Homily originally presented June 7, 2020
Most Holy Trinity!
I go through a little routine every morning as I get ready for the day.
Right after I shower, I put in my contact lenses.
I carefully take each lens out of the case ... one at time ...
and wash it and lubricate it and place it on my eye.
As I do this, I begin thanking God ... for my eyes and for the ability to see ...
I thank Him for the technology that enables me to see so clearly.
I thank Him for the insurance that helped me to pay for these lenses
And I thank him for my eye doctor, Dr. Dorrine Goldschmidt,
and ask for his blessings upon her.
As my lenses settle in I turn to a little plaque I have hanging on the wall
and covering one eye at a time I just make sure that I can read it.
It’s entitled: “The Full Armour of God” with the words from Ephesians 6,
but I just look for the word “God” and say to myself, “I want to see God.”
Yes, that’s what I say every morning: I want to see God ...
meaning first, seeing the word “God” ... so I know I got my lenses in right ...
but also meaning ... that at the end of my life ... I want to see God ...
not the word “God” ... but God!
How about you? Do you want to see God?
Actually, the desire to see God is written on every human heart!
God, who is Love, made us to be with Him.
It’s God’s intention that we would one day be with Him ... and see Him.
Right now, we can’t see Him with our human eyes.
So, how do we know He’s there? With the eyes of Faith.
Yes, we have heard enough and experienced enough to know that there is a God.
And except for a brief moment in time, we humans can’t see Him with our eyes.
In our First Reading from Old Testament, Exodus, we heard how Moses encountered God on Mount Sinai: “Having come down in a cloud,
the Lord stood before Moses there and proclaimed his name, “Lord”.
So, Moses heard the Lord ... but he didn’t see the Lord ...
for God was hidden from his sight ... hidden in a cloud.
As a side-note, notice here how the words God and Lord are used interchangeably in the Old Testament.
“The Lord stood before Moses.”
We’re so used to thinking of Jesus when we hear the word “Lord”,
we need to know that from way back in Old Testament times
the word “Lord” ... written as “Adonai” in Hebrew
was a title of God, whose name is “Yahweh”.
So remember this as we pray the Eucharist Prayer in every Mass.
The Eucharistic Prayer in Mass is directed to the Father.
and so when you hear the title “Lord” in that Prayer, there it means Father!
For example, I begin one Eucharistic Prayer with these words:
“You are indeed Holy, O Lord, and all you have created rightly gives you praise.”
that’s directed to God not just Jesus.
When I pray: “Therefore, O Lord, we humbly implore you by the same Spirit
graciously make holy these gifts we have brought to you for consecration.”
that’s directed to God not just Jesus.
And again, when you hear the words:
“Therefore, O Lord, as we celebrate the memorial of the saving Passion of your Son, his wondrous Resurrection and Ascension into heaven, and as we look forward to his second coming, we offer you in thanksgiving this holy and living sacrifice.”
Yes, the Eucharistic Prayer is our offering of
the Eternal Sacrifice of the Son of God to the Father ...
that gives Him great glory and brings many blessings to us.
It’s a great mystery. In our worship of God ...
God the Father is still veiled from our sight ... and
God the Son that we offer to the Father is now veiled from our sight.
But it wasn’t always that way!
For there was that brief moment in time that I spoke of ...
that brief 33 years ... out of some 4,000 years of salvation history ...
where the unseen God showed Himself to us.
Yes, the human desire to see the face of God was fulfilled by
the Incarnation of God’s only-begotten son ... Jesus.
In Jesus, the
tender compassion, the personal favor, the patience, and the unconditional love that Israel recognized as the signs of God’s presence with them
were manifested in human form.
Jesus is more than just an icon of God ... more than just an image of God.
Jesus is God!
And the Father sent Him to show us the depths of His love for us.
No one could have known the immensity of God’s love for us
until Jesus laid down His life for us and God raised Him up,
opening the way to Eternal Life for all who believe in Him.
In our Gospel today, St. John declares,
“Whoever believes in (Jesus Christ) will not be condemned,
but whoever does not believe has already been condemned,
because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.
Here John is saying that God is more than one; God is Father and Son
and that we need to express our faith in both of them.
We Catholics verbally express our belief in Jesus, the Only Son of God each time we receive the Eucharist in Holy Communion.
It’s then that the Priest or Extraordinary Minister presents you the Host and says, “The Body of Christ”.
To which you respond, “Amen”.
In doing so you’re actually saying, “I believe”. …
I believe in the Name of the only Son of God and I believe
that He is here truly and substantially present in the Host that I am receiving.
Listen again to the farewell wish that St. Paul makes at the conclusion of his 2nd Letter to the Corinthians proclaimed in Second Reading:
“the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God
and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”
Surely that greeting sounds familiar to you.
It’s very similar to the greeting I extend to you at the beginning of Sunday Mass.
“May the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father
and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”
Paul’s greeting is one of the clearest Trinitarian passages in the New Testament!
For Paul clearly refers to God as three distinct persons. (Repeat)
From Scripture we see that
God has revealed His glory as ... the glory also of His Son and of the Holy Spirit.
God Himself is a unity of Three Divine Persons.;
He is Trinity. He is Community. He is Family.
And since we are made in His image, we too are made to be ... a community;
we too are made to be ... a family.
How providential that we’re celebrating this feast honoring the Most Holy Trinity
at a time when the closeness of the human race has been shaken by evil.
The unnecessary killing of a black man by a white policeman in Minnesota
2 weeks ago and the subsequent riots that have taken place in various cities
show that there is a grave misunderstanding of how we’re related as people.
white or black ... we’re not just members of the same human race ...
we’re members of the very same family ... God’s Family!
We are all made in the image and likeness of God ... who is community.
Yes, God as Trinity ... is a community
where Father and Son are united by Love ... the Holy Spirit!
So we too are expected to be a community ... a community united by Love.
We need to recognize that we all have the same Father and the same Brother, Jesus
And so saying we’re Brothers and Sisters goes way beyond us just being residents of the same planet earth ... we are members of the one Family of God.
One Father ... one Family!
So, the expectation is that we’d look out for one another and respect and care for one another and never do anything to bring evil upon one another.
It’s a great big world ... with people of many different colors and cultures.
We may not like their food ... or their music ...or their fashions ... or other things
but God expects us to love them as brothers and sisters ... in His family.
We may never want to take vacation with them ... and that’s ok.
God doesn’t ask us to like them ... He commands us to love them!
Jesus tells us, “Love one another as I love you.”
Today we honor the Trinity. A family of Persons so united they are One!
Let’s realize that that’s God’s design and desire for us ...
that we ... His children ... would be a family of Brothers and Sisters ...
so united ... that we are one like Him ...
because we are one in Him.
As we go forward lets pray for the grace to see
the Mysterious unity of God visible in our communities ...
where we truly live as brothers and sisters.
Then, we will be able to see evidence of the invisible God in this life ...
and merit to be able to see the Triune God in Eternal Life!
The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. It is the mystery of God Himself. It is therefore the source of all other mysteries of faith.
We Catholics reverence this mystery each and every time we bless ourselves. We trace out the sign of our salvation, the Cross, as we proclaim God’s Holy Name, honoring each Person of the Trinity, saying
“In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit!”
Think of this when you’re absolved in Confession, “I absolve you of your sins.” Think of this when you’re blessed at the end of Mass.
We are family as God is family.
I know of a non-Catholic Christian man who attended many different Protestant churches during his life … and after visiting a Catholic Church he said that one big difference that he noticed was in how Catholics prayed.
He said that in many bible Churches it’s all about Jesus.
Whereas, in the Catholic Church, it’s all about the Father, Son and Holy Spirit!
Notice the hymns we sing … the Gloria … our Creed … the Eucharistic Prayer.
It’s not just me and Jesus. It’s me and the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit!
Recall the last words that Jesus spoke to His Apostles as He ascended into Heaven. He said, “Go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them (how?)
in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,”
Those are the words that the Priest or Deacon spoke at your Baptism that brought you into God’s family.
It’s through Baptism that we are called to share in the life of the Blessed Trinity,
This sharing begins here on earth … through the eyes of faith
and is fulfilled after death in God’s eternal light.
As we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, let’s remind ourselves
to listen closely to the prayers that we pray and recognize how we reverence the mystery of God as Trinity, one God, yet three distinct persons.
For example, listen again to the Opening Prayer that we prayed at Mass today.
“Father, you sent your Word to bring us truth and your Spirit to make us holy.
Through them we come to know the mystery of your life. Help us to worship you, one God in three persons, by proclaiming and living our faith in you. Grant this through Our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God forever and ever. Amen.”
And of course there’s the Doxology of Praise at the end of the Eucharistic Prayer where I hold up Jesus, truly present under the appearance of Bread and Wine, and offer Him to the Father saying, “Through Him, with Him, in Him, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours, Almighty Father, forever and ever.”
Our prayers and our praise are Trinitarian.
Let’s never cease to praise God for the mystery that He is:
one God in three Divine Persons.
“Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit!”
who is God.
God is mystery.
And we have no adequate way to explain the mystery of His being.
The Father is God, the Son is God and the Spirit is God … but they are one God!
Three distinct persons in one true God.
This is the Central Mystery of Christian faith and life …
it is the mystery of God in Himself.
None of us adults can fully understand the mystery that God is Trinity … so it’s easy to see why the kids have trouble with it too!
Notice how we Christians are baptized: in the name of the Father and of the Son
and of the Holy Spirit … not in their names (plural).
There is one Creator of all things …
for in God there is one Father from whom all things have their being, and
there is one only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom all things exist, and there is one Spirit, the gift who is in all.
In other words, there is one power which brings all things into being,
one Son, through whom all things come to be,
and one gift who proceeds from both … in an eternal exchange of love.
As St. Hilary wrote, “Nothing is wanting in this flawless union: in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, there is infinity of endless being, perfect reflection of the divine image, and mutual enjoyment of the gift.” (exceptional words to describe exceptional reality)
Today we celebrate this mystery … the mystery of the Trinity.
No, we’ll never understand it this side of Heaven,
but that’s ok, because as St. Augustine wisely said,
“Any God I that can explain … isn’t worth my adoration!”
We’ll never be able to explain God … but we’d sure like to!
And we sure try … don’t we?
Recall how St. Patrick tried to explain this mystery to the Irish by using a Three-leaf Clover. It was one leaf with three distinct leaves … it was 3 in 1,
representing in some way the 3 persons in 1 God.
Another way we try to understand this mystery is by considering the 3 phases of the water molecule, H2O. It can exist in 3 distinct phases: ice, water, and steam. But in each of these phases, it is still H2O. So it’s 3 in 1! Imaging the Trinity of 3 in 1.
Today, much of the non-Christian world believes that there is one true God.
For example, the Jews the Muslims, believe in one God, but they see Him as 1 person. Whereas, we Christians believe in one God, who is 3 persons.
three persons in one God … it’s the mystery of Trinity.
Yet, all our efforts to explain the Trinity are lacking. And that’s just the way it’s going to be. Our finite minds will never be able to comprehend our infinite God.
Believing in Jesus ... as we just heard in John’s Gospel ...
involves more than just an assent to Jesus being Lord.
It also requires a personal commitment to Him and
participation in His mission to reveal God’s love to the world.
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