “we are so glad meet you! We heard your boat go past
island and came in a hurry, hurry to meet you.” “What do you want?” asked the
bishop filled with wonder seeing them walking on water as Jesus did. “Bishop,”
they said, “we so sorry. We forgot that lovely prayer you taught us. We
remember only this much: ‘Our Father in Heaven, holy be your name, your
kingdom come’ . . .the rest we forgot. Please teach us whole
prayer again.” The bishop felt humbled. “Go back to your homes, my good men,”
he said, “and each time you pray, say your Holy Trinity prayer, ‘We are
three, You are three, have mercy on us!’” (Fr. Anthony de
Mello S.J., The Song of the Bird, adapted from Tolstoy’s
original story, The Three Hermits). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
19) “Welcome!” There is a
beautiful Russian icon of the Blessed Trinity painted by a monk named Rublev.
The monk, Andrei Rublev (c. 1360 – 1430), was a medieval Russian who painted
Orthodox icons and frescoes. His Trinity icon is considered
the greatest of its kind, and one of the finest works of religious art ever
created, depicting a wordless conversation among Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
It is based on an earlier icon known as the “Hospitality of Abraham”
illustrating Genesis 18 which depicts the three angels who visited Abraham at
the Oak of Mamre (see Genesis 18:1-15) sitting around a table. But the painting
is full of symbolism and is often interpreted as an icon of the Holy Trinity. A
dish of food lies on the table. But the thing that immediately strikes you is the
fact that at the front of the table there is a vacant place. The vacant place
is meant to convey openness, hospitality and welcome towards the stranger and
outsider. — That vacant place is meant for each one of us, and for all the
human family. It signifies God’s invitation to us to share in the life of the
Trinity. God doesn’t exclude us. He invites us to come in and sit at His table.
He wants to share His life with us. (Flor McCarthy in New Sunday &
Holy Day Liturgies; quoted by Fr. Botelho). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
20) We don’t need to understand God to allow Him to take
over our lives
Thomas Edison, the inventor, once remarked: “We don’t know
what water is. We don’t know what light is. We don’t know what electricity is.
We don’t know what heat is. We have a lot of hypotheses about these things, but
that is all. But we don’t let our ignorance about these things deprive us of
their use.” — The truth of that statement is real. Most of us do not know how
an electric light works, how a telephone or a TV works, but this does not
prevent us from using them. Let us try to apply the same common sense to our
Faith in the doctrine of the Trinity. (John Pichappily in The Table of
the Word; quoted by Fr. Botelho). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
21) “Holy, Holy, Holy”: Today’s “signature” Hymn
is familiar to all of us. It begins,
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty!
Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee;
Holy, Holy, holy, merciful and mighty,
God in Three Persons, blessed Trinity. Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
22) Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity Becomes a House of
God: No one understood this better that Blessed Elizabeth of the
Trinity. She grew up in France in the late eighteen hundreds, the daughter of a
successful military officer who died of a heart attack while she was still only
a girl. She was an extremely strong-willed and temperamental child. Her
frequent fits of rage were almost uncontrollable, and she was known as the
“little devil.” This began to change after her first Communion, when she was
eleven. That afternoon she met for the first time the prioress of the nearby
Carmelite convent. The nun explained that the girl’s name, Elizabeth, meant
“house of God,” and wrote her a note that said: “Your blessed name hides a
mystery, accomplished on this great day. Child. Your heart is the House of God
on earth, of the God of love.” From then on, recognizing that God had taken up
residence in her soul, she waged a holy war against her violent temper. She
didn’t win overnight, but she did win, eventually, and she also discovered her
vocation to become a Carmelite herself. Her mother didn’t like the idea,
however, and made her wait until she was twenty-one. She won friends of all
ages during those years of waiting, singing in the parish choirs, arranging
parish day-care service for families that worked in the local tobacco factory,
and also winning several prizes for her skill at the piano. She died only five
years after entering the convent, at the age of 26, after having suffered
horribly for months from an extremely painful disease of the kidneys. But her
realization that the Blessed Trinity dwelt within her enabled her to suffer
with patience and even with joy. As she wrote to her mother: “The bride belongs
to the Bridegroom, and mine has taken me. [Jesus] wants me to be another
humanity for him in which he can still suffer for the glory of his Father, to
help the needs of his Church: this thought has done me so much good.” — Blessed
Elizabeth of the Trinity had discovered the intimate, loving presence of God
that He so eagerly wants to reveal to all of us. (E-Priest). Fr.
Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
23) “As there is fire and water in this brick” According
to Tradition, when St. Spyridon of Trimithund was asked at the Council of
Nicaea (A.D. 325) how three can simultaneously be one, he responded (with a
little Divine help!) by taking up a brick and squeezing it. From the now-soft
clay in his hands, a flame flared up, while simultaneously water flowed
downward. “As there is fire and water, and clay in this brick,” said St.
Spyridon, “in the same way there are three persons in the one Godhead.” (The
great 20th-century Catholic theologian Father Karl Rahner, SJ, was supposedly
asked once by a priest friend how he should explain the Holy Trinity when
preaching. Father Rahner’s reply was simple: “Don’t!”) — The mystery we
celebrate in today’s feast defies not only explanation but also comprehension.
The preacher is left to reaffirm our core belief that God, remaining One, is
somehow also Three in that Oneness – Triune. The preacher is further challenged
to help his congregants (and himself) understand why that truth might matter in
their daily lives.) Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
24) The universal testimony: A good illustration of
the Trinity comes from world-renowned scientist Dr. Henry Morris. He notes that
the entire universe is Trinitarian by design. The universe consists of three
things: matter, space, and time. Take away any one of those three and the universe
would cease to exist. But each one of those is itself a trinity. Matter = mass
+ energy + motion. Space = length + height + breadth. Time = past + present +
future. Thus, the whole universe witnesses to the character of the God who made
it (cf. Psalm 19:1). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
25) Another simple explanation:” St. John of Damascus, a
great Eastern theologian of the eighth century, said we should think “of the
Father as a root, the Son as a branch, and of the Spirit as a fruit, for the
substance of these three is one.” He also said, “Think of the
Father as a Spring of Life, begetting the Son like a River and the Holy Ghost
like a sea, for the spring, the river and the sea are all one nature.”(https://anastpaul.com) Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
26) A Divine Mystery in our world of mysteries: The
world, we live in, is not as simple as it might seem to be. It is full of
unexplained mysteries that raise several questions that remain to be answered
even today. There are many such mysterious phenomena, which find no
satisfactory explanation in science. Many of the mysteries keep us wondering,
asking questions, and striving to learn more about our world; others are simply
amusing. They have perplexed individuals all throughout history. The Bermuda
Triangle is believed to possess certain supernatural powers due to which
aircraft and ships coming in its vicinity disappear. Moreover, researchers have
never been able to find the exact cause of the disappearing of vessels and
aircraft, neither have they been able to trace the lost objects. The Bermuda
Triangle remains an unexplained mystery. Unidentified objects, abbreviated as
UFOs, are disk-like objects seen in the night sky. Some of them glow and have
lights. People claim to have seen them float in sky or fly across speedily. It
is said that they could be spaceships or vehicles of the aliens traveling to
Earth. Archaeologists have found about thirteen crystal skulls in parts of
Mexico as well as Central and South America. They are 5000 to 36000-year-old
human like skulls made out of milky crystal rock. Long years of research might
be able to find answers to some of them while many will remain being unresolved
for generations to come. — If there are so many things that cannot be explained
in this world, how can we expect to explain the mysteries relating to the
Creator of this world! Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy
Trinity. It is a mystery that cannot be comprehended by the human beings. (Fr.
Bobby Jose). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
27) The “Dogmatic” Sarcophagus, also known
as the “Trinity Sarcophagus” is an early Christian sarcophagus dating to
320–350,[2] now
in the Vatican
Museums (Vatican 104). [1] The
three persons of the Trinity are portrayed as three bearded males, in the act
of creating Eve while Adam lies nearby in a deep sleep. It was discovered
in the 19th century during rebuilding works at the Basilica
di San Paolo fuori le Mura, (Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Wall),
in Rome, Italy. Together with the Sarcophagus
of Junius Bassus, it one of the most important examples of Christian-Roman
sculpture of the Constantinian era.
It draws its name from its clear references to the dogmas of the Council of Nicaea (325),
in particular to Christ being consubstantial with God the Father, as shown (for
example) by the scene of a figure with the appearance of Jesus between Adam and Eve, though
whether the figure is to be understood as Christ or God the Father is less
clear – the dogmatic point works either way. (Sanchez Archives &
Wikipedia). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)
28) Icon of the Trinity by Andrei Rublev: In
1425 AD, Andrew Rublev, a Russian monk, painted an icon of the Trinity in which
three angelic figures are seated around a small table, engaged in intimate
conversation. On the table is a chalice, in the background is a tree. The trio
of figures and the tree are reminiscent of the visit which angelic messengers
paid to Sarah and Abraham at the Oak of Mamre. As they enjoyed the generous
welcome of Sarah and Abraham, the messengers announced the unexpected birth of
Isaac (Genesis 18) whom Abraham would later be willing to sacrifice if God
willed it (Genesis 22). From his knowledge of iconography, Henri Nouwen has suggested
that Rublev intended this angelic appearance to prefigure the Divine visitation
by which God sends the unexpected gift of His Son, who sacrifices himself for
sin and gives new life through the Spirit. Rublev wished that his icon would
offer his fellow monks a way to keep their hearts centered on God, Father, Son
and Spirit, despite the chaotic world of political unrest in which they lived.
(Sanchez Archives). Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/) L/21
