SUNDAY HOMILY: SOLEMNITY OF THE MOST HOLY TRINITY (YEAR A)
HOMILY THEME:Â ROOTED IN THE TRINITY
 By: Fr. Johnbosco Obika
We celebrate the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The Trinity is a mystery. A mystery is something difficult or impossible to understand or explain. The doctrine of the Trinity is the most difficult Christian teaching to comprehend by both believers and non believers as well. A saying goes that he who tries to deny the doctrine of the Trinity is in danger of loosing his faith and he who tries to understand it is in danger of loosing his mental sanity. So to avoid falling into these dangers we shall concentrate today on the application of the doctrine of the Trinity.
Thomas Edison once put it this way: “We don’t know what water is. We don’t know what light is. We don’t know what electricity is. We don’t know what heat is. We have a lot of hypothesis about these things, but that is all. But we don’t let our ignorance of these things deprive us of their use.” Even though we may not fully comprehend these realities it doesn’t prevent us from seeing how they reflect in our humanity, in the society and in the entire creation. That the Trinity is a mystery doesn’t stop us from seeing how God has fashioned us to reflect him.
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Christians are baptised in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit: not in their names, for there is only one God, the almighty Father, his only Son and the Holy Spirit: the Most Holy Trinity (Catechism of the Catholic Church no. 233). This teaching is informed by the scripture. At creation God began every word of creation with the clause “Let us” which implies the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit (Gen. Chapter 1).
At the baptism of Jesus, the Blessed Trinity was present. As John baptised Jesus (the Son) a dove rested upon his head (the Spirit) and a voice spoke from heaven (the Father) (Matt. 3: 16-17).
When Jesus sent his disciples he asked them to go and make disciples of all nations baptising them in the name of the Trinity: Father, Son and the Holy Spirit (Matt. 28:19).
There is a distinction between theologia (Theology) which is the mystery of God’s inmost life in the Trinity and oikonomia (economy) which refers to all the works by which God reveals himself and communicates his life. We are not going to be theologizing today but to look into how we reflect God in many ways in his works. The God who revealed himself in three persons, in different stages in the economy of salvation and in three different ways. He revealed himself as the Father, the creator. He revealed himself as the Son who took flesh to redeem the world. He revealed himself as the Holy Spirit, the sanctifier.
What overwhelms us is the unity and love of God in the Trinity. We see our connectedness and need for each other in the Trinity. We live and have our being in God. We should also draw lessons from the undivided unity and immeasurable love of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Human nature bears the reflection of the Trinity. In his image and likeness he created man. We bear the image of God in our souls and bear his likeness in our tripartite composition. Man is made of soul, mind and body. The soul is the spiritual state, the mind is the intellectual faculty and the body is the physical element. For a man to be sane and balanced, these three compositions must agree and work in harmony. But there is often an aggressive dichotomy, a kind of dialectical tension between the soul, mind and body which leads to disoriented personality. Looking at the Trinity as a model we must come to terms with ourselves, blending our spiritual live with our intellectual quest and the bodily needs. If the individual is united within the community is stronger without.
The human family mirrors and bears the of the family of God—the Trinity. Going by the words of the Pope Emeritus, Benedict XVI, “The human family is, in a certain sense, the icon of the Trinity because of the love between its members and the fruitfulness of that love.” The family is made up of father, mother and children. By praying together and loving deeply it’s members, families that are dysfunctional and destabilized can trace their root again in God and the image of God will shine more vividly in such families. Breaking it down more, the human government reflects the nature of the three persons in one God. The government has three tiers but one government: the executive, the judiciary and the legislative. This arrangement is structured to reflect the image of the true God and must copy the life of God in order to function.
Experience so far has shown that the government is in a chaotic state and does not work when there is constant disagreement between the executive arm, the legislative arm and the judiciary. Things will get back to order if the handlers of the three arms should work together for common good. As we reflect upon this mystery of God today, we pray that his love will influence us and his unity will bind us together and stronger. Amen.
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