We come together today to celebrate our triune God, one God and yet three persons. God the Father created the world and everything and everyone in it. God the Son was born into this world, a part of humankind, and chose to sacrifice his life to save us all. God the Holy Spirit was sent into the world by the Father and the Son to be with us always. In our limited imaginations we cannot hope to truly comprehend this sacred mystery, but we join together in praise and thanks to God— Father, Son, and Spirit.
THE FULLNESS OF LOVE
Much debate in the 20th century centered on the thought of three outstanding figures, Charles Darwin, Sigmund Freud, and Karl Marx, described irreverently as “the unholy trinity.” They pushed us into the modem world, often in spite of our protests. Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution was greeted, particularly by the established churches, with howls of derision, and had to battle hard for recognition. Sigmund Freud opened up the universe of the unconscious and profoundly affected conventional attitudes. The socialist theories of Karl Marx came to dominate one half of the planet and considerably influenced the other. Of the three, only Darwin and his theory of evolution remain intact. Recent events in the Eastern Bloc have largely discredited Marx. The theories of Freud are more and more contested in recent times. Time has taken its toll of “the unholy trinity.”
The Holy Trinity, whose feast we celebrate today, is beyond the reach of time and the grasp of human reasoning. It is a mystery of our faith. We can only fumble in the dark in search of glimmers of light. “Two is company, three is a crowd” is a popular expression. The gospel would have it otherwise. There, the figure three symbolizes completeness and perfect symmetry, and re-appears at all the key moments of the Christ story. His life itself constantly reflected the Trinity. Three figures make up the nativity scene in Bethlehem — the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Their first visitors were the three wise men. Later, in the desert preparing to begin his public life, Jesus was tempted three times by the devil. A good story should have a beginning, a middle and an end. Christ was a storyteller par excellence and three figures prominently in his parables. The Prodigal Son is about a father and his two sons; the Good Samaritan tells of the behavior of three passers-by, MORE
Gospel: John 3:16-18
“God sent his Son to save the world through him.“
Jesus said to Nicodemus, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life.
For God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved.
No one who believes in him will be condemned; but whoever refuses to believe is condemned already, because he has refused to believe in the name of God’s only Son.
CATHOLICISM