Trinity Sunday 2014
All of us know how important it is
to have a solid, foundational understanding of the doctrine of the Holy
Trinity, right?
I mean, who of us hasn’t found
ourselves harassed upon all sides by Gnostics, Arians, Valentinians and the
like, only to be saved through a clear and thorough articulation of Trinitarian
Doctrine… If only you had a nickel for every time that’s happened, am I right?
Well, in case you aren’t from the 4th
Century, and you only find your understanding of the Trinity challenged by
precocious seminarians and Jehovah’s Witnesses—then it’s likely that you don’t
have a ‘pet’ explanation of Trinitarian Doctrine, and it’s also likely that
you’ve gotten on with your faith just fine so far…
Now, so as not to make light of all
of this; I will say that in earlier ages in the Church, the articulation of the
Nature of God and why Three Persons in a Trinity of Being still made sense for
a monotheistic faith system was a bit more important—there really was a bit
more at stake.
After all, rival theological
statements—some of them more popular than others—posed an understanding of God
(Father, Son and Holy Spirit) sometimes in ways that disconnected our
historical roots to the same God of Israel.
Beyond this, and other matters,
these rival theologies were also a bid for power—but in the end, Trinitarian
theology prevailed, and the Nicene Faith affirmed, after hundreds of years of
trying to figure out what to make of Jesus and the Holy Spirit—both of Whom the
Church venerates and worships. But how to do that without creating two more
separate gods was the question.
So, for people like Gregory of
Nazianzus, his brother Basil the Great, Athanasius, and a host of others;
articulating a faith statement that made sense of this was more than a matter
of street cred—it was an attempt at explaining what Christianity meant for the
world in a time of immense upheaval and transition.
The
statement that they adopted then, in 325 at the Council of Nicaea, was what we
now know as the Nicene Creed (a clever name). And is the Creed that we recite
every Sunday (unless we don’t). Yet, even though in its original Greek it is a
loaded, complex and elegant statement of the faith, it’s about as clear as mud.
What this leaves us with today,
especially regarding the Doctrine of the Trinity, is a belief that (while it is
considered foundational) is all the same difficult to understand, hard to
articulate, and really only important to persnickety catechism teachers. At
least that’s how it seems.
But rather than throwing the whole
Doctrine of the Trinity out, or trying to over-simplify it with bad
analogies—perhaps we need to start by trying to understand what the Nature of
the Trinity speaks to our own time and culture—which, like the 4th
Century, is also very much in transition…
First off, let’s just get some
basic handle on what it is that is articulated in the Nicene Creed.
Effectively, the Creed affirms that God is One, and that the Son and the Holy
Spirit are of one and the same substance with the Father. God is before all
things, through the Son (Jesus), all things were created; and the Holy Spirit
proceeds from the Father.
Somehow, because the Three Persons
of the Trinity are so perfectly in communion, they are of One Substance, yet
because God is Love—and we understand that Love by nature has to have some kind
of economy, and is therefore shared—in this way, the Father, the Son and the
Holy Spirit share perfectly in one substance because they are perfectly in
love, and therefore God is Love.
Now, we’ve been through this
already a couple of times before, and I even had a few people dancing here in
the front to better demonstrate that the Co-existent Nature of the Trinity is
often described as a kind of dance—each Person of the Trinity is in perfect
inter-procession with and among one another. Again, like the Nicene Creed,
clear as mud. But, once again we find our language less than equal to the task
of speaking of such things.
Anyway, what all of this seems to
speak to, for us, and perhaps generations before us, is that God (the Holy
Trinity, and the perfect image of loving and whole community) calls us not only
to be in community (with God and others), but calls us to healthy and whole
community.
This, I think is particularly
important—healthy, whole community—because, of course whole and holy have the
same root, and as we know, God calls us to holiness, which in turn is
wholeness. And, I would imagine if a community of faith were about creating and
cultivating such a community—we would be less worried about programs and
advertising, because we would honestly have no trouble drawing people to be
part of such a community.
But what would this kind of community
look like? How do we even work toward living into such a vision?
Well, first, I think we need to
work at the integration of our faith and our lives. So, this means taking our
faith seriously. This doesn’t mean living into some rigorous, or complex holiness
code. But it does mean beginning with the very basics: Love God, love our
neighbors—and live and love as if it really mattered.
We need to believe that people are
worth something because God says so, and by God’s grace, we do our best to see
it. What this means is keeping in mind how we treat one another; how we talk
about one another; and how we value one another. Because as long as we continue
to give ourselves passes on these whenever it suits us, we’ll never really be
changed, and neither will our world.
Along with taking our faith
seriously, we also need to get past childish faith. Notice I didn’t say
“Childlike faith,” I said childish faith. Childish faith is the idea that
everything you learned about God and faith when you were six is still enough to
get you by as an adult. The fact is that I’m not really comfortable teaching
anyone, of any age easy answers to faith questions—but, I am interested in age
appropriate conversations about faith. However, the sad truth is that for many
of us, our faith has been formed by naïve, easy answers when we all know full
well that the world is asking tough questions. And easy answers are just
insufficient, and irresponsible. So, I think we do a disservice to ourselves,
and others when we don’t try to grow more mature in our faith.
Finally, we need to learn to not
judge—whether that be people, or even situations. We need to be able to step
back, take a breath, and check to see that we’re seeing the bigger picture.
Because, more often than not, communities of faith have the exact same patterns
as family systems. So, like families, there is a kind of homeostasis that is
kept—and this can be healthy or unhealthy, constructive or destructive—but,
unless the people in the family system, or even the community system try to
step back and see matters more clearly, often the system remains in negative
cycles. What’s more, because some of these systems are so used to being
unhealthy, and that feels more normal to them—the system will resist change,
even healthy change…
So as people of faith, it’s up to us to check
out our notions, or even our understanding of situations—otherwise we might
find that we’re perpetuating negativity, and most likely resisting possible healthy
change.
So, getting back to the Nature of
the Trinity; remember that I said that God, as Three Persons existing as One
God, in Perfect Community, invites each of us into Divine Union with God’s
Self—to be in community, even communion with God. However, as is the nature of
being in community, we don’t do it alone—God doesn’t call us to a one-to-one
relationship (personal, yes, but not isolated). What this means then is that
there will be other people who are called together with us, to be in communion
with God. But if we’re not willing to strive to be healthy and whole as a
community, we can never pretend to be holy, either. We likewise can’t hope to
be agents of healing, if we’re not, ourselves, trying our best to be healthy.
And we’re if not a holy community of faith, or workers for healing in the
world, then what is the purpose of the Church? Because there are plenty of
country clubs, and organizations who can make individuals feel like they
belong—but it’s the Church’s work to be an agent for positive change in the
world. But that positive change has to begin with each one of us in this
community, so that we can carry that same work out into the world in the name
of Christ. “And we will with God’s help.”
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