Trinity Sunday
Intro: no one has ever seen God, but St. Paul reminds us that He has been made visible in Christ Jesus. This same Jesus reveals more about the hidden life of His Father and the Holy Spirit.
Readings: the Wisdom of God was there at the beginning of creation, and remains a guiding force in all human activity.
Paul gives the Romans an insight into their relationship with the Trinity: they share the Father's glory through the saving work of the Son, and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
Proverbs 8: 22-31;
Romans 5: 1-5;
John 16: 12-15
When you first meet someone, you're likely to be a bit wary; it's unlikely that you'll reveal a lot about yourself but simply talk in generalities But as you meet more often, and begin to see something in her/him, it's probable that you'll begin to talk about your work, your leisure activities, what your interests are. Finally, as you grow in knowledge and trust of that other person, you might begin to talk about your hopes, your desires, your aspirations for the future .. yourself. And so, love is born..
If your relationship continues to deepen into love, you want to hear more about the other person too, and show various ways of proving your own love.
And that's precisely what the Trinity's all about! God knows and loves each of us - as individuals, not simply as members of the the human race He's created. Because He loves us, He wants to tell us something about Himself - He tells us in Genesis how He created a whole world for us, how He placed plants, fish, animals and all other good things in it for us to enjoy. It was His gift to us. But because we rejected that gift, that sign of His love and destroyed our relationship, He tried again. To show His total love and everlasting commitment to us, He made it even easier as He gave us a visible sign of that love in His own Son. Once that Son had proved His love, He sent the Spirit of His love to reassure us and help us spread the message of His love. So the mystery, the story of the Trinity is a love story.
We shouldn't try to understand the mystery of the Trinity intellectually - it is a mystery! and we would miss the whole point by doing so. Instead we must see it as an invitation to a relationship with someone Who loves us very much, Who wants us to become part of His family.
Because we're human, we try to see and under stand that relationship in human terms, coming to grips with a spiritual reality by means of finite examples and words (shamrock, clover leaf, triangle). And while we'll never grasp the full meaning of the mystery, it's not entirely beyond us. Christ became human so that He could speak to us in our own language about God, and He told us about His Father and the Spirit. Always remember: the Spirit leads us to the complete truth!
Think of how many logos can you identify, or T.V. jingles can you sing? We live in the age of the product logo, the corporate image (McDonald's with its yellow "M", Kellogg's cornflakes with its rooster, etc). When you walk round Asda or Tesco's, you look for that logo, as an easily identifiable symbol of a particular product you want. As we sign ourselves with the sign of the cross, the sign of the Trinity, we create a logo which is a constant reminder of God's revelation about Himself and the quality of His commitment to us and His love for us.
So let's be full of gratitude for the gift of our faith, and celebrate together God's closeness to us in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.