Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity (2025)
There is a popular old folk tale (which has found its way into several religious traditions, including Jain, Hindu, and Buddhist texts) which tells the story of three blind men who examine an elephant to try to determine what sort of animal it might be.
One grabs hold of the elephant’s tail and exclaims, “This creature is very like a rope.”
The second man runs his hand over one of the tusks, declaring, “This creature is very like a spear.”
Finally, the third man, patting the wide, solid side of the elephant, says, “This creature is surely a wall.”
Individually, each of the blind men grasped an aspect of the majestic creature, but their understanding was limited. But, if any one of them had all three insights at once, they would have understood a great deal more elephants than any one of them could have known alone.
Like the experiences of those three men, each of the Church’s various celebrations throughout the year works together to help us enter more deeply into the mysteries of salvation, because each of the great seasons and feasts of the Church Year shines a light on a particular aspect of the Divine Mystery that we encounter in our celebrations of Word and Sacrament.
This Sunday’s celebration honoring the Most Holy Trinity is no exception.
And yet, this special day honoring the Holy Trinity was a fairly late addition to the Church’s cycle of seasons and feasts. In fact, Pope Alexander II (d. 1077) is said to have objected to having a special day to honor the Holy Trinity because, as he observed, the Holy Trinity is celebrated every Sunday and every day in the Church’s prayer. It was Pope John XII who made the Feast of the Holy Trinity part of the official liturgy of the Universal Church in 1334.
“The Most Holy Trinity” by Niccoleto Semitecolo
Falling as it does on the Sunday after Pentecost, this day honoring the Most Holy Trinity brings together all the mysteries that we have celebrated during the seasons of Lent and Easter. And so, today, in a particular way we recall not only the creative, saving, and sanctifying work of God that freed us from sin and death, but we also remember how God has invited us into this communion of faith that is the Church.
The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity also reminds us that the God whom we adore is “one God in the Trinity” and “Trinity in unity” (from The Athanasian Creed), and this becomes an invitation for us to consider how all of our relationships are reflections of that dynamic, dancing communion that exists within this Triune God, whom our tradition has named Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And, by the grace of baptism, we have been caught up in this heavenly dance and brought into the very life of God!
We get a sense of this in this Sunday’s Gospel as we hear Jesus speaking with his disciples about his relationship with the Father and the Paraclete (i.e. the Holy Spirit), whom he promised would come to his followers after his departure. In this beautiful text, Jesus explains that the promised Spirit “will take from what is mine and declare it to you.” But, as Sister Barbara Reid, O.P., notes, “what is Jesus’ is also what is the Father’s as Jesus asserts, ‘Everything that the Father has is mine.’” She continues, “There is no ‘yours and mine’ in the Godhead—only ‘ours,’ as the three interweave in a communion of love in which there is no possessiveness” (from Abiding Word).
Today’s celebration of Trinity Sunday calls each of us to continue to move beyond my “self” and what I claim to be “mine.” God continues to bless us—in the ongoing act of creation, in the perduring gifts of healing and redemption, and the life-giving Spirit that inspires faith, hope, and love—and God invites us to receive the graces and gifts freely given. And we, in turn, are called to extend that invitation to others—to invite them to join this dance that is the life of God—by sharing what we have received.
By way of a conclusion, I want to share these words from the late Pope Francis, which he offered on Trinity Sunday in 2022:
“The Trinity teaches us that one can never be without the other. We are not islands; we are in the world to live in God’s image: open, in need of others and in need of helping others. And so, let us ask ourselves this last question: in everyday life, am I too a reflection of the Trinity?”
God our Father, who by sending into the world
the Word of truth and the Spirit of sanctification
made known to the human race your wondrous mystery,
grant us, we pray, that in professing the true faith,
we may acknowledge the Trinity of eternal glory
and adore your Unity, powerful in majesty.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
This homily was preached at St. Joseph Chapel (School Sisters of St. Francis) in Milwaukee, WI
