A Homily for Trinity Sunday 2006
The Very Rev’d Michael J. Pitts
Isaiah 6:1-8
Romans 8:12-17
John 3:1-17
I think it helps us to understand what we are doing in our service here each
Sunday (and in deed each day of the week), if we reflect that the next nearest
activity in human endeavor is musical drama. In our liturgy we are acting out
each week part of the Christian story, within the context of the whole
Christian story. The church is a theatre, but a theatre without a proscenium
arch. This is total drama in which were all the actors, each having our parts
to play. The Christian Year, which begins at the cusp of November and December
each year, through its assigned Biblical readings, collects and liturgical
texts, tells the story from the calling of Israel to the life of the church in
an ordered fashion around the year. Advent deals with the calling of Israel.
Christmas to Pentecost tells the story of Jesus. The weeks between Pentecost
and Advent speak of the work of the Spirit in the Church and in the World,
both in ancient times and in our own day. While each week’s drama presents one
part of the story, it also presents the whole story, especially in the
Eucharistic prayer and in the creed.
At this time of the year, then, we are moving from the story of Jesus to the
story of the church, and the turning point is marked by this festival called
Trinity Sunday. This festival is a late-comer in the historical development of
the Christian Year, not being formally added to the Calendar until 1334 CE.
But it serves to emphasize each year the Christian activity which is twinned
with liturgy, namely theology. If liturgy and drama belong together, then
theology is to be understood as close to philosophy. Its purpose is to bring
to bear on Christian experience, ordered logical thought. For most of our
history the thought-forms which have dominated the world have been those which
arose from the schools of Greek philosophy, especially of Plato and Aristotle,
and most of Christian Theology has been worked out within those thought
patterns. The Creeds and the important conciliar statements of the early
church are all expressed within Greek philosophical terms.
But in the past 300 years the church, and especially the western protestant
church, has tried to struggle with the thought forms of different
philosophies. The Enlightenment challenged western humanity across the board
to critique past authority by present experience, and out of that arose
scientific method, together with philosophies such as Hegelianism, nihilism,
existentialism, logical positivism, Marxism and feminism, to mention a few. Of
the theological attempts to work with these new thought forms, I mention in
particular Paul Tillich who worked with existentialism, Ian Ramsey who strove
with logical positivism, Roger Garaudy, Gustavo Gutierez, Leonard Boff and the
liberation theologians who thought out their faith through Marxist spectacles.
I mention also John Polkinghorne who seeks to understand faith through the
eyes of a scientist, and Karl Barth who strove to provide a means of
understanding faith without any philosophy.
You have to realize that in sharing this with you, I am way out of my depth.
My own specialty is Biblical and especially New Testament Study. If you want
to take any of the philosophical thinking more deeply, you will have to speak
to Dr Roger Balk or Paul Jennings or Dr John Simons. But, despite being out of
my depth let me add that, the somewhat under-defined and still arising
philosophical movement we call post-modernism, also brings new challenges to
thinking out our faith. Post-modernism calls into questions not only theology,
but all philosophical systems, and its themes of the plurality of narratives,
traditions and hermeneutic endeavors, strongly suggest to me, that study of
the Christian story, together with its presentation in the Christian drama we
call liturgy, is where I want to be at, which you will have noticed from my
sermons of the past ten years!
However, creeds, conciliar statements and systematic or philosophical theology
form part of the tradition in which we stand and we have to deal with them in
some way or other. From where I stand, I try to come at these things by
striving to understand their history. As an immediate critical observation let
me point out that for centuries most of Christian theology has been his story.
It is only in my generation that we have begun to hear her story.
Historically it seems to be that the development of the theology of the
Trinity arose as the church had to grapple, in the context of polytheistic
religion, with a tradition of strict Jewish monotheism one the one hand and,
on the other, with the Christian experience of the risen Christ who seemed
both Lord and God, and the presence of the Spirit who equally seemed divine.
As the church struggled to understand this many options were considered. Among
them were:
• Adoptionism, which saw Jesus as a human being adopted by God as his son.
• Sabellianism, or modalism which saw the Father Son and Holy Spirit as
temporary manifestations of the one Godhead.
• Arianism which had the Son as pre-existing, but as created by the father,
and not co-eternal.
There were many others. We could even include Islam, where Jesus is revered as
a prophet of importance only slightly less than Mohammed, but is certainly not
the eternal Son of God.
These pathways of understanding were labelled as heresies by the church, and
rejected, but in a time when all the past is being called into question we
need to be aware that we can see two dominant motives for rejection. One was
the process of striving for logical non-contradictory thought, and with it
perhaps the rejection of systems which led to unhealthy practice. But another
was the shear exercise of political power by the Roman Empire. The council of
Nicea was called together in 325 by the Emperor Constantine, not to write the
Nicene Creed to be said in the Eucharist, but to settle the dispute with
Arianism because the dispute was threatening the unity of the Empire.
The most complex expression of the theology of the Trinity is found in the
Athanasian Creed, which most scholars agree is not a creed, and was not
written by St Athanasius. I do not intend to expound it, and if you want to
find it you will have to look in the Book of Common Prayer, as it is not
printed in the Book of Alternative Services. But I do want to draw your
attention to a fascinating diagrammatic summary of the first part of the creed
which deals with the Trinity. You will find the diagram in one of our stained
glass windows, but I have put a photograph of it on the front of the bulletin.
It is all in Latin. In the centre is the word Deus, meaning God. In the
circles making a triangle are the words Pater (Father) Filius (Son), and
Spiritus Sanctus, (Holy Spirit). Connecting each of the three with Deus is the
word est, meaning is Connecting each pair of the three are the words non est
(is not). So the Father is God, the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God. But
the Father is not the Son, and the Son is not the Holy Spirit, and so on. I
have always thought that our window is a neat summary of 500 years debate in
the Church.
Of the Doctrine of the Trinity, in the words of Forrest Gump i,
that’s all I have to say about that. But I do want to add two more general
comments about theology. I firmly believe that we can no longer do our
thinking about our faith as though Christianity were the only show in town. We
live in a multi faithed, multi-cultural, multi-philosophied, post modern
world. We have to think through our faith in that context.
Secondly, Faith, in most religions is about change. If in your adherence to
Christianity, you are seeking a bulwark of stability against a world of
change, you are not on the same page as the Bible or the Christian tradition.
Change in the Christian faith is envisaged as salvation, moving from one state
to another, both individually, socially and politically. Salvation is imaged
in many different ways in the scripture and Tradition, but for me, two
important ways in the scripture are the release of God’s people from slavery,
and the deliverance of a city from siege, with the people being bought by God
out into a broad place. Theology and Doctrine are signposts on the way of
Salvation, but there are many in the church today, who, in my understanding,
wish to abuse theology and doctrine to enslave and confine the human mind. It
is because of this, that, despite possible misunderstandings of the word, I
rejoice to call my self a liberal Christian. I firmly believe that the gospel
brings freedom, and I could never belong to a church which binds its members
to particular doctrines and theological views, requiring them to sign
statements of essentials or covenants of doctrine. If there is heresy in the
church today, I believe it is that.
[i] The Reference is to the film Forrest Gump directed by
Robert Zemeckis, 1994