Trinity Sunday, 2012
Fr. Anthony Brankin
(Full text of sermon) Today of course is Trinity Sunday—the day we celebrate our belief that there are three Persons in One God: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
When we say we believe in Three Persons—that is not to say that we think that they are three gods. Nor are we saying that there is one god with three attitudes.
No there is only one God—one Being who is God—but in this God are three distinct Persons—each of whom is a separate person—but is only the one God. This is a mystery. It is impossible for us to understand it as it is. Though that is not to say that we cannot come nearer to it and see how, it is, at least, reasonable.
For example, when Saint Patrick tried to explain the Blessed Trinity to the Irish—and they were having a terrible time accepting One God and three Persons—he showed them the three leaf clover, the shamrock; and he explained that just as in the little clover there are three distinct leaves—but there is only one shamrock—so too are there Three Distinct persons in only One God.
We have been teaching it
Now you will find that there is no place in the Bible where it says that there are three Persons in one God. Not one. And any Christian—all the Protestants—the Evangelicals and the Pentecostals who say that there are three Persons in one God—all those who believe in the Trinity believe it because we Catholics have been teaching this for almost two thousand years ago.
Only people who believe in the Trinity—only people who believe that there are Three Persons in one God— can be called Christians. You must believe that the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are equally God or you cannot be called Christians. That is why if you do not believe that Jesus is God—if you believe that Jesus was only a creature of God—then you have no way of understanding how we are saved. You have no way of understanding how we are to live our lives in this world or how we are going to get to heaven.
The Mormons deny that Jesus is God. The Jehova Witnesses deny it, and the liberals and modernists deny it.
Deny the Trinity
Therefore they deny the Trintity. All we can say is: if Jesus is not God, then we are going to die in our sins. And there is no hope for us or for our world. If Jesus is not God—then we have no idea from where we came or to where we are going. If we do not know who the True God is we have no idea who we are either.
Do you see how it all holds together? The doctrine of the Blessed Trinity is not just some abstract, abstruse theological principal that has nothing to do with our lives. The Blessed Trinity is the doctrine that tells us who the True God is and how Jesus is going to save us and how we co-operate with that by our lives.
And yes—it is only Jesus who is going to save the world. It is only Jesus who is our true God and true King. Only Jesus. Of course that is why the world is in such a mess because it does not believe in the True God—the Triune God. It does not accept Jesus as King.
We see it every day (if we are watching) the life of a world lived without God—without Jesus and without the church. It is a world of unremitting sadness, violence and tears—a world of wars and bombings—vampires and cannibals—a world of dead babies and divorce—and no one is happy and no one is content. Without Jesus, the Son of God, without the Trinity, we are a world with no history and no future—no fathers, no mothers—no wives, no children. This is where we are—and where we are going.
False promises
All brought to us courtesy of the people who told us to cast off our God—our Trinity and Jesus and embrace the new gods of pleasure and wealth. They told us that would bring us happiness and fulfillment and joy—but it only brought us a nightmare.
I think of our young people as they are about to take their place in this kind of world—and they will have a hard time of it. Because if they resist this world and all its false temptation—if they continue to hold to the true God for the sake of their own lives and families, they will be confronted at every turn with the possibility of actually having to suffer for it. Oh it may not be quite as dramatic as priests facing the guillotine in France or nuns being machine gunned in Spain or little boys being shot in Mexico.
I might be more subtle. Our Catholic young people will be faced with choices about doing things and accepting things and approving things that they find abhorrent and they will have to make a choice—my faith or my life? Maybe they will be nurses or doctors and their superior will tell them one fine day that they have been assigned to help kill babies in the womb. And they (only a few years from Catholic grammar school) will say, “Why I cannot do that! That is murder. I don’t do those things. I only heal!” And the administrator will hiss into the young nurse’s or doctor’s ear, “My dear, if you do not do this—you will have no job. And what will your family do then?”
What if one of our young people in the next thirteen years is drafted in to the military—and their officer tells them that their target is a village—sort of shock and awe for civilians. And our young Catholic hesitates and asks—“Do we really bomb women and children?” And the superior barks “Soldier, do you want a courtmartial?” What if one our young people becomes a police officer or a lawyer and they are asked to serve arrest papers on some parish priest because he will not perform a gay marriage?
I do not think that any of this is an exaggeration. This is our near future—and every one of us—old as well as young—is going to be forced to make choices about life and love and duty and responsibility that will not be pleasant. Choices for God or against God—choices to be loyal to the Church or be loyal to the regime.
Stay true to Jesus
Choices to go along with them and avoid problems—or stay true to Jesus and risk everything.
So when you say you believe in the Trinity—you do not get just a nice, mysterious, theological conclusion.
You get trouble for yourself. You will be ridiculed and mocked and threatened. You might lose your standing in the world—you will certainly lose your comfort zone.
But that’s what you get when you believe in the Trinity. You get Jesus who is Divine—and you get a Church that speaks for Jesus and you get a way of life and code of conduct and a moral imperative that stands as a constant reproach to those who do not believe as you do.
Yes, believing in the Blessed Trinity might make this life difficult for you—if you take it seriously. And you may have to shed either your blood or your pride for that belief—but at least it will guarantee you integrity in this life and happiness in the next.