Feast of the Holy Trinity – Year C: Mission is born of the Trinity-Love

Everything That Exists Bears the Imprint of the Name of the Trinity!

“The Spirit of truth will lead you to the complete truth.”
John 16:12–15

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. During the seasons of Lent and Easter, we experienced the saving action of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. On this Sunday after Pentecost, the Church invites us to contemplate this loving action of the three Divine Persons in their unity and synergy.

The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity is a relatively recent feast. It was introduced into the liturgical calendar in the 14th century and placed on the Sunday after Pentecost, considered the most appropriate time, since the Trinity was fully revealed with the descent of the Holy Spirit.

We are not celebrating a catechism truth locked within a dogmatic formula, nor an enigmatic mystery. This is a living, beautiful, surprising reality, at the very heart of the Good News of the Gospel, which St John summarises in the statement: “God is love” (1 John 4:8).

The Journey Towards Faith in the Trinity

All Christians profess belief in the Trinity: “God is one in three Persons.” This definition is not found in the Bible, and the first Christian generations did not yet use the word “Trinity”. The first to use it (Trinitas) was Tertullian, a Father of the Church (+240). His use was not an invention, of course, but the result of his meditation on Sacred Scripture.

The New Testament contains many allusions to this truth of faith. The conclusion of Matthew’s Gospel gives us the most explicit Trinitarian formula: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19).

Given the deeply monotheistic context of Israel’s faith, we can imagine how scandalous it was that Jesus proclaimed himself the Son of God and spoke of the person of the Holy Spirit. The first Christians were truly bold in initiating belief in the Trinity, which would only be clearly formulated in the 4th century, at the Councils of Nicaea (325) and Constantinople (381). Only a profound conviction, received through Jesus’ teaching and witness, could make them so courageous: “No one has ever seen God; the only-begotten Son, who is God and is in the bosom of the Father, he has revealed him” (John 1:18).

The Trinity as a Requirement of Love

If, on one hand, the mystery of the Trinity is hard to grasp because it goes against our logic, on the other hand, it could be seen as simple, since it is a requirement of love itself. A God who is only one Person would be solipsistic: how could such a being be love? Love between two might become a love of reciprocity, a mirrored love, in which the two lovers reflect one another: this is still imperfect love. A Third is needed—one who embodies diversity and pushes love beyond mere reciprocity to embrace the other.

God created humanity “in his image and likeness” (Genesis 1:26–27), but the icon of the Trinity is not the couple—it is the family: the fruitful couple that welcomes “the other” and goes beyond mirrored logic. God is Family. Humanity bears the Trinitarian imprint. Within the Trinity is the revelation of our deepest identity and vocation.

Not only the human family, but all of reality bears this Trinitarian mark, as Pope Benedict XVI said:
“In everything that exists, the name of the Most Holy Trinity is, in a certain sense, imprinted, because all being, even down to its tiniest particles, is being-in-relationship; and thus the God who is relationship shines through—ultimately, the Creator Love shines through. Everything comes from love, tends toward love, and moves under the impulse of love, naturally with different degrees of awareness and freedom.” (Angelus, 7 June 2009)

Two Reflections on Today’s Gospel

Jesus speaks of the close relationship between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Most Holy Trinity can only be understood within this network of relationships. God is pure Relationship. This is beautifully portrayed in the famous icon by Andrei Rublev, which, inspired by the Genesis account of God’s visit to Abraham, depicts three angels seated around a table, their gazes meeting with infinite tenderness.

We too are invited to take part in this intimacy. One might say that whoever works to create bonds, to weave communion, to foster fraternal relationships, lives within the very heart of the Trinity. “If you see love, you see the Trinity,” says St Augustine.

Speaking of the specific role of the Holy Spirit, Jesus says that he still has many things to say, but the disciples are not yet ready to bear them. Think, for example, of the weight of the Word of the Cross, so absurd and scandalous (cf. 1 Cor 1:18–30). It is the Spirit who will guide them to the fullness of truth.

Just before this, Jesus had said to Peter: “What I am doing you do not understand now, but later you will understand” (John 13:7). We too still dwell between that “now” and the “later”. Truth is a journey to be travelled. It is always ahead, “beyond” each stage. We will only reach it “afterwards”, at the end. And each one must make this journey personally. For this reason, truth must be proposed with patience and respect—never imposed. Only the Spirit can enlighten the mind, warm the heart, and strengthen the will to “guide us to all truth”.

“The Spirit is the watchman at the prow of my ship. He announces lands I cannot yet see. I listen to him and steer in their direction, and I can act with certainty that what delays will come—to behave as if the rose had already bloomed, as if the Kingdom had already come.” (Ermes Ronchi)

Prayer Exercise:

1. Make the sign of the cross at the beginning of the day with special awareness of living it in the name of the Trinity.

2. Repeat often throughout the day, as a breath of the heart, the doxology:
   Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.

3. Let us pray with Saint Catherine of Siena:
   “Eternal Trinity, you are like a deep sea; the more I search, the more I find, and the more I find, the more I thirst to seek you. You are insatiable; and the soul, satiated in your abyss, is not sated, because it remains hungry for you, it longs ever more for you, O eternal Trinity, desiring to see you in the light of your light.”

Fr Manuel João Pereira Correia, MCCJ

Feast of the Holy Trinity

Gospel Reading
John 16:12-15

This week we return to the liturgical season of Ordinary Time. This Sunday and next Sunday, however, are designated as solemnities, special days that call our attention to central mysteries of our faith. Today, on the first Sunday after Pentecost, we celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. This feast invites us to consider what we believe about God, who has revealed himself to us in the Trinity—one God in three persons.

The verses of today’s Gospel come near the end of Jesus’ long discourse at the Last Supper. In the early part of this discourse, as we saw last week on Pentecost, Jesus offers assurances to the disciples. Even though he must leave the disciples, he tells them that they will have a future because of the help he will send them in the Holy Spirit. In this section he focuses more on the shape of the future, which will include Jesus’ victory over the world that they will share in. The disciples of Jesus cannot know the future. They can only know that, whatever shape the future takes, they will not have to face it alone. They have the Spirit of Truth, who will continue to provide the teaching of Jesus in the future.

Reading this passage on Trinity Sunday reinforces our understanding of the unity shared by the members of the Trinity. Although the idea of one God in three persons remains a mystery, we have the assurance that, as Jesus and the Father share all, Jesus and the Spirit share all.
http://www.loyolapress.com

When the Spirit of Truth Comes
Kathleen Rushton

Katheen Rushton discusses what the Spirit is doing in our time as a continuation of Jesus’s teaching in his time in John 16:12-15.

In John the Evangelist’s farewell discourse (Jn 13:1-16:33), Jesus’s teachings are presented in terms of both the present and the future. The first time frame is the last supper and the end of Jesus’s life on Earth. At this time Jesus talked to the disciples of “going away” — departing from his present life through his suffering and death. He would “return” to them as the Risen Jesus. The second time frame is Jesus assuring the disciples, then and always, that though he has departed Earth they will not be left alone.
Earlier in the farewell discourse, Jesus speaks of knowing not only that the disciples’ hearts were troubled but that future disciples might also be troubled (Jn 14:1, 27). In this third section of the discourse (Jn 16:4b‒33) Jesus assures disciples — those of his own time and us today — that he will remain through the work of the Holy Spirit (Jn 16:12-15) as we complete the works of God.

“I have said these things to you” (Jn 16:1)

John 16 moves between the present and future indicating the beginning of a new age. Jesus states that his disciples are to remember his words when the hard times come. He repeats three times: “I have said these things/this to you” (Jn 16:6, 25, 33). But we know that more will be revealed because Jesus also says: “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now” (Jn 16:12).

“But you cannot bear them now” (Jn 16:12)

In John 16:13–15, when Jesus speaks about action of the Holy Spirit in the future, he repeats the verb “declare” (NRSV) or “tell” (JB) three times. In the Greek Old Testament, this verb (anangellō) has the sense of re-announcing what has been heard previously — mysteries already communicated are described. Jesus is encouraging the disciples to face the hard times ahead by seeking deeper meaning in what they have already heard, seen and experienced.
When they, and we today, can bear it, the Spirit will re-announce and re-proclaim what the disciples received from Jesus who was sent by God. Jesus links his departure with the coming of the Spirit of truth. He has already told the disciples that his going is to their advantage — otherwise, the Advocate will not come (Jn 16:7). Jesus describes that the twofold role of the Spirit is to expose (Jn 16:8–11) and to guide (Jn 16:12–15).
Raymond Brown explains: “The declaration of the things to come consists in interpreting in relation to each coming generation the contemporary significance of what Jesus has said and done. The best Christian preparation is not an exact knowledge of the future but a deep understanding of what Jesus means for one’s own time.” The ministry and trial of Jesus are over, but the implications of Jesus’s death-resurrection for disciples of all generations and for all creation need to be worked out in every generation, in every time and in every place.

God, Jesus and the Spirit

The identity of Jesus and his relationship with God are central. Jesus is “the way” because he is “the word made flesh” who reveals that God is “truth”. When people come to believe into Jesus, they share in eternal life. In the work of guiding disciples, Jesus and the Spirit share similar titles. Jesus is “the truth” (Jn 14:6) and the Paraclete is the Spirit of Truth (Jn 14:17; 15:26; 16:13) who will “guide you into all truth”.
The Greek word for Spirit (pneuma) is used throughout the Scriptures for the Hebrew ruah, the “wind”. Sometimes ruah is translated as the “breath” of life. The images of wind and breath indicate the unseen wonder of the Spirit whom we know through its actions, effect and how it feels. The Spirit flows through all creation bringing life and love.
Both Jesus and the Paraclete teach and guide the disciples (Jn 6:59; 7:14, 8:20; 16:13; 14:26). The Paraclete’s teaching glorifies Jesus (Jn 16:14) and Jesus glorifies God (Jn 14:13; 17:4). Jesus named the Spirit as his successor — a bridge between the past of his historical life and the post-Easter life of the church in this world God loves (Jn 3:16). As Raymond Brown says: “The one who Jesus calls ‘another Paraclete’ is really another Jesus. Since the Paraclete can only come when Jesus departs, the Paraclete is the presence of Jesus when Jesus is absent.”
Jesus said: “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now” (Jn 16:12). As disciples, when we can bear it, the Spirit will re-announce, re-proclaim and remind us what has been received from Jesus who was sent by God.

In Our Generation and Place

As pilgrims of hope in this Jubilee Year, we are invited to move into the “not yet”, into a new vision of life which Jesus calls us to live into, sustained by his words and guided by the Spirit who re-announces to us the contemporary significance of the truth of God already communicated in what Jesus has said and done.
We are also reminded that we are in the second time frame John describes — the future. We are called to complete the works of God with the Spirit as our guide. And with the death of Pope Francis and the election of Pope Leo XIV, we have an example in the papacy of this ongoing renewal: each pope, like all of us, must listen with the Church to Jesus’s message and participate in God’s mission for our own time.
This is work we do “not on my own authority” (Jn 14:9); rather, it is the continuity of discipleship presented in John’s farewell discourse: we work, despite our troubled hearts, not alone but with the Spirit as our guide.
Tui Motu Magazine. Issue 304 June 2025: 24-25
https://hail.to

Solitary God or God of Communion?
Gospel reflection – John 16:12-15

It is the fifth time that, in John’s the Gospel, Jesus promises to send the Spirit, and says it will be the Spirit to carry out the project of the Father. Without his work people could never be able to accept salvation. The passage begins with the words of Jesus: “I still have many things to tell you, but you cannot bear them now” (v. 12). This phrase might suggest that Jesus, having lived a few years, has not had the opportunity to convey his whole message. So as not to leave his mission halfway, abruptly interrupted by his death, he would send the Spirit to teach what was missing.

This is not the meaning. Jesus clearly stated that he has no other revelations to do: “I have made known to you everything I learned from my Father” (Jn 15:15) and in today’s Gospel he says that the Spirit will not add anything to what he has said: “he has nothing to say of himself, but he will speak of what he hears … . He takes what is mine and makes it known to you” (vv.13-14). He does not have the duty to supplement or expand the message but to enlighten the disciples to make them understand correctly what the Master taught. The reason why Jesus does not explain everything is not the lack of time, but the inability of the disciples to “bear the burden” of his message. What is it? What is the “too heavy” topic for their weak forces?

It is the weight of the cross. Through human explanations and reasoning, it is impossible to come to understand that the plan of salvation of God comes through failure, defeat, and the death of his Son at the hands of the wicked. It is impossible to understand that life is reached only by passing through death, through the free gift of oneself. This is the “total truth,” very heavy, impossible to sustain without the power communicated by the Holy Spirit.

In the First Reading, we have considered the project of the Father in creation. In the Second Reading, it was explained to us that this project is carried out by the Son, but we did not yet know that the path to salvation would be not only strange but even absurd. That’s why the Spirit’s work is necessary. Only he can lead us to adhere to the project of the Father and the work of the Son.

He will tell you of the things to come (v. 13). This is not—as claimed by the Jehovah’s Witnesses—the predictions about the end of the world, but the practical implications of Jesus’ message. It is not enough to read what is written in the Gospel; one needs to apply it to the concrete situations of the world. The disciples of Christ will not deceive themselves in these interpretations if they will follow the impulse of the Spirit because he is the one in-charge of guiding “into the whole truth” (v. 13).

To whom does the Spirit reveal himself? All Christ’s disciples are educated and guided by the Spirit: “You have received from him an anointing, and it remains with you, so you do not need someone to teach you … so remain in him, and keep what he has taught you” (1 Jn 2:27).

In the Acts of the Apostles, an episode shows the way and the privileged setting in which the Spirit loves to manifest himself.

In Antioch, while the disciples came together to celebrate the cult of the Lord, the Spirit “speaks,” reveals his plans, his will, his choices (Acts 13:1-2). Prayer, reflection, meditation on the Word, fraternal dialogue create the conditions that allow the Spirit to reveal himself. He does not miraculously send from heaven the solutions; he does not reserve his illuminations to some privileged member; he does not replace the efforts of people, but rather accompanies the passionate pursuit of God’s will that the disciples do together. That’s why, in the early Church, everyone was invited to share with the brothers what, during the community meeting, the Spirit suggested for the edification of all (1 Cor 14).

“He will glorify me” (v. 14). To glorify means for us to applaud, exalt, incense, magnify. Jesus did not need these honors. He is glorified when the Father’s plan of salvation is implemented: the evil becomes right, the poor receive help, who suffers finds solace, the unhappy resumes to hope and to believe in life, the lame man stands up and the leper is made clean. Jesus glorified the Father because he finished the work of salvation which he had been entrusted.

The Spirit, in turn, glorifies Jesus because he opens the minds and hearts of people to his Gospel, gives them the strength to love even the enemies, renews relations between people and creates a society founded on the law of love. That is the glory of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit: a world in which all are his children and they live happily!

Fernando Armellini
Italian missionary and biblical scholar
https://sundaycommentaries.wordpress.com

MYSTERY OF GOODNESS
José A. Pagola

Throughout the centuries, theologians have made an effort to go deeply into the mystery of God by examining in depth their concept of God’s nature and by expressing their conclusions in different ways of speaking. But all too often our words hide God’s mystery more than reveal it. Jesus doesn’t talk much about God. He simply offers us his experience.

Jesus calls God «Father» and he experiences God as a mystery of goodness. He lives this mystery as a good Presence that blesses our life and draws us, God’s sons and daughters, to fight against anything that destroys humanity. For Jesus, this ultimate mystery of reality that we believers call «God» is a close and loving Presence that is opening a path in the world in order to construct, with us and beside us, a more human life.

Jesus never separates this Father from the Father’s project of transforming the world. He isn’t able to think of God as someone enclosed in an unfathomable mystery, with back turned on the suffering of God’s sons and daughters. That’s why he asks his followers to open themselves to the mystery of this God, to believe in the Good News of God’s project, to unite ourselves to God in order to work for a more just and happy world for everyone, and to seek always that God’s justice, God’s truth, God’s peace reign more and more in our world.

Furthermore, Jesus experiences himself as «Son» of this God, born to promote here on earth the humanizing project of the Father and to bring it to definitive fullness that is even beyond death. That is why he seeks at all times what the Father wants. His faithfulness to God leads him to seek always the good of God’s sons and daughters. His passion for God translates itself into compassion for all who suffer.

Therefore, Jesus’ whole existence as Son of God consists in bringing healing to life and alleviating suffering, defending victims and demanding justice for them, sowing deeds of goodness and offering everyone the gratuitous mercy and forgiveness of God: the salvation that comes from the Father.

Lastly, Jesus acts at all times driven by the «Spirit» of God. It’s the Father’s love that sends him to announce to the poor the Good News of God’s saving project. It is the breath of God that moves him to bring healing to life. It is his saving power that manifests itself in every prophetic path.

This Spirit won’t be extinguished in our world when Jesus is gone. He himself promised this to his disciples. The power of the Spirit will make them witnesses of Jesus the Son of God, and co-workers in the saving project of the Father. This is the concrete way we Christians live out the mystery of the Trinity.
http://www.feadulta.com

Mission is born of the Trinity-Love

Today’s feast is an open provocation on the reality of God and on our perception of Him. A persistent question harbours in the hearts of all believers of all religions: What is God like within Himself? How does he live? What does he do? How much does He care about man? Why do people take an interest in Him? … And so forth. The answers are often convergent and at times divergent, according to the ability of the human mind and everyone’s personal experience. The mystery of God is an objective reality that speaks by itself, and which the human heart cannot evade, in spite of some forms of atheism. The divine mystery acquires for us new light and amazing value when Jesus – God himself in human flesh – comes to reveal to us the true and complete identity of our God, who is full communion of Three Persons.

Catechisms tend to declare, simplistically, that “God is One alone in three Persons”. This says it all, but the all still has to be understood, taken in, welcomed with love and adored in contemplation. The subject has central importance in the area of mission, too. Then again, there is a facile inclination to declare that all peoples – even non-Christian – know that God exists, so that even pagans believe in God. This shared truth – albeit with differences and reservations – is the basis that makes dialogue between religions possible, particularly between Christians and peoples of other beliefs. On the basis of a God who is one and common to everyone, it is possible to put together an understanding among nations, with a view to joint action for peace, in defence of human rights, so as to carry out development projects… But this is only part of the evangelising action of the Church. Indeed, the Church offers the world a message with a new content and objectives with a much wider range.

For a Christian it is not enough to base oneself on a single God, and even less for a missionary, aware of the extraordinary revelation received through Jesus Christ; a revelation that embraces the whole mystery of a God who is Unity and Trinity. The God of Christians is unique, but not solitary. The Gospel that a missionary takes to the world, besides strengthening and perfecting the understanding of monotheism, opens the way to the immense and surprising mystery of God who is a communion of Persons. The feast of the Trinity is a feast of communion: the communion of God within us, the communion between God and us; the communion we are called to live, announce and establish every day and in every corner of the earth!

The three readings of this feast speak in turn of the three Persons of the Holy Trinity: the Father, the Son and the Spirit. The Father is introduced in the role of creator of the universe (I Reading): from the context God does not appear to be unique, but as one who shares with Someone else (the mysterious Wisdom) his creation project. Everything is created with love; everything is beautiful and good; God reveals himself as a lover, jealous of his creation (v. 30-31). Blessed is the man who is able to recognise the beauty of God’s work (responsorial psalm). We find here also the theological and anthropological foundations of ecology and bioethics. The Son (II Reading) came to restore peace with God (v. 1), and the Holy Spirit floods our heart with God’s love (v. 5). The Christian God is always near to every person, inside everyone and works in their favour.

For a Christian the Trinity is a friendly presence, a silent but reassuring company, as St. Therese of Lisieux, a missionary in her monastery, used to say: “I have found my heaven in the Holy Trinity who dwells in my heart”. The mystery is so rich and inexhaustible that always surpasses our understanding. Even the apostles (Gospel) realised that “it was too much for them”, so that Jesus entrusted to the “Spirit of truth” the task of leading them “to the complete truth” and to tell them “of the things to come” (v. 12-13). The ‘heaviest’ aspect of the mystery of God is certainly the cross: the suffering in the world, death, the suffering of the innocent, the death of the Son of God on the cross… Yet, thanks to the interior light-love-strength of the Spirit promised by Jesus, even this mystery makes sense to the saints. So much so that Paul (II Reading) boasted even “about sufferings” (v. 3); Francis of Assisi found “perfect happiness” even in unfavourable situations and praised God for “sister death”; Daniel Comboni wrote at the end of his life: “I am happy in the cross, which, if willingly borne for the love of God, generates triumph and life eternal”. Only the God-Love can enlighten even the absurd folly of the cross!

It is the God-Love that supports the martyrs and the missionaries of the Gospel. For the missionary Church draws its origin from the spring of love of the Father, through the Son, by the power of the Spirit, as Vatican Council II teaches: “The pilgrim Church is missionary by her very nature, since it is from the mission of the Son and the mission of the Holy Spirit that she draws her origin, in accordance with the decree of God the Father. This decree, however, flows from the «fount – like love» or charity of God the Father” (AG 2). From this the inseparable name combination of love-mission.

Fr. Romeo Ballan, mccj