Father Thomas Welbers' Homily	Jump back to Homily Index
Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, June 6, 2004 Proverbs 8:22-31 Romans 5:1-5 John 16:12-15	Listen to Audio

How do you picture God? What kind of image comes to mind?

First and foremost, our Christian faith insists that God is a Trinity. The word “trinity” is an abstract noun meaning “threeness.” Therefore, a Christian’s image of God, if we are going to faithful to our faith, has to include “threeness” in some way. Does your image of God start with something having to do with the number three? If not, it might be worth asking, why not? Maybe to put it another way, if the thought of “God as three” doesn’t spring to mind first, is that a sign that your faith and your understanding of your faith needs some work? If you discover that’s true for you, take heart: there isn’t a person alive, even the most saintly, whose faith doesn’t need some work. We are all a work in progress.

Back to our original question, how can we picture God? Isn’t the very idea of God, transcendent and infinite divinity, the very essence of abstraction? We may have some idea of what divinity might mean, but how can we draw a picture of it?

Of course, the impossible has never stopped artists. And the beauty of art is that it can often capture a glimpse of what is otherwise unseeable, convey a hint of what is otherwise unknowable, whisper a phrase of what is otherwise inexpressible.

I have here four representations of the Trinity from artists through the ages. The most ancient is this Byzantine-Russian icon, representing the tradition of the Church where Christianity first began to grow, the middle east, and the origin of today’s traditions of the Easter Rites, both Orthodox and Catholic. It pictures three young men seated around a table, and when you look more closely, they have wings. They are the “angels” who, in the Old Testament Book of Genesis, appeared to Abraham and Sarah, promising that Sarah in her old age would become a mother. One of the ancient Christians traditions sees this event as an Old Testament hint of God as One-in-Three, that would be more completely revealed by Jesus, God the Son become human as one of us. In this picture is both an obvious equality among them, as well as subtle differences that speak of the relationship of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. For many people, this image is a favorite focal point for meditation and prayer.

The second image is an illuminated letter from a medieval manuscript. Within the embrace of the letter “U” we find God the Father, depicted as a seated old man embracing his Son who is kneeling and in turn embracing the cross, upon which is perched a dove, representing the Holy Spirit. What I find striking in this image is the look of infinite sorrow and compassion on the Father’s face. Here we do not have an angry, vengeful, punishing God, but rather the loving Father supporting his Son as he, Christ, embraces the sorrows and pains of those whom he has come save, symbolized in the cross.

The third image, is a picture by El Greco, painted in 1577, which echoes Michelangelo’s famous Pieta. In this image, the body of the dead Christ is held by the Father, with the Spirit, again in the form of a dove, radiating a golden light on the scene. The principal figures are surrounded by angels, who are quite obviously servants of the love of God, presenting the sacrifice of Christ to us as the sign of all embracing love.

Finally, a modern work by Latino artist Cerezo Barredo. The Father and the Spirit are shown faceless, indicating transcendent divinity, while the Son is shown both with a very human face and the wounds of his passion. All are reaching out to embrace the human figures below, who are also embracing one another. The Spirit is distinctively pictured as having his hand up to his ear, as if to say that the essence of God’s relationship and ours, which is self-giving love, is based more on listening than on speaking.

What can we learn by trying to picture the God who is essentially beyond our powers to grasp and understand, much less express in human terms? The common lesson of all these pictures seems to be that love transcends knowledge. If we are made in the image and likeness of God, we fulfill the meaning of the Trinity in our own lives more by the quality of our love for one another than by any intellectual achievement.

Or, as St. Paul affirms, “hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts.”

© Thomas Welbers 2004

Here are some useful links, which provide material for the study of these liturgical readings, and reflections on their message:

The Text This Week, Trinity Sunday.

Daily Word of Life

The Center for Liturgy at St. Louis University

Lectionary Resource for Catholics