MAY 26-27, 2018
4:30 PM (SAT), 7:30 AM, 9:00 AM, 10:30 AM ORDINARY FORM (ENGLISH) MASSES
12:00 NOON EXTRAORDINARY FORM (LATIN) MASS AT RUTHERFORD, HOLY FAMILY
Today is Trinity Sunday.
The doctrine of the Trinity was fleshed out during the Fourth Century, due to what is called the Arian Heresy. What we have from that time is the Creed we normally recite at Sunday Mass.
The point in question revolved around the word “consubstantial.”
In the Greek language, the word was “homoousious” … which Arius cleverly twisted into “homoiousios” in order to spread his teaching. This would be similar to changing “consubstantion” to “cosubstantial.”
As early as the year 325, and then made even more clear in the year 381 the Creed we recite was formulated and finalized. Yet it wasn’t until the year 586 that the Creed was recited within the Mass.
For the next 500 years, this was good enough, until petitions were made to the pope for a feast day honoring the Most Holy Trinity. It was not until the 14th century, 300 years later, that was it placed in the Missal on the Sunday after Pentecost, and has remained there until the present day.
While the word “Trinity” itself is not used in Scripture, Jesus speaks of being “one” with God the Father, at Jesus’s baptism, the voice of the Father is heard, and the Holy Spirit descends like a dove, today’s reading has Jesus instructing the Apostles to baptize using a trinitarian formula. The doctrine is alluded to in the Old Testament, and spelled out in more detail in the New Testament letters.
On top of the that, we have the hagiography of St. Patrick using a Shamrock to teach the Celts about the Trinity in the Fifth Century.
The scholastics devising an almost mathematical representation of the Trinity indicating that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all are God, yet are distinct persons, and then declaring step by step that the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Spirit is God; however, the Father is not the Son nor is the Father the Spirit, and on and on through the entire equation.
In art, we have the famous image of the Trinity from the Russian iconographer Rublev.
The renaissance painter Botticelli’s image of the Trinity, currently in a museum in London shows the Father and the Holy Spirit embracing the crucified Son.
The images of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries show the Father and Son enthroned – as if they are imperial or royal figures – with the Holy Spirit enshrined between them. Such images exist even in statues from that time – as seen at the parish Church of the Most Holy Trinity in Marsa, Malta.
But all of these images fall short of the immensity and majesty of God. Our human representations are merely attempts at encapsulating the infinite, immortal, invisible Triune Godhead in finite, mortal, visible ways.
Scripture tells us in Genesis that God created everything through His Word. And so perhaps we might seek a verbal means of expression.
And, for what it’s worth, we have just such a thing.
In our liturgical worship, we use what are called “doxologies” from the Greek “doxa” meaning “glory” and “logos” meaning “words.” And so, towards the end of the Introductory Rites, we sang (recited) the Gloria – “Glory to God in the highest … almighty God and Father … Lord Jesus Christ … with the Holy Spirit …”
Most likely you are familiar with a simpler formula that we pray in various ways “Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit …”
At the end of the Eucharistic Prayer – whichever of the dozen or so is used – the priest prays “Through Him, with Him, in Him …” offering the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ to the Father in the unity of the Holy Spirit.
One of the longer greetings in the Mass begins “Grace to you and Peace from God our Father …”
And at the beginning of the Eucharistic Prayer, we pray “Holy, holy, holy” – to the “thrice holy” Godhead – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Our worship is filled with verbal images of the Most Holy Trinity, and while it pervades the prayers, perhaps we do need today’s special Solemnity to remind us that through our Baptism we are called to share in the Divine Life of the Most Holy Trinity, and while there are concrete signs and graces of God’s presence in our daily lives, how that will come to be in the next life remains shrouded in mystery.
As we approach this altar to receive the Sacred Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ – let us pray for a deeper relationship to the One, True, God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And while our human understanding may fall short of the magnitude of God’s majesty … let us offer our prayers of praise and worship God with all our heart and with all our mind.
