What Trinity Can Mean

Today is Trinity Sunday.  It is a day to observe our understanding of God as One, who is known as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Is this confusing, or is it awesome?

Last Sunday in the “Week in Review” section of the New York Times there was an article by two professors of psychology about the experience of awe.  A favorite expression we often hear is that something is “awesome.”  The authors of the article ask, “Why do humans experience awe?”

They respond by stating, “We humans … can get goose bumps when we experience awe, that often-positive feeling of being in the presence of something vast that transcends our understanding of the world.”  Awe “motivates people to do things that enhance the greater good.  Through many activities that give us goose bumps — collective rituals, celebration, music and dance, religious gatherings and worship — awe might help shift our focus from our narrow self-interest to the interests of the group to which we belong.”

In their research the authors “found that awe helps bind us to others, motivating us to act in collaborative ways that enable strong groups and cohesive communities.”  They also discovered “that participants who reported experiencing more awe in their lives, who felt more regular wonder and beauty in the world around them, were more generous to the stranger.”

At another level they said, “You could make the case that our culture today is awe-deprived. Adults spend more and more time working and commuting and less time outdoors and with other people.”  They are preoccupied with individual needs and the need for personal economic security.

There is a sense in which our understanding of the Trinity is awesome and there is also a sense in which our contemporary understanding of a Trinitarian God is deprived of awe.  The purpose of the doctrine of the Trinity is to teach us something about the nature of God.  It tells us something about ourselves.  Since Christ lives by the very life of God, and we live by the life of Christ, we too live by the life of God. 

The very structure of our existence has been transformed to this basic reality: in being and destiny, through our baptism in the death and resurrection of Christ, we have been taken into the sphere of God’s own life.  We are in relationship with God, with Jesus Christ, and with everyone through the Spirit.  How awesome is that!

Karen Armstrong, in her book, “The Case for God,” states, “The whole point of the doctrine of the Trinity was to stop Christians from thinking about God in rational terms.  Trinity was mythos, it spoke a truth that was not accessible to reason, and it made sense only when translated into practical action.  It was a meditative device to counter the idolatrous tendency of people who perceived God as a mere being.”

God is indescribable. We do not know nor can we know the mind of God.  The Trinity is a mystery; no one is required to believe it as a divine fact.  The Trinity today remains a problem, pointless, incomprehensible, and even absurd because it is understood as an abstract metaphysical doctrine rather than a meditative activity.”

We need to renew our appreciation for mystery.  Living as we do in a rational and objective culture, we deprive ourselves of seeing both with our eyes and our minds what is truly awesome.

Our scripture readings from Paul’s letter to the Romans and from the 3^rd chapter of the gospel of John invite us to know this awesome reality.

In Romans we read, “All who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God.  For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, "Abba! Father!" it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ-- if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.”

John’s gospel also discusses this awesome reality: “Jesus said to Nicodemus, "Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony.  If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things?  No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man…. For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.”

Let us meditate on what the idea of the Trinity can mean in our lives and, as we reflect on the early experience of the Church, Paul’s letter to the Romans, and John’s gospel, we should focus on restoring experiences of awe.  It is worthy of our consideration that people who experience more awe in their lives feel greater wonder and beauty in the world around them, and are more generous to the stranger.   Amen.