Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. (1 John 4:8)
If God is love, then God cannot exist in solitude because love implies a relationship, it implies going out of oneself. This being the case, the divinity must consist of at least two people who love each other. This type of love, however, is not perfect; a marriage that does not constitute a family is a selfishness of two. The child, be it in a figurative or physical sense, must play a role in the marriage.
Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone. Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music. (…) And stand together, yet not too near together; for the pillars of the temple stand apart, and the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other’s shadow. Khalil Gibran, The Prophet
Marital love should not be the “I give you, you give me, give and take” kind of love, but instead, one where both individuals are looking in the same direction. As Khalil Gibran points out, they are like pillars that must be equidistant from each other to support the temple at the center; they are together, but not fused together because then they would not be able to hold up the temple. If they live one depending on the other, they would also not be able to sustain the temple in this way. Instead, each must have his or her own function, with their common objective being the support of the temple.
The back and forth movement regarding the love dynamism of the husband for the wife and the wife for the husband exists neither in nature nor in the universe. It is an artificial movement that, if at all possible, requires the two wheels be joined by a vector: the wheels turn, but the vector, which connects them, moves back and forth.
The natural movement is always circular. Therefore marital love reaches its perfection when it overcomes the binomial and becomes a triangle. A family of father, mother, and child allows for this circular movement between these three distinct persons, but within a single love. The human family is a metaphor of the divine family and vice versa. God is a communion of three distinct persons united in love, for love, because God is love.
We conclude then, If God is love and love implies a relationship whose objective is not staring at each other, but both looking in the same direction, then love as well as God cannot be neither “mono” nor “stereo”, but tridimensional.
Polytheism refers to the existence of a plurality of gods; absolute monotheism refers to the existence of a single God (Judaism and Islam); Christianity or trinitarian monotheism refers to the existence of one divinity in three distinct persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The Implicit or Latent Trinity in the Bible
The definition and the formulation of the dogma of the Holy Trinity is the result of extensive reflection, meditation, and prayers of countless Christians throughout the centuries. It was defined in two stages: at the First Council of Nicaea (325 AD) and at the First Council of Constantinople (381 AD). The Church, however, already saw in the Bible the primordial source of revelation, a latent or implicit Trinity, in which the theological reflection is rooted.
In the Old Testament
The Bible opens in the second verse of the first chapter by saying that in the beginning, the Spirit of God hovered over the waters (Genesis 1:2). Mysteriously, unlike the creation of the rest of the creatures, in the creation of Man, God refers to himself in the plural when he says, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness” (Genesis 1:26).
In effect, Man is as one and triune as God himself. The same thing happens in the episode of the Tower of Babel, “Come, let us go down, and confuse their language there, so that they will not understand one another’s speech” (Genesis 11:7). God visits Abraham in person, presenting himself in the form of three venerable lords (Genesis 18).
In the New Testament
God is proclaimed as the Father in countless passages. Jesus reveals that God is the Father and reveals himself as his Son in saying, “No one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.” (Matthew 11:27)
Saint John states in the prologue of his gospel that “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (…) And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:1-14)
Saint Paul also presents God as the “Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation…” (2 Corinthians 1:3)
Before his Passion, Jesus announces to his disciples that the Holy Spirit in action since the creation (Genesis 1:1-2) will be sent to them as the defender of truth and will come to the disciples to teach and lead them to the full truth ( John 16:13). Therefore, the Holy Spirit is revealed as another divine person in relationship with the Father and the Son.
Saint Matthew ends his gospel by showing Jesus sending his disciples to all the world, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always to the end of the age.” (Matthew 28:18-20)
The Trinity in the Church Tradition
The Church expresses her trinitarian faith by professing a belief in the oneness of God in whom there are three Persons: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The three divine Persons are only one God because each of them equally possesses the fullness of the one and indivisible divine nature.
They are really distinct from each other by reason of the relations which place them in correspondence to each other. The Father generates the Son; the Son is generated by the Father; the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.
Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, #48
We do not profess three gods, but one God in three persons. One God with one divine nature, one substance, one essence in three distinct persons. The nature is what one is, the person is who one is.
It is true that the whole which is the Trinity is made up of three parts with each part being a divine person; the whole is not equal to the parts nor are the parts equal to the whole. However in the Trinity, the whole contains the part, and the part contains the whole. The same thing occurs in the human body: each cell is only an infinitesimal part of the whole body, made up of trillions of cells; however, even though it is only an infinitesimal part, each cell contains within it the whole body through the DNA that is inside of it.
It is the DNA, our genetic code that unites the trillions of cells, some of bone, others of blood, liver, etc. in one body. The same is true of the divine Trinity: each divine person is a single, whole, autonomous being on one hand, and on the other each divine person is part of a greater design – the Trinity – because all parts have the same genetic code, that is, the same nature, the same essence.
This is why the three divine persons do not each have only a part of the divinity, that is, it is not one divinity divided by three, since each divine person is the entire God. They are also not three distinct gods, for the only distinction that exists is within the Trinity. They are distinct in their relationship to one another and in their relationship to or commitment to humanity, that is, in their role in the economy of salvation. They constitute a multiplication not a sum: 3 x 1 = 3 or 1 x 3 = 3.
The three persons share the same essence; therefore, they do not represent a return to polytheism, or in this case, tritheism. The three persons are eternal, without a beginning or an end, they have always existed. The Son was begotten, but not created, the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son; therefore he is neither begotten nor created. If we ask what is God then the answer is: God is one and triune, this is his nature and essence, his Being. If we ask who is God then the answer is: God is the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
The Father the Creator – God over us
I believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible… The Nicene Creed
Then the Lord said, "I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey…" (Exodus 3:7-8)
God over us is the representation of the transcendence of God. God is the Creator, the Lord of all things and all people, of the life which is the most precious gift that he gave to mankind. He did not create us only to abandon us to our fate. He went down to Egypt through Moses; but to the more generalized and global Egypt to which his creation has been transformed, he himself descended in the person of his Son.
But this is a long story that occupies the entire Old Testament of the Bible. It is a story of God’s love for his people and their infidelity to him, their creator, and the countless times he interceded as the saviour in the vicissitudes of history.
God chooses for himself a people for the purpose of saving all peoples. There are those who have understood this ever since – the universalistic current of Judaism represented by the prophet Isaiah – and there are those who never understood it – the xenophobic nationalist current represented by the prophet Elijah who thought that God favored his people above all peoples.
God never chooses anyone for privilege but rather, for service. The people of Israel and its culture would be the cradle from which, many years later, the saviour of all humanity would be born. As Isaiah had dreamt, Jerusalem would end up being the stage for a banquet for all nations. (Isaiah 25:5-12)
A city for all. WE WILL RAISE.
A city of a large common roof.
A round table like the world. WE WILL RAISE.
A bread of multitude. An open heart language.
A hope: COME, LORD JESUS.
WE WILL NOT REJECT THE CORNERSTONE.
ON THE FOUNDATION OF YOUR BODY
WE WILL RAISE THE CITY. (bis)
The peoples of the world rise.
They go up to the city.
Those who spoke in different languages.
They proclaim unity.
Nobody asks. Who are you and from where?
All are called CHILDREN OF PEACE. (Spanish Hymn: A City for All)
The Son the Saviour – God with us
I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages. God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten not made, con-substantial with the Father… The Nicene Creed
After leaving his family in the church for the Midnight Mass, a Canadian farmer returned home, escaping from the approaching snowstorm. Nothing came out of his wife’s insistence that he attends the Mass with them. For him, the incarnation of God made no sense. While he slept by the warmth of the fireplace, he was startled awake by the crashing sound of geese against the front door and the windows. Thrown off by the storm from their migratory trajectory to the south, they were completely disoriented.
Feeling sorry for them, he went out into the cold and opened the gates of the large barn and began to run, shoo, whistle, and shout trying to get them to go into the barn where they would be warm and safe until the storm passes. The geese, however, fluttered in circles, not understanding the meaning of the open barn and the dramatic gestures of the desperate farmer (who had not convinced them with the trail of breadcrumbs he made leading into the barn). Defeated in his attempts to save the poor creatures, he sighed, "Ah, if only I were a goose! If only I spoke their language!" On hearing his own lament, he recalled the question he had posed his wife earlier, "Why did God want to become a man?" And without realizing, he blurted out the answer, "To save them!" … And it was Christmas. (Christmas Geese, author unknown)
All we like sheep have gone astray; we have all turned to our own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. (Isaiah 53:6) Jesus, the Son of God, came to show us the way, the truth, and the life, walking side by side with us, as he did with the disciples of Emmaus.
As the Letters to the Hebrews (1:1-10) reveals to us, God has spoken throughout history in many ways through the prophets. However, he noticed that his messages were always changed, never arriving intact to their recipients. Furthermore, as Jesus conveys in the parable of the wicked vinedressers in Matthew chapter 21, these prophets were all killed.
But he, who was in the form of God did not regard equality with God as something to be exploited, (…) emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness (Philippians 2:6-7). He revealed himself as equal to us in all things except sin, to say in his flesh and by his flesh that sin is not part of the human nature, just as it was not when God created man and placed him in the Garden of Eden.
Unlike the older brother in the parable of the prodigal son, Jesus, our elder brother, came to restore us to our former dignity, making God, his Father and our Father, reinstate us as his children, putting on our fingers the signet ring of our heritage, and putting on tunics on our backs and sandals on our feet (Luke 15:11-32).
The Holy Spirit – God in us: defender/comforter/inspirer
I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets… The Nicene Creed
No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit. (1Corinthians 12:3) This same Spirit is the one who causes us to cry out in our hearts, ‘Abba! Father!’ (Galatians 4:6). This shows the intrinsic union of the three persons of the Trinity who do not act alone, by themselves, like snipers, but indissolubly always united.
However, in the economy of salvation, which is related to its historical relationship with mankind, the Holy Spirit is God within us, being the representation of the immanence of God, of the God who is the intimior intimo meo as Saint Augustine said. In his transcendence, God is above all things and all people, not to be mistaken with any creature; in his immanence, God is the heart of each and every thing and each and every person.
The Holy Spirit is the one who guides and governs the Church, which was formed at the Last Supper and confirmed by the apparitions of the Risen Lord but she lacked the impetus and the courage to go out of herself. Just as in the beginning when God formed Man out of clay and breathed life into his nostrils, so now the Church established by Christ is being breathed into her nostrils by the impetus of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. From that moment on, the Church began to live and spread, carrying the message of Jesus Christ to all peoples.
The same Holy Spirit, as God within us, guides, comforts and inspires each and every Christian. He inspires what the word of God waters by helping to interpret and discover the truth and applying it here and now of our time in history. The Holy Spirit also inspires what the faithful hears and finds in preaching what he needs in the present moment of his life, and then afterward helps him to put it into practice.
The interpellation between Man and the Trinity in the second half of the Lord’s Prayer
The prayer that Jesus taught us is like a condensed gospel: in it, we find summed up what is most important of his doctrine, what truly matters and what we should put into practice. The second part of this prayer, the only one that Jesus taught his disciples, deals with our needs: it describes the three primary human needs and the three dimensions of time in which human life occurs.
- Give us this day our daily bread – First we ask for the bread that is needed to sustain our life on Earth, bringing therefore to the presence of God our needs at the present time.
- Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us – Secondly, we ask for God’s forgiveness for the wrong that we have done, bringing therefore to God’s presence our past ills to be redeemed.
- And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil – Thirdly, we ask for the strength and help when faced with temptation, so we trust in the divine providence and put our future in God’s hands.
- When we ask for the bread to sustain our earthly life, we are directing our prayer to God the Father, the Creator and Sustainer of life.
- When we ask for forgiveness, our attention turns directly to God the Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior, and Redeemer.
- When we ask for help to overcome future temptations, this request leads us immediately to think of God the Holy Spirit, the Comforter, the Guide, the Guardian who gives us strength and encouragement.
Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC
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