Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

God: Three equals one.
They are strange! Alleluia!
More to say. Not now.

Prv 8:22-31; Ps 8:2-9; Rom 5:1-5; Jn 16:12-15

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Today is our annual reminder that the Divine is not the rational and reasonable object we wish them to be. God is strange, in so many ways. We can try to explain away such truth. Or we can accept it. We can embrace it. And then we will come to know someone wonderful, someone far more wonderful than any consumer-friendly version peddled by corporate religion. Yes, God is strange! Alleluia!

Proverbs 8:22-31; Psalms 8:2-9; Romans 5:1-5; John 16:12-15

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Scripture tells us that we were created in God's image. So if they are three, plural, a we are instead of an I am, then what does that make us? If the Trinity is truth, and we take that truth seriously, can we continue to worship our sacred cows of freedom or tribalism? Parent, Son, and Spirit are bound to one another as a family of love. Like it or not, so are you and I and all the rest of our brothers and sisters. We are family; bound to one another in a sacred dance that takes us far beyond our comfort zones of tolerance, sentimentality, or utilitarian convenience. A true we are, not just a collection of I ams.

So how do we tap into our trinitarian nature? How do we act more like the family that we are? Perhaps it is as simple as being gentle to one another. Give your siblings the benefit of the doubt. Try with all your might to see the best in the person you like the least. Do less agitating and more listening. And take a lesson from some anonymous Turkish villagers who in the midst of genocide mourned the loss of their neighbors: "The Armenians were the salt of our land … that which gave us taste and aroma is gone … may God look after us all." Yes, may We Are look after those she has chosen to be his own, those whom they have blessed with the greatest of all inheritances: family.

Deuteronomy 4:32-40; Psalms 33:4-22; Romans 8:14-17; Matthew 28:16-20

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Exodus 34:4-9; Daniel 3:52-56; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; John 3:16-18

How often do we turn on the evening news only to be greeted by the spectacle of countless brothers and sisters being slaughtered or exiled because they proclaimed the "wrong" name for God? And how often do we turn away from such visions certain in the knowledge that we are better than those who perpetrate such evil? But are we? Yes, we put down our swords, at least the faith-based ones, a few centuries ago. But that has not stopped so very many of us from asserting that the "infidels" will get their comeuppance in the end. "Whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God." But then the Trinity wanders into the mix. If we confess that God goes by multiple names and faces, how can we be certain that any of our siblings are worshipping the wrong one? Two thousand years ago, we knew less than half of God's faces. But now we know that we have seen them all? If the Trinity teaches us anything, it is that the Divine One is not an I, but rather a very big we. It also reminds those of us who use the "correct" names that we are still a "stiff-necked people" who do not understand our Parent nearly as well as we think we do. Fortunately, our stupidity, not to mention "our wickedness and sins", has never stopped them from embracing us as their own. "Glory and praise for ever!"

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

The Trinity: such sublime truth. And such silly fools we are for trying to make sense out of it. Why do we insist on turning poetry into physics? Why do we let our brains rule our souls? That is the original, Original Sin. "I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now." Will we ever be ready?

Proverbs 8:22-31; Psalms 8:4-9; Romans 5:1-5; John 16:12-15

Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

Deuteronomy 4:32-40; Romans 8:14-17; Matthew 28:16-20

The Trinity teaches us that God is about relationship. The problem is that corporate religion actually believes it can dissect that relationship and describe its precise nature. God cannot be quantified. Three equals one is a simply beautiful paradox, not a horrifically complicated math problem.