In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  We don’t realize just how radical that Trinitarian statement that we just made is.  At yesterday’s Jesseville High School graduation ceremony, one of the graduates who is from our parish gave the Invocation and began with the sign of the cross.  You could see heads everywhere turn and look up.  For many people the mention of the trinity is met with skepticism and disbelief.  In many parts of the world the sign of the cross could get us in serious trouble.  There are countries where we would immediately be unwelcome, maybe even in danger. 

G. K. Chesterton, the English writer and Catholic convert, once said that one of the reasons he believed in Christianity was because of its belief in the Trinity.  He said if Christianity had been made up by a human person, it would not have at its very core a concept that is impossible to grasp or explain:  the idea that God exists as one but within three persons.  That makes no sense, we just can’t understand it.  God, by definition, is beyond understanding, beyond imagination, beyond language.  This is the point where someone usually says, OK, just tell us it is a mystery and end the homily!  But our belief that God is a trinity helps us learn something about the nature of God and how God deals with us.

The Trinity is at the center of our story of Christianity.  And that is a story of love.  Love has an irresistible urge to go out of itself, to share.  Love relates to others by giving itself, by pouring itself out.  Today’s readings talk about the ways God pours his love out in creation, in the Word and in the Spirit. 

The reading from Proverbs talks about the beginning of time and how the spirit of God, the spirit of love that is God, was poured forth in creation.  It talks about the delight God had in His greatest creation, us.  And our Responsorial Psalm echoed that theme, “What is man that you should be mindful of him, yet you made him little less than the angels, crowned him with glory and honor.”  Genesis says we were created in the image and likeness of God.  That means we were made to love, it is in our DNA.  That is why St. Augustine said, “You have formed us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.”  Love wants to be with love

But we rejected God’s love.  Yet He never stopped loving us.  No, He again poured out His love, this time taking on human flesh, Jesus.  Now Love itself would show us how to love.  Our Gospel says that the Spirit “will take from what is mine and declare it to you.”  What is the Spirit taking from Christ?  The love between the Father and the Son.  St. Paul tells us in that second reading, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us.”  Father pouring out His love to the Son, the Son returning that love to the Father and Father and Son pouring that love, the Holy Spirit into us. 

That’s it, that is the “take away” from this feast of the Most Holy Trinity.  That is what makes Christianity different.  We don’t just have Yahweh or Allah or a Supreme Being up above watching over us.  We have God’s loving Spirit in us.  That is the radical, unbelievable concept we claim in the Trinity - God is part of us, in us.  How?  Through the sacraments.  The sacraments are a sharing in God’s very life, His life of love.  God pours His Spirit, Himself, into us at Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist.  And yes, at Marriage, Holy Orders, Reconciliation and Anointing of the Sick. 

Pope Francis said, “The Spirit is given to us by the Father and leads us back to the Father.”  The Spirit reestablishes that relationship of love in which we were created.  So today, when you come up here to receive God in the Eucharist, realize that the Holy Spirit is being poured into you.  And go out into the world to live Spirit filled lives!

In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.