Trinity Sunday
The Catholic Faith is this: That we worship one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; Neither confounding the Persons: nor dividing the Substance. For there is one Person of the Father, another of the Son: and another of the Holy Ghost. (Athanasian Creed, 500AD)
For many of us, the liturgical calendar of the church is a new way of ordering and comprehending time. Perhaps an entirely different way of living out this Christian Life. I'm most likely on safe ground in assuming that most Christians celebrate our Lord's incarnation on Christmas Day and his glorious resurrection on Easter morning. If you do, then you've been following the liturgical calendar at least part of it anyway. Whether you are new to the Anglican way or not, you've realized that the liturgical year is marked by several seasons and feast days.
The Christian year divides into two principal sections. The first half corresponds to the Divine revelation of salvation for the world in the Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Think of it as the Gospel playing out in real-time. Since Advent, we have remembered the Love of each Person of the Trinity through separate high feasts of the church. In the Incarnation, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension of our Lord, we have contemplated the Love of both the Father and the Son: for it was the Father who sent his Son into the world. Last week on Whitsunday (or The Feast of Pentecost), we acknowledged the Holy Spirit's extraordinary and marvelous work, the third Person of the Trinity sent forth by the Father and the Son.
The first part of the liturgical year progressively reveals the God of Scripture as Trinity: Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Three distinct persons, yet without separation, unified as One God. And this is a great mystery which is very center of the Christian Faith, into whose Triune Name we are baptized and by whose Name we are blessed. You see, one cannot be a Christian without believing and confessing the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost, three Persons, and one God, foundational Christian dogma forever made clear and professed in the creed attributed to St. Athanasius.
Trinity Sunday is a day to acknowledge and recognize, with specific intent, that the salvific plan of loving goodness towards this fallen world is a Trinitarian movement. The writings of St. Paul and Peter tell us that it pleased God, in His goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will. His will is that everyone, everywhere and at every time, should have access to the Father, through Christ, the Word made flesh, in the Holy Spirit, and thus become sharers in the divine nature, regardless of any human distinction. "For Christ came into the world to save sinners..." without exception.
The God, who dwells in unapproachable light, desires to communicate his divine life to humanity, whom he freely created, and to adopt them as his sons and daughters in his only-begotten Son. By revealing himself as He wishes: as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God has revealed himself in this way because within the economy of time, the Lord chose to no longer cloak or hold back the full manifestation of himself. What was understood partially, seen but not understood, has now been revealed by the incarnation of the Son and the giving of the Holy Spirit. Pentecost, therefore, is the final unveiling of the Holy One of Heaven, and he is Trinity.
Today, on Trinity Sunday, the first half of the Christian year has come to a close as we gather together all three Persons of the Trinity in our worship, witnessing to the glory of the eternal Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Ghost, as one God, who are equally concerned in our salvation. And with all the saints, we look upward into Heaven and triumphantly cry:
Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God Almighty,
which was, and is, and is to come...
Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power;
For, the triumph of the saints, which is the triumph of all who believe and born again by the Holy Ghost, is theirs because life itself, God, has brought us into his life. You see, our salvation from sin is to participate in the Life of God, the Divine Life. Yes, we have regenerated, justified, made clean, an inheritance awaits us in that far and beautiful country. But all of this is ours because we have been brought back into fellowship with our Creator. The very breath you breathe, all that you have been given, every spiritual blessing you enjoy are but gifts possessed by any who are possessed of God. He is our Life. In him is our hope. In him is protection from the storms of this life and the judgment to come.
The Trinity is more than a complicated and wonderful doctrine of the mind, food for theological contemplation... instead, it is the reality in which we move, and live, and have our being. We must move beyond a systematic or philosophical approach to God as Trinity, and awaken the soul to the Love of God, who has and does come to us as we partake of the Divine Life of the Almighty through His Word, in prayer, in the sacrament, and often through our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. We are partakers of the Divine Nature: we are in Him and He in us. Because God is Love and Love seeks blessing and goodness for the beloved.
Trinity Sunday is also the beginning of the second half of the Church year. Having been taught the Trinitarian nature and all that has been done and given to us through the Son, we are now called to respond by emulating the Divine Life here in the here and now. In a sense, Trinity Sunday is a day in which we restart and rededicate ourselves to bearing the image within our families, friendships, and parish, reflecting the Divine Life to a confused, anxious, and hopeless world. This new start is reflected in the aim and purpose of Trinity-Tide, which is the most extended season of the Christian year. The many weeks ahead are all about our growth in virtue and persevering in holiness, intending to shape our lives into the Divine Life. Jesus told Nicodemus, "ye must be born again." And, in a sense, we all need a renewing of the Holy Spirit, each and every one of us to various degrees. And how will we be shaped into the Divine image if not by the Holy Spirit? Who among us would discount their need for the Holy Spirit's grace to shape our imperfect souls?
Surely we need patience in temptation, humility in all things, wisdom to pursue peace and reconciliation, the courage to seek justice for the oppressed and equal treatment of the poor; to take hold of the necessity of a faith that produces good works; the control of the tongue; the curbing of lusts; tolerance to guard against the danger of material riches; a hunger for the beauty and use of prayer; and above all grace towards all men.
God has always existed as one yet in a perfect community of three. An eternal dance of love, deference, and giving. The Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Father, and the Holy Spirit processes from the love between the two. Perfect unity and harmony and yet, with distinction, for the Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Father, and the Holy Spirit is neither the Father nor the Son. Rather, three distinct persons in one God. Distinction without separation. Friends let the pattern of the Divine community be ours as well. Celebrating our God-given individuality, our diversity, and distinctions. Each with unique perspectives and experiences. The diversity of talents and abilities, passions, and callings. We arrive at differing opinions, often seeing the world from our own point of view. The very image of God enjoys distinction as man and woman, and yet there is a common humanity.
The Divine Life neither destroys distinction, nor does it separate. Instead, it flourishes in unity. Therefore, let us bind ourselves unto the Name, the Strong Name of the Trinity, participating in and communing with our God. May our participation in Him enable, bless, and guard the unity of the life we share. I close with these words from St. Paul,
"I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all." Amen+
