It's the relationship (homily)

Wynn Wagner is now an archbishop. He serves as the Regionary Bishop of the Southern Province USA, of the North American Old Catholic Church.

It's the Relationship

Today is TRINITY Sunday, the day where we honor the three persons of God. Today is the beginning of the second half of the Christian year. The first half is the entire journey of Christ… from Advent and Christmas to Lent and Easter and the Ascension. Although you don't hear it described often, the first half of the year is a long Mystery Play about our Lord.

The second half of the year is about us. It is not the journey of Christ. It is full of feasts and readings about our journey. Our journey opens with a celebration of a central belief: the Trinity.

It isn't like Christians have exclusive rights to a Trinity. The Power of Three is everywhere. In ancient Egypt, the Trinity was Isis, Osiris, and Horus. Hindus celebrate Brahma, Shiva, and Vishnu. Pagans celebrate maiden, mother, and crone. Northern Buddhists have a trinity. Aztecs and Incas had a Trinity. You will even find a Trinity in Judaism, although not many will admit it. The Jewish Trinity uses terms from the Kabala: Kether, Binah, and Chockma. The first line in the first book of the Jewish Bible is "In the beginning, God created…." The word for God in Genesis 1:1 is "Elohim," and that is the plural form of the word for God. The word is not singular and not dual. "Elohim created" means the God was three or more persons.

Our personal journey is not to be good in order to earn a place in heaven. We have that: every one of us. Our personal journey is to repair the exile that began with Adam. Our personal journey includes one God with three persons. Our personal journey begins with God the Father. It continues through God the Son, where the almighty being chooses to be vulnerable… to be the lamb slain from the foundation of the world. And our journey is worth nothing without God the Holy Spirit… the divine wisdom, the comforter - which is God the Mother.

Words always fail when trying to describe God. What I am saying here is wrong because no finite word can be accurate enough to describe infinite God. But words is what we have, and the Trinity isn't rocket science. The person who owns the company I work for is my boss. When he fires somebody, he is a destroyer of lives. When he goes home, he is a husband. He is also a father. You have one person but several aspects. The Trinity has three aspects or persons, but we don't have three gods.

It is good that we start the life of a new parish - Saint Mychal Judge - with the celebration of the second half of the Christian year… the personal journey of us all. God, the creator. God, the fragile offspring. God, the comforter.

The gods created the world in Genesis. Then what? God sent his son to us to show us victory over matter. Then God promised the Holy Spirit would be with us until the end of the world. None of this is about dogma or theology. Every bit of it is about relationships: This is not about what you think: not about orthodoxy. It is about how you relate to yourself, your neighborhood, your world. "For God so loved this world that he sent is only begotten son." God loved the world so much that he sent his son. And we love the world so little that we have strip mining and call it 'progress' and pollution but call it growth. Our relationship to each other is just as dysfunctional. God, the son, so loved mankind that he said "Arise and fear not, for lo I am with you always, even until the end of the world." God's relationship with mankind is love, yet we hate each other because of religion, and we kill each other in the desert over oil.

We have the whole second half of the Christian year to sort through this mess, and I invite you to join us. And it isn't hopeless… in a moment we will have a chance to hug each other and offer each other the Peace of God. When we get to that point, think of the relationships… think of what God feels about the world and about each one of us. Even if you don't know anybody else, when we get to that part of the Mass… hug your neighbor and say "I love you." …