Dear Good People of Trinity Church,
This Sunday is uniquely ours—Trinity Sunday. It is the day we celebrate the magnificent mystery and the sacred simplicity of one of the greatest truths of our Faith: God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer.
Since the fourth century, the Church has wrestled with the doctrine of the Trinity. It has been explored and examined, discussed and debated through the centuries. Theologians have written volumes, councils have convened, and believers have pondered. And yet, despite all our efforts to explain it, I wonder if we sometimes try too hard to understand something that is not meant to be fully understood but rather experienced.
We can dissect the Trinity with words and doctrines, but true understanding dawns only when we encounter the living God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—in the depth of our lives. Once we experience the triune God, no theological argument can make that experience more real, and no debate can take it away.
The Trinity, I believe, is not merely something to be believed about—it is a divine reality we know, deep in our hearts, when we have encountered Love itself.
Fr. Richard Rohr once wrote:
“Many of us say we believe in the Trinity—but we really don’t, because we don’t know what to do with it. We can’t even imagine it; all of our metaphors are simply words trying to grab at the reality, at the experience of God that ultimately can’t be verbalized. It can only be experienced.”
Julian of Norwich, the 14th-century mystic, knew this well. In a time of illness and deep contemplation, she received a series of divine visions—what she called “showings.” In one of these, she encountered the Trinity so fully that her heart overflowed with joy. In the words of translator Mirabai Starr, Julian writes:
“In the midst of this showing the blessed Trinity also revealed itself to me and filled my heart to overflowing with joy. I realized that this is what it will be like in the world to come, for all beings, and for all time. For the Trinity is God, and God is the Trinity. The Trinity is our creator and our sustainer, our Beloved forever and ever, our endless joy and bliss.”
This Sunday, may we move beyond analysis and into awe. May we allow ourselves not just to contemplate the Trinity, but to encounter the Trinity—and in doing so, be transformed.
In the name of the Triune God,
Paul+
