Meditation on the Mystery of the Trinity

The first thing we need to understand about the Holy Trinity is that we can’t really understand it.

      St. Patrick used the shamrock to explain It — the three leaves, distinct each from the other but equal; all bound together on one stem. To break away any one would be to destroy the oneness.

      Out of infinity God manifested Himself in Creation — the Garden of Eden and Adam and Eve who fell from grace. Periodically, through time and history, by way of angels and people, patriarchs, kings and prophets, God from Heaven guided man towards salvation.

     Then He manifested Himself as the God-man, Jesus, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity; but who is this Holy Spirit, the Third Person? He was manifested as a dove, as tongues of fire, as a mighty wind. We can’t see the wind, but we know it is there. The Holy Spirit was spoken of in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, St. Luke told us how He overshadowed Mary as Jesus was conceived in her womb. We could complicate things by saying; wouldn’t that make Him the Father of Jesus? No! We know God the Father is the father of Jesus, because Jesus said so. He referred to and prayed many times to His heavenly Father. And, He referred to the Holy Spirit when He said I will send the Holy Spirit on my Apostles on the day of Pentecost.

     How do we know the Father?

     The answer is, through Jesus when he said, “No one knows the Son, but the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son AND ANYONE TO WHOM THE SON WISHES TO REVEAL HIM.”[1]                                      

     The Son revealed the Father to us. But how do we know the Son? The answer is through the Holy Spirit who came into us at Baptism and remains in us as long as we do not turn away from Him.

     So, through the Holy Spirit we know Jesus; through Jesus we know the Father; and there we have the three persons of the Blessed Trinity; each with a distinct role to carry out, yet each inseparably bound together in the one Eternal Godhead.

     Since, then, we would not know Jesus if we did not have the Holy Spirit in us, and we accept this as truth; but, the question remains, “How can we neglect the Holy Spirit if we talk mainly to Jesus and to the Father and not through or directly to the Holy Spirit?

     We know it is the Holy Spirit, whom we respect, reverence, and honor — the Spirit who is within us and is giving us His divine grace that enables us to make us WANT to love, adore, and communicate with God, as One, or singly as one of the Three Divine persons.

     Personally, since I firmly believe that in addition to the Holy Spirit dwelling in me, Jesus is ever walking beside me and the Almighty Father is ever somewhere in Heaven watching over me benignly, compassionately, mercifully and forgivingly; blessing, guarding and guiding me. I simply cannot separate any one of the three Divine Persons from any other one or from the ALLNESS and togetherness of them in the mystery of the Godhead. I cannot relate to one without relating to all. Maybe I’m wrong in thinking this way, but it is the way I think, even while I believe there are three distinct Persons, each with a distinct role. I KNOW that the Holy Spirit is a powerful one of these persons, active in His mysterious way throughout the world, bestowing His extraordinary gifts upon the people of God.

     What is this Godhead? SOMEONE … SOMETHING … SOMEWHERE … EVERYWHERE — behind all … over all ... in all … out of which all that is, is.

      Blessed be the “Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, now and forever!!!

      Here are some revealing Scripture passages:    

  “Philip said to Him, Master, show us the Father, that will be enough for us. Jesus said to him ‘Have I been with you for so long a time and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, Show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you I do not speak on my own. The Father who dwells in me is doing his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.’”[2]   

      And finely in John’s Gospel: we hear the words Jesus is praying to His heavenly Father: “I pray that they may be one, Father! May they be in us, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they be one, so that the world will believe that you sent me. I gave them the same glory you gave me, so that they may be one, just as you and I are one: I in them and you in me, so that they may be completely one, in order that the world may know that you sent me and that you love them as you love me.”[3]