Trinity SUNDAY 2006 June 11, 2006

Acts 2: 1-11 Psalm 104 Gal 5:16-25 John 15: 26-27; 16 : 1-15

1. The feast of the Trinity seems to come in with three strikes against it. First it seems to be a feast not of a person - Mary, or St. Anthony, that we can relate to; or an event like Easter or Christmas that we can visualize or imagine. It seems to be a Feast of Ideas, of Doctrine, of Dogma. It sort of leaves one in the realm of words and this can be boring. The second is that we have had one feast after another, Easter, Ascension, Pentecost. It is like another bar of Chocolate after Valentine’s or another candy after Halloween. We can almost hear people say: “could we not have something just plain, simple and ordinary.” Thirdly, we do not seem to be able to get a fresh look at Scripture. For the Ascension even though we have heard the story many times, we can imagine Jesus telling us for the first time in 2006 - to go out and preach the Good news. Times and circumstances have changed so much and preaching the Good News is a fresh challenge. But when we come to Church on the Feast of the Holy Trinity, our minds are already made up “Three persons in One God” - and the Scriptures are interesting but do not provoke me to do anything new in light of the Feast.

2. However, the Feast of the Holy Trinity is not a mental workout as to “Who God is?” but rather an invitation or call into a relationship. In the first place it is the very foundation of the entire Liturgical Celebration of the Eucharist that we are celebrating.

We begin our Eucharist in the Name of the Trinity: The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. It is not merely a creedal formula, but it is a celebration in the presence and with a God of love who creates and renews us all the time.

We end with and journey out in the company of this same One God - a Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

At the Climax of the Liturgy of the Word, when we all stand at the Gospel, we sign ourselves with a triple sign once more under the protection of God as we bless ourselves on our head, lips and heart - reminding us to love God with all our minds, our beings and all our heart.

When we come to the heart of the Eucharist prayer, we offer the entire Sacrifice to the Father through, in and with the Son and in union with the Spirit.

As one spiritual writer puts it, the entire Eucharist is a Dance step with God and when we are tired, God carries us in God’s arms.

3. The Eucharist is the Heart and Centre of our Community which we call the Catholic church. However, our very entrance into this community, and our continued presence within this community is in Relationship to the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. We were baptised in the name of this Spirit. And so as Paul tells us in the Letter to the Romans ch.14 :8 For whether we LIVE, we LIVE unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we LIVE therefore, or die, we are the Lord's.

4. This relationship must give us a sense of Awe and Wonder - which are one of the gifts given to us by the Holy Spirit at our Confirmation. It is the same Awe and Wonder that Moses is talking about in the first reading. He talks in rhetorical questions, “has anyone since the beginning of creation, seen or heard of the wonders God has done for us?” One can roam to the ends of the Earth and never find a God so wonderful either in the heavens above or the earth below.

a. In 1996, Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton act in a movie called the Twister. At first sight it is not attractive. Who wants to see something destructive. But as the movie develops, one cannot help being caught up in the Awesomeness of the Tornado. Its power, its strength, its beauty just mesmerizes people. Even the Weather seems to stop. The Sun gets dark, it is neither hot nor cold - everyone and everything wants to watch and admire this Force of Nature. But we must not stop there, we must move to the Creator of nature itself. We are called into a Relationship with the Trinity. The difference is that the Tornado is destructive, but the Relationship with the Father, Son and Holy spirit is nourishing and nurturing. How much more the power, the strength and Beauty of the Blessed Trinity. And so the words of Moses are very real for us in 2006, “Has anything so great as this ever happened or has its like ever been heard of before?”

5. The month of June is the month of weddings. Young couples dreaming dreams - a home, a family, “happily ever after.” and then the baby comes and the parents live in the expectation of when the child says the first word: Dada, Mama ! It has been said a billion times, but the thrill and joy of the first time parents at those words. Paul invites us also to feel the thrill as of children uttering for the first time the words Abba -Father. We have said it hundreds of times, a thousand times - on this feast of the Trinity, perhaps we can savour it as if we are understanding it and saying it for the first time, from the perspective of the Wonder and Awe that is described in our First reading. However, we can call God our Father only because of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and only in the name of Jesus - the Word of God that we have received into our hearts. In a word: we can only do this because we are invited into a Relationship with the Persons of the Holy Trinity.

6. A mother was telling her little girl what her own childhood was like: "We used to skate outside on a pond. I had a swing made from a tire; it hung from a tree in our front yard. We rode our pony. We picked wild raspberries in the woods." The little girl was wide‑-eyed, taking this in. At last she said, "I sure wish I'd gotten to know you sooner!"

Each Feast of the Holy Trinity, we hear once again the Father inviting us

to skate on the pond of love

to swing from a rainbow

to ride on a cloud and

to pick and dream impossible dreams... It is high time for us to get to know the Father and Son and Holy Spirit - and it cannot be too soon.