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Holy Trinity Sunday Jn16/12-15 |
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| Background: Recently
there has been complaint that the doctrine of the Holy Trinity is no longer preached.
Perhaps the reason for this is that the doctrine, as presented in the class rooms and
taught in the seminaries, seems to opaque to be the subject of preaching. With all due
respect to the three Cappadocians (Gregory,
Basil, and Gregory) their rhetoric is not our
rhetoric. Most preaching on the Trinity goes over the head of the laity – and the
clergy. Perhaps the best path for a homilist to follow is to say that the Son is
God’s knowledge and the Spirit is God’s love and that the knowledge and love of
God are so enormous and so powerful that are persons. Hence we are in the hands of
knowledge beyond our imagination and of love which dwarfs any love we can know. That God
knows us so perfectly might be scary. But that God loves us so passionately ought to be
powerfully reassuring. |
read the padre |
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Story: Once upon a
time a father and two children were out in a boat on a very small lake. The kids were
little and the father made them wear life preservers, despite their protests. Suddenly a
terrible storm came along. Rain and wind, lightening and thunder, waves and fog. The
engine in the boat died. The kids were scared but they knew their father would take care
of them. Then a fierce burst of wind and a big wave hit the boat and turned it over. The
boat was on top of the kids and they had to struggle out from under it. When they came up
outside the boat, sputtering and gasping, they could not see their father anywhere.
He’ll come for us, the boy said to the girl. I know he will, she replied. Their life
jackets kept them afloat but they clung to the boat so their father would know where to
look for them. But he didn’t come. Maybe he drowned said the little boy. Then
we’d be alone, the little girl said. They were both terrified. The screamed and they
cried. No one answered them. Eventually the storm blew over. The first thing they saw was
their father in another boat only a few yards away from them. Then they realized that they
were at the end of their pier and that they could if they tried touch the bottom of the
lake. Their father got out of the boat and
waded ashore with them.
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