Proverbs 8:22-31
Thus says the wisdom of God: “The LORD possessed me, the beginning of his ways, the forerunner of his prodigies of long ago; from of old I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth. When there were no depths I was brought forth, when there were no fountains or springs of water; before the mountains were settled into place, before the hills, I was brought forth; while as yet the earth and fields were not made, nor the first clods of the world. “When the Lord established the heavens I was there, when he marked out the vault over the face of the deep; when he made firm the skies above, when he fixed fast the foundations of the earth; when he set for the sea its limit, so that the waters should not transgress his command; then was I beside him as his craftsman, and I was his delight day by day, playing before him all the while, playing on the surface of his earth; and I found delight in the human race.”
Psalm 8:4-5, 6-7, 8-9
R (2a) O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth!
When I behold your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you set in place — What is man that you should be mindful of him, or the son of man that you should care for him?
R O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth!
You have made him little less than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him rule over the works of your hands, putting all things under his feet:
R O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth!
All sheep and oxen, yes, and the beasts of the field, The birds of the air, the fishes of the sea, and whatever swims the paths of the seas.
R O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth!
Romans 5:1-5
Brothers and sisters: Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we even boast of our afflictions, knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance, proven character, and proven character, hope, and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.
Cf. Revelation 1:8
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Glory to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit;
to God who is, who was, and who is to come.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
John 16:12-15
Jesus said to his disciples: “I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming. He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine and declare it to you. Everything that the Father has is mine; for this reason I told you that he will take from what is mine and declare it to you.”
Proverbs 8:22-31
Although the date of the writing of Proverbs is uncertain, most scholars date the book sometime at the beginning of the fifth century B.C. It gets its name from the first word of the book masal. Masal translates to proverb but can also mean parable or wisdom saying. In the early Church the book was often titled Book of Wisdom or Wisdom.
The purpose of the book is clearly stated in the first seven verses and summed up in verse seven: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; wisdom and instruction fools despise.” The Hebrew word for fear is yirah. Whereas, this word can mean craven fear, when in reference to our relations with God, it most always means reverence or awe. It is often used in the context of bowing or kneeling before God. It is that posture that describes the right relationship between creature and creator. In Proverbs this posture or reverence is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge.
Chapter 8 of Proverbs consists of the second speech of Personified Wisdom. It is the second of three first person oracles.
Thus says the wisdom of God: “The LORD possessed me, the beginning of his ways, the fore-runner of his prodigies of long ago; from of old I was poured forth, at the first, before the earth. The Hebrew word translated as Lord is Yahweh, often depicted as God the Father, the transcendent God. The Hebrew word for possessed is qanani. The word can mean formed. It can also mean begotten or brought forth. This verse reminds me of the prologue, the begin-ning, of John’s Gospel. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” (Jn 1: 1-2). St. Paul refers to Christ as the Wisdom of God: “Christ the power of God and the Wisdom of God.” (1 Cor 1: 24). It is Christ, the Eternal Word, the Wisdom of God, that existed before all things, before creation.
Then was I beside him as his craftsman. The Hebrew word translated as craftsman is amon. The word can also be translated as architect, artificer, or master-workman. This again draws me to the Prologue of John’s Gospel: “All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing came to be.” (Jn 1: 3). The image of Wisdom as artificer is also prevalent in The Book of Wisdom: “Such things as are hidden I learned, and such as are plain; for Wisdom, the artificer of all, taught me.” (Wis 7: 21-21). (See also Wis 7: 21- 8:1).
The salient theme of this pericope is that there was a plurality within God before creation. The Father was in relationship with the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Eternal Logos was pre-sent at creation as artisan, as was the Mighty Wind (Ruah-Holy Spirit) that hovered over the primordial chaos that was formed into the beauty of creation.
Psalm 8:4-5, 6-7, 8-9
Psalm 8 consists of just ten verses and is titled Divine Majesty and Human Dignity. Verse two and verse ten are identical, O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name through all the earth! As is very common with the Psalms the verse that begins the body of the Psalm and concludes the Psalm are the same, sort of providing “bookends.” They serve to introduce and to conclude the main theme the psalmist is conveying. The theme of Psalm 8 is that of the power and transcend-ence of God, who desires to be mindful of, care for, and be in relationship with His creation. God is both higher than the highest heavens and with the humblest of His creation.
The Hebrew word translated as Lord in verse two is Yahweh. The Hebrew word that is translated in this verse as God is Adon. Yahweh is most often translated as God and Adon is usually translat-ed into English as Lord. Therefore, I would translate verse two as O God, our Lord.
The Hebrew word that is translated as wonderful is addir. Sometimes addir is translated as mighty, majestic, magnificent, awesome, beautiful, stately, princely, and lordly. The second sen-tence of verse 2, which is not included in our Psalm selection is: “You have set Your majesty above the heavens.” The Hebrew word for heavens as it appears in this verse is samayim, which describes the highest heavens or the most majestic or sublime heavens. The psalmist is attempt-ing to portray in this verse the most transcendent, majestic, all-powerful God!
When I behold your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you set in place — As human beings we can see the power and grandeur of God in the immensity of His creation. Created in God’s image and likeness, created a little less than the angles with intelli-gence and reason, we can posit the majesty of our creator. It requires that we look up and see our-selves as creature vis-à-vis our creator.
What is man that you should be mindful of him, or the son of man that you should care for him? The psalmist is conscious of the fact that just as God is higher than the highest heav-ens, and more majestic than we can comprehend, He yet is mindful and cares for His beloved creatures. Hebrews would later quote this psalm passage when describing the exaltation of Christ precisely through abasement. “What is man that You are mindful of him, or the son of man that You care for him? You made him for a little while lower than the angels; You crowned him with honor, subjecting all things under his feet.” (Heb 2: 6-8). “We do see Jesus crowned with glory and honor because He suffered death, He who ‘for a little while’ was made ‘lower than the angels,’ that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone.” (Heb 2: 9).
All sheep and oxen, yes, and the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, the fishes of the sea, and whatever swims the paths of the seas. From the beginning of creation, God has given humanity dominion over the creatures of the earth. Humanity has been created not only to be in relationship with God and with each other, but to be in relationship with all of God’s creation. It is a role of stewardship and care.
Romans 5:1-5
Chapter 5 in Romans begins a section that is often titled Results of Justification. This seg-ment of Chapter 5 is sometimes titled simply Faith, Hope and Love. Our pericope was se-lected for Trinity Sunday because Paul speaks of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The three theological virtues of Faith, Hope and Love are also featured is this short passage.
Therefore, since we have been justified by faith. The Greek word translated as justified is dikaioo. In addition to the meaning of being justified or made righteous it also con-notes the image of being set free, acquitted or vindicated. Interestingly, the etymology of the word comes from a root word meaning a straight road or a straight, level, or mor-al way of life. St. Paul describes the origin of justification in a prior verse: (Speaking of the faith of Abraham) “That is why it was ‘credited to him’ as righteousness. But it was nor for him alone that it was written ‘it was credited to him’; it was also for us, to whom it will be credited, who believe in the one who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was handed over for our transgressions and was raised for our justification.” (Rom 4: 22-25).
The Greek word that is translated as faith is pistis. The word carries with it our com-mon understanding of the word faith. It means a system of beliefs that we hold and pro-fess. It means trust and confidence. It means loyalty, fidelity and assurance. As it is portrayed throughout Sacred Scripture it takes on an even deeper meaning. It connotes a deep, abiding, personal relationship of love, even a sharing of life. This deep abiding relationship is made possible by the justification that comes from the dying and rising of Jesus. By the Paschal Mystery we are set free to enter this communion of love with the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Jesus prayed, “I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word so that they may all be one, as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they may also be in Us.” (Jn 17: 20-21).
We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. The first fruit of justification is to experience the peace of Christ. The Greek word for peace is eirene. The He-brew/Aramaic translation is shalom. The Jewish people understood that God is the source of this peace. It is more than an absence of discord; it is an inner peace not af-fected by external circumstances. Shalom flows from the fullness of Messianic bless-ings, the gift of salvation. Jesus said, “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you.” (Jn 14: 27).
Through whom we have gained access by faith to this grace in which we stand, and we boast in hope of the glory of God. Faith is both a response on our part and a gift from God. It is a two-way relationship. Once we connect with God, the virtue, or the gift of God that we call faith is given to us. This gift is called grace, or divine life poured into us. One of the fruits of this gift is hope. Hope is the second of the Theological Virtues. It holds fast in times of plenty and in times of trial.
The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us. Hans Urs Von Balthasar once described the Holy Spirit as “the whirl of love between the Father and the Son that bursts out into all of creation.” The Greek word translated as poured is ekcheo. I find it interesting that it is the word that is used for the shedding of blood.
John 16:12-15
Our pericope today from the Gospel of John is an excerpt from the great Last Supper Discourse. The entire passage consists of the words of Jesus, Himself. It is a selection from a larger pas-sage titled Jesus’ Departure, Coming of the Advocate. Jesus is talking directly to the apostles and to us with great intensity as these are His parting words before entering into His Passion. In this passage Jesus speaks of the Father and of the Holy Spirit. It is therefore a great selection for Trinity Sunday.
“I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now.” There is only so much that the human mind can comprehend without the enlightenment of the Holy Spirit. St. Augustine called the inner light that flows from the Holy Spirit, Divine Illumination. Only with the light of the Holy Spirit can we begin to fathom the depth of Spiritual Truths.
“But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth.” Earlier in the Dis-course Jesus spoke the promise of the Holy Spirit: “The Advocate, the Holy Spirit that the Father will send in My name: He will teach you everything and remind you of all that I told you.” (Jn 14: 26).
Jesus spoke of Truth often. “Jesus then said to those Jews who believed in Him, ‘If you remain in My word, you will truly be My disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’” (Jn 8: 31-32). “For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth.” (Jn 18: 37). In one of His great I Am statements Jesus even revealed Himself as the Truth: “I Am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.” (Jn 14: 6).
The Greek word that is translated as truth is aletheia. It is one of those words that does not translate well into English. It means much more than the English connotation of truth. It means ultimate reality, something that is absolute and immutable. Many Scripture Scholars have com-mented on the promise of Jesus that the Spirit of truth will guide you to all truth. The Greek words for the phrase all truth are en te aletheia pase. Some scholars interpret the passage as saying that the Spirit will lead the disciple “to the very heart of all truth.”1 If Jesus is the Truth, then will not the Spirit lead the disciple into the very heart of Jesus?
“Everything that the Father has is mine;” Jesus and the Father are one. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the begin-ning with God.” (Jn 1: 1-2). The Father is the one who is. He reveals Himself in Exodus 3:14 as the one whose nature is to be, or as being itself. Jesus is one in being with the Fa-ther. The Father is the ground of all being.
“For this reason, I told you that he will take from what is mine and declare it to you.” What Jesus chooses to share with us through the Holy Spirit is a share in being. “All things came to be through Him, and without Him nothing came to be. What came to be through Him was life.” (Jn 1: 3). “To those who accept Him He gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born not by natural genera-tion nor by human choice nor by man’s decision but of God.” (Jn 1: 12-13). In the crea-tion story it is the breath of God, the Holy Spirit, that was breathed into the clay of the earth, and man became a living being. It is the same Spirit that is breathed upon the apos-tles in the Upper Room that first Easter Sunday evening and it is the same Spirit that is breathed upon the world at Pentecost.
This weekend we will celebrate the great feast of the Most Holy Trinity. The fact that God is one in being yet three distinct persons is one of the central mysteries of our faith. Jesus reveals God to us as a Trinity of three persons. His parting words at the ascension are: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit…” (Mt 28:19) Jesus reveals to us who God is. He reveals Himself as the Son, and talks of and to the Father, and He promises us the gift of the Holy Spirit.
In his great dissertation on the Holy Trinity, St. Augustine starts in the Old Testament. In the beginning God reveals Himself in the plural as He says, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness” (Gen 1:26). Then St. Augustine turns to the various names for God in the Hebrew Scripture. Yahweh is the unspeakable name. The name itself speaks of all powerful, transcend-ent, creator God, the God who created the entire universe from nothing. Another name for God that is prevalent in the Old Testament is Elohim. Elohim speaks of God who is with the people, the God who pitched His tent and was with them on the journey. The third name for God that appears is Ruah, or life breath, or Spirit. In the story of creation, the mighty wind hovered over the waters. God takes the clay of the earth and breathes His life breath into it and man becomes a living human being. God reveals Himself as the all-powerful and transcendent Father, as the ever-present immanent Son, and as life breath or Spirit. Therefore, God is one, yet three per-sons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
St. John reveals God as Love. Love requires relationship by its very nature. The Holy Spirit is the bond of love that makes the Father and Son one. Because love is self-giving by its nature it must be shared. The Holy Spirit is the sharing of God’s life. It is the life that was breathed into humanity at creation. It is life that is the ground of our being. It is the life that God wants to share with us eternally. It is life and love that is given to us in a very personal way through the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
Love requires and seeks a personal relationship. Within God is this personal relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Jesus prayed, “Father may they be one as You and I are One.” Love seeks union and God therefore seeks union with each one of us. God’s love requires a very personal response from each one of us. Some of our protestant brethren speak often of the necessity of taking Jesus as our “personal Lord and Savior.” As you approach the altar to re-ceive Communion, I remind you that when you receive Jesus as He gives His life to us in the most Holy Eucharist, it does not get any more personal than that! Where Jesus is there are the Father and the Holy Spirit. They are one. If you come with an open heart, if you give yourself to God as He gives Himself to you, you will enter union with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. As we come together to the source of all that is we enter a common union with all of cre-ation in union with the source of all that is and all that ever will be. Ultimately it is called Eter-nal Life.
Come Holy Spirit fill the hearts of us Your faithful and enkindle in us the fire of Your love. Amen.
Yours in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit,
Several years ago, in one of my parish assignments I was involved in prison ministry. I had the privilege of meeting a young man in his early thirties who was totally on fire for the Lord. At the time I met him he was leading a bible study group with fellow inmates. He joined our prison R.C.I.A program and was initiated into the Catholic Church. In the following years he headed up our prison R.C.I.A group and helped to lead many souls to the Lord.
Derik (not his real name) was doing an extended prison term for murder. As a teen he was tried as an adult and pleaded guilty to first degree murder. He openly shared his story with eve-ryone who would listen. He grew up in the inner city without ever knowing his father. He had one older stepbrother who also did not know a father. His mother was an addict and was sel-dom present. His older brother was involved in a gang that trafficked drugs in a specific territo-ry of the inner city. At the age of fourteen Derik begged his brother to allow him to join the gang. Derik entered the gang a month later and he said that he finally felt that he belonged. It gave him a sense of family for the first time. He had brothers that cared for and looked out for him. He had a job and a sense of purpose. He had enough money to care for himself. His job was to peddle drugs to the younger children in the area.
One summer a rival gang began to infringe on their territory and a war broke out. Derik’s older brother was killed in the process. Derik in a rage of anger and revenge shot and killed a member of the rival gang. He was only 16 and the boy that he shot was only 17, a person that he did not even know. And now he was in prison serving extended time for his crime.
On the night that I first heard Derik’s story I laid awake thinking of the young man and his circumstances. I remember wondering, what if I were born into his situation? Would I be in prison? I grew up in a strikingly different environment. I grew up in a rural area near a small town. I grew up in strong Catholic family of six children with a good hardworking father and a stay-at-home mother. I was surrounded by a large extended family with dozens of cousins, with both sets of grandparents close to the family. I was involved in various 4H groups, several youth sports teams, numerous elementary extra-curricular activities, etc. I was heavily involved in my Catholic faith and belonged to a very vibrant parish community. I worked on the farm and had my chores to do daily. As a child, in my childlike mind, I had too much belonging!
God is a community of love, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We are created in God’s image and likeness. We are created out of love and for love. We are created for relationships. The need to belong, the need for community, is a part of our created nature. One of the deepest longings of the human heart is to belong. Conversely, one of the deepest fears of the human heart is isolation.
One of the anxieties, and there are many, of young people that I recently heard of is being termed FOBLO, i.e., fear of being left out. As society turns away from personal interaction and towards screens, we are feeling more and more isolated. In isolation the need to belong intensi-fies.
The Feast of the Most Holy Trinity is a celebration of community. By our baptism we are invited to enter the Trinity of God, the Communion of love with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Jesus formed a community around Himself that we call the Church. Just as the Ho-ly Spirit cannot be contained, but bursts out into all of creation, so too are we called to bring God’s love into our families, into our communities and to the ends of the earth. It is to this end that we are chosen and empowered. It is to this mission and this community that we are called to belong.
May God bless you and your loved ones in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
