Holy Trinity Sunday, with Pictures

Today, while much of the U.S. celebrates Father's Day, the Church celebrates Holy Trinity Sunday:

I know that many Christians think of the Trinity as the central mystery of our faith, but it's never seemed as difficult to me as other aspects of theology.  Perhaps the words of Walt Whitman make sense to invoke here, that line about containing multitudes.

 

Some of us might think about changing the traditional language of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  What words would make more sense?  I prefer Creator, Son, and Holy Spirit.  There are so many elements that we could stress.

We might spend some time thinking about which aspect of the Trinity speaks to us most.  We could spend time charting our answer to that question across our life's trajectory.

I like what Pastor Duncan says in this blog post:  "It is so easy for us to fall into a focus on one person of the Trinity over the others.  Some Christians relate to Father, some focus on Jesus, some on the Spirit.  But to do this is like getting a bike for Christmas and instead of putting it together so you can ride it, you pull out the seat or the frame or the wheels and play with that part and ignore the rest of the bike.  You aren’t going very far on that bike if you do that.  Similarly, we limit our own experience of God when we focus on one person of the Trinity and exclude the others.  This is one reason we regularly remember our Baptism and Luther encourages us to make the sign of the cross – this keeps us grounded in the Holy Trinity: Father, Son and Spirit."

Triune God in 2 plants and wind chime