Walking with Jesus on Trinity Sunday, June 7, 2020

Solemnity of The Most Holy Trinity

Exodus 34:4-6, 8-9; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; John 3:16-28

We have known special people in our lives. The ones who personally stand out are those who have a deep-seated desire to bring out the best in us. They perceive our gifts and talents in the way that the Holy Spirit has formed us. They are very special to us and we are deeply blessed to have them in our lives. Do we ever make the jump and put God in this classification? Do we believe and live our lives knowing God cares for us deeply, watches out for us and is leading us closer to our promised goal of heaven?

How else can we interpret the first line of today’s gospel: “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.” [John 3:16]

This desire and help from God is recorded in each reading today:

• Exodus 34:6: “The Lord, the Lord, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity.”
• Daniel 3:52: “Blessed are You, O Lord, the God of our fathers, praiseworthy and exalted above all forever …”
• 2 Corinthians 13:11: “Brothers and sisters rejoice. Mend your ways, encourage one another, agree with one another, live in peace, and the God of love and peace will be with you.”

Every passage of the scriptures shows consistently how much God cares for us. From the fall of Adam and Eve to the final judgment, the entire history of our salvation encompasses the coming of Jesus as our Savior. In His actions, in His teaching, in His miracles, in His care for everyone, Jesus showed continually that God loves us. Because God loves us so much, He couldn’t bear to see us perish in our sinfulness and be deprived of heaven. God cares and Jesus is the definitive proof of this … why else would He suffer and die and rise so that we could see that death is not the end? The eternal glory of heaven is the promised goal for every person.

So what drags us down? Isn’t it Pogo who says, “I have met the enemy and he is us?” This was written by Walt Kelly in the 1960s and refers to the turmoil caused by the Vietnam War. The gift of our free wills has been a detriment to heaven because we want what we want. In doing this we are distracted from the gifts and blessings God has given us so that we can help others get in touch with God’s gifts and blessings and know we are each loved.

Fr. Richard Rohr makes some interesting observations in On the Threshold of Transformation, Daily Meditations for Men. In the homes of so many of the poor in Africa and Latin America, there are no locks on the doors. Actually many homes don’t have doors. Here in our civilized country we have locks and security locks. What does this say? Are we afraid of losing what is precious? What really is precious to us? It seems that the more we have, the more we want ... which leads us to fear losing it. A few years before his death, Pope St. John XXIII said, “I have to start simplifying my life.” Isn’t this a comfortable thought? Yet greed and materialism have a way to sidetrack us and drive away faith and trust in our loving Lord.

Fr. Richard Rohr states this well:

The gospel proclaimed by Jesus and lived by the early church was concerned not only with the world to come, but also with liberation in this world now. The ‘Good News’ that Jesus shared was that people can be free from the oppression, illusion, and death that binds them — here and now. We turned the gospel into an innocuous evacuation plan into the next world. If we do not want heaven here, why would we want it later?

Heaven and hell are simply continuations of what we choose, love, and live here and now.

So I reflect on:

• What hopes have I placed in heaven that I could live out now?
• What is distracting me from doing that?
• We can never really know how and why God loves us so very much and why He has chosen us. This is His plan. What do I have to do to live this plan each day?
• When life presents us with difficult situations, where does popular culture encourage us to look for answers? God asks us to have faith and trust. Which is easier? Which is best?

Sacred Space 2020 states:

“God sent Jesus into the world to save it, not to condemn it. How might this truth affect the way I look at the world and at myself?

“‘God so loved the world’ is the whole message of Jesus, expressed in His words and embodied, directly or indirectly, in the whole of His life. As one theologian has said about His message, ‘There just isn’t anything else.’ Am I convinced of this myself? In love for me, God desires my salvation, my being made whole.”