26 May 2013
Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
A student once turned in a short essay on the Trinity that began with this stunning admission: “Many people suggest that the Trinity is too confusing and that it doesn’t make sense, but none of those people have taken the time to try to understand it.”He proceeded to explain, in 2 short pages, how simple and even obvious the doctrine was! Truth be told, the paper was fairly good – showing how the Gospel of John has Trinitarian themes. But he failed to see how the Trinity is fundamentally a mystery to our minds and that we can accept it as a mystery.
For many if not most Catholics, the mysterious doctrine of the Trinity is so confusing as to be relegated to the status of the impractical. What difference does it make, some might say?
Take a look at St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises. They are deeply imbued with Trinitarian reflections. For example, he gives instructions on the “colloquy” or conversation that takes place at the end of a prayer period. There, St. Ignatius invites the retreatant to pray distinctly to different persons of the Trinity. He found this to be very important – not something esoteric or advanced, but something essential and basic.
It is important that we, too, take time to make this a part of our real spiritual lives. We do not need to perfectly understand – we only need to believe and then take this belief to prayer.