The Most Holy Trinity – Year A
John 3:16-18
- First reading: Exodus 34:4b-6, 8-9
“If I find favor with you, O Lord,do come along in our company. This is indeed a stiff-necked people; yet pardon our wickedness and sins, and receive us as your own.” - Second reading: 2 Corinthians 13:11-13
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you. - Gospel: John 3:16-18
God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.
GOSPEL REFLECTION
There are only three but very dense verses. They constitute the Gospel passage today. They would be enough to correct the distorted image of God still present in the minds of many Christians—that of the stern and inflexible judge—and to open our hearts to trust in his love.
“God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son that whoever believes in him may not be lost”(v. 16). It can be considered the summit reached by the biblical revelation on the meaning of creation, life and human destiny.
Contemplating and amazed at the revelation of God’s plan, John discovers that God’s gratuitous love is at the origin of all. Unlike what he says in his first letter—where he sees this love spilling itself over into the Christian community (1 Jn 4:7-12)—here the evangelist attends to the unfolding of endless horizons: the love of God expands, irrepressible, unstoppable and fills the entire “world.” We are at the antipode of the famous statement: “The world in which we live can be understood as a result of the disorder and chance; but if it is the outcome of a deliberate intent, this must have been the intent of a devil.”
Although it may seem strange, the image of God who loves people has struggled to establish itself in Israel. It had to wait for the prophet Hosea (8th cent. B.C.) to find it for the first time. This reluctance was due to the fact that, in pagan religions, the rapport of love with the divinity had ambiguous connotations of a sexual nature.
John, who has seen with his own eyes and touched with his hands the word of life (1 Jn 1:1), arrives to say, “God is love” (1 Jn 4:8); love that manifested itself in giving his only begotten Son as his gift to the world. He has not only given him in the Incarnation; he delivered him into human hands to die on the cross. There he has shown his true face, without any veil.
Paul shows that he understood this miracle of love when, writing to the Romans, says: “But see how God manifested his love for us, while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom 5:8).
In the face of this gift, what is required of a person? One thing only: that one trusts, abandons oneself in God’s arms—as does the bride with the groom—who hands herself to him in immense love and in the certainty of meeting life.
When we think of God who became one of us in Jesus of Nazareth, sometimes we make the mistake of considering this fact as an episode, a sad parenthesis of his existence. He came among us, remained a little more than thirty years, suffered and died on the cross, then returned to heaven, far away, happy to have retaken the former state.
That is not so. Our God took on our human nature and remains forever one of us. He has not pulled himself out of our world. He is and remains always the Emmanuel, the God-with-us (Mt 28:20).
One of the most balanced articles of the Jewish faith was the God who judges everyone’s deeds. The same Messiah was awaited not as one who helps to overcome sin, but as the executor of divine judgment. This belief also transpires from many texts of the New Testament: John the Baptist announces an impending judgment from which no one could escape (Mt 3:7-10); Paul preaches the “a great punishment on the day of judgment when God will appear as a just judge. He will give each one his due, according to his actions” (Rom 2:5-6); Jesus himself uses at times, the image of the court: “I have never known you, away from me, you evil people” (Mt 7:23).
In the Gospel of John, neither the Father nor Jesus appear as judges who condemn, but only as saviors of persons: “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world; instead, through him, the world is to be saved” (v. 17). “For I have come, not to condemn the world, but to save the world” (Jn 12:47).
They seem to be contradictory texts; in reality, while using various languages and images, they affirm the same truth: God’s judgment is always and only salvation. It’s not a judgment pronounced at the end of life. It is the valuable assessment that the Lord puts today in front of every person so that his choices are guided by true wisdom, not that of this world which leads to death, but that of Christ.
The third and final verse of today’s passage is read in this perspective. In it, the responsibility of each person in front of God’s love is highlighted. “Whoever believes in him will not be condemned. He who does not believe is already condemned” (v. 18).
The judgment is not pronounced by God at the end of time but now. It is the person who, trusting in Christ and in his word, chooses life. Refusing God’s plan of love, a person decrees his own condemnation.
Today we are called to welcome the joy that God offers, but we can also commit the folly of delaying or even refusing his embrace. He expects an immediate “yes” from persons because every moment spent in sin, in the rejection of his love, is a wasted opportunity.
What is the criterion, the reference point specified by God to have a wise and right judgment on the choices to make in life?
We find the answer in a group of texts that, in John’s Gospel, present Jesus the judge. “I came into the world to carry out a judgment” (Jn 9:39); “The Father has entrusted all judgment to the Son” (Jn 5:22). It is on his person, on his proposal of life, and values he preached that the Father will assess the existence of every person and he will decide the success or failure.
It does not state that in the end, he will forever refuse who did wrong, who followed other criteria, other judgments. God does not cast out anyone; “he wants all to be saved” (1 Tim 2:4). The absurdity of one of his condemnation is presented by Paul with a series of rhetorical questions: “If God is with us who shall be against us? Who shall accuse those chosen by God? He takes away the guilt. Who will dare to condemn them? Christ who died, and better still, rose and is seated at the right hand of God, interceding for us?” (Rom 8:31-34). The conclusion is obvious: “No creature will ever separate us from the love of God which we have in Jesus Christ, our Lord” (Rom 8:39).
However, at the end of life, when God “will test the work of everyone” (1 Cor 3:13), the conformity or discrepancy of each person’s action with the person of Christ will appear clear. God then surely welcomes all in his arms, though some will be forced to admit to having badly managed, and hopelessly wasted the unique opportunity that was offered to them. The work of this person—warns Paul— “will become ashes; although he will be saved, but it will be as if passing through fire” (1 Cor 3:15).
READ: The Gospel proclaims the inexhaustible depths of God’s love that gives away the Son to redeem humanity.
REFLECT: Being a communion of love, God gives us the fullness of Himself and His Love. So, like the Trinity, we are all called to be in communion in Love as well.
PRAY: Communion and solidarity are what we need in this globalized but greatly divided world. We pray for the unity of all the children of God. We also pray for the daily gift of grace, love, and fellowship of the Trinitarian God in our life.
ACT: How can we be agents of unity? It is when we build bridges, not walls, in our communities
Fernando Armellini
Italian missionary and biblical scholar
https://sundaycommentaries.wordpress.com
The Bible readings for this Sunday, feast of the Most Holy Trinity, helps us to enter into the identity of God. The second reading presents the departing words that Saint Paul bids to the community of Corinth: “the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you” (2 Cor 13:13). This — as we say — “blessing” of the Apostle is the fruit of his personal experience with God’s love, that love which the Risen Christ revealed to him, which transformed his life and “impelled” him to take the Gospel to the peoples. Beginning from his experience of grace, Paul could exhort Christians with these words: “… rejoice. Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another” (v. 11). The Christian community, even with all its human limitations, can become a reflection of the communion of the Trinity, of its kindness, of its beauty. But this — just as Paul himself testifies — necessarily passes through the experience of God’s mercy, of his forgiveness.
It is what happens to the Hebrews in the Exodus journey. When the people break the covenant, God presents himself to Moses in the cloud in order to renew that pact, proclaiming his own name and its meaning. Thus he says: “the Lord, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity” (Ex 34:6). This name implies that God is not distant and closed within himself, but is Life which seeks to be communicated, is openness, is Love which redeems man of his infidelity. God is “merciful”, “gracious” and “rich in charity” because he offers himself to us so as to fill the gap of our limitations and our shortcomings, to forgive our mistakes, to lead us back to the path of justice and truth. This revelation of God is fulfilled in the New Testament thanks to the Word of Christ and to his mission of salvation. Jesus made manifest the face of God, in substance One and in persons Triune; God is all and only Love, in a subsistent relationship that creates, redeems and sanctifies all: Father and Son and Holy Spirit.
God always blooms first
Pope Francis
Today’s Gospel “sets the stage” for Nicodemus, who, while playing an important role in the religious and civil community of the time, has not ceased seeking God. He did not think: “I have arrived”; he did not cease seeking God; and now he has perceived the echo of His voice in Jesus. In the nighttime dialogue with the Nazarene, Nicodemus finally understood that he had already been sought and awaited by God, that he was personally loved by Him. God always seeks us first, awaits us first, loves us first. He is like the flower of the almond tree; thus says the Prophet: “It blooms first” (cf. Jer 1:11-12). In fact Jesus speaks to him in this way: “God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life” (Jn 3:16). What is this eternal life? It is the immeasurable and freely given love of the Father which Jesus gave on the Cross, offering his life for our salvation. And this love with the action of the Holy Spirit has shined a new light on the earth and into every human heart that welcomes him; a light that reveals the dark corners, the hardships that impede us from bearing the good fruits of charity and of mercy.
May the Virgin Mary help us to enter ever deeper, with our whole being, into the Trinitary Communion, so as to live and witness to the love that gives meaning to our existence.
Pope Francis
Angelus11th June 2017
The Holy Trinity:
source of mercy and of mission
Romeo Ballan mccj
There are many questions about the mystery of God: What is God like within Himself? How does he live? What does he do? Where does he live?… They are the kind of questions that just about everyone asks, at various stages in life. Today’s feast of the Most Holy Trinity answers a number of these questions, at least for Catholics. It is the Feast of “One God in Three Persons”, as the Catechism tells us. That says it all, but in reality everything is still left to be explained and understood, to absorb with love and to adore in contemplation. The topic has an enormous, central importance for Mission. In fact, it is easy to say that all peoples – even non-Christians – know that God exists; they name God and call upon God in various forms. Indeed, it is easy to agree in saying that even pagans believe in God. This shared truth – though with some differences and reservations – makes dialogue possible between religions, in particular the dialogue between Christians and the followers of other religions. On the basis of a single God common to all, it is possible to put together an understanding among peoples in preparation for common action: in favour of peace, in the defence of human rights, in carrying out projects for human and social development, as it is done in many places. But for the evangelising activities of the Church these initiatives, though praiseworthy and necessary, are just a part of the Christian message to be transmitted. The human family finds unlimited resources for improvement: starting from and adhering to the newness of Christ!
A Catholic is not satisfied by basing his spiritual life only on the existence of One God; nor can – even more so – a missionary who is aware of the extraordinary richness of the gift of Jesus Christ, who leads into the mystery of the Triune God. The Gospel that the missionary carries to the world, besides enriching the understanding of monotheism, opens up the immense and ever surprising mystery of God, who is a communion of Persons. The word mystery here must not be understood simply in the sense of a hidden truth, difficult to understand, but rather of truths that are always new and to be discovered. In this area, it is better to leave the word to the mystics. For St. John of the Cross, “there are many greater depths to be sounded in Christ. Indeed, He is like a mine rich in immense veins of treasure of which, no matter how deep one goes, the end cannot be found; indeed, in each cavity, new veins of wealth are discovered”. Considering the Trinity, St. Catherine of Siena exclaims: “You, O eternal Trinity, are like a deep ocean, in which the more I search the more I find, and the more I find, the more the thirst to seek you increases. You are insatiable; and the soul, filling itself in your depths is not satiated, because the hunger for you remains, and it desires you all the more, oh eternal Trinity”.
The revelation of the Triune God has (that is, it must have) immediate and amazing consequences for the life of a believer: it offers new dimensions regarding the mystery of God, regarding the way of forming relationships between human persons, regarding the relationship of man with creation… Even the dialogue between religions is enriched with new horizons, as expressions like the following show. An anonymous source has transmitted a brief but profound dialogue between a Moslem and a Christian:
– The Moslem said: “For us, God is one; how could he have a son?”
– The Christian replied: For us, God is love; how could he be alone?”
The challenge is how to continue this dialogue: at doctrinal as well as at life level.
The God of Christians is Trinitarian, being one, but not solitary. This revelation even enriches the monotheism of Judaism, Islam and other religions. Indeed, the God revealed by Jesus (Gospel) is God-love, God who wants the world to live, God who offers salvation to all peoples (vv.16-17; see Jn.4:8). He has always revealed himself as a “God of mercy and pity… rich in love and faithfulness” (1st. Reading, v.6); “A God rich in mercy” (Eph.2:4).
All nations have the right and the need to know this true face of God, revealed by Jesus. Missionaries are its bearers. Hence the Council declares that “the pilgrim Church is missionary by its very nature, in that it takes its origin from the mission of the Son and from the mission of the Holy Spirit, according to the plan of God the Father (cf Ad Gentes, 2). In the early paragraphs of the same Decree, the Council explains the origin and the Trinitarian foundation of the universal mission of the Church, and in the process if offers one of the most exquisite theological synthesesof the whole Council.
“Where does God live?” The catechism tells us that God is in Heaven, on earth and everywhere. This is true, but there is an even more vital and personal reply. One day the Rabbi Mendel di Kotzk asked some of his learned guests: “Where does God live?” They all laughed: “Why, don’t you know? Is not the earth full of his glory?” But the rabbi replied: “God lives wherever He is let in”. God seeks a personal encounter and friendship with each of us. Not for His own good, obviously, but for ours. Because this friendship is for us the one guarantee of life and of joy. He stands at the door of our heart and knocks; to the one who hears and opens the door, he promises: “I will enter and dine with him, and he with me” (Rev. 3:20). With an intimacy that warms the heart, renews life and leads to mission.
