Lectionary reading
First reading: Deuteronomy 4:32-34, 39-40
Responsorial Psalm: Ps 32(33):4-6, 9, 18-20, 22
Second reading: Romans 8:14-17
Gospel: Matthew 28:16-20
Link to readings.
Commentary
The Church closes the long Lent–Eastertide liturgical season with a feast that invites us to sit back and reflect upon the nature of God as revealed in the Paschal mystery: the feast of the Holy Trinity. It is, of course, through the experience of that mystery and subsequent theological reflection upon it that the early Christians came to know God as three Persons in the one divine essence. The doctrine of the Trinity is not, then, an arid theological puzzle but a necessary conclusion from a sense of being grasped by and held within a divine communion of love. For all the terrors it might inspire in the hearts of preachers on its yearly round, it is a feast about the nearness rather than the remoteness of God.
Of course, the formulation of the doctrine of the Trinity in its classic shape did not occur until well after the New Testament era. It is difficult, then, to find suitable Old Testament readings for the feast. The reading from Deuteronomy (4:32-34, 39-40) chosen as the First Reading is appropriate in the sense that Moses, before outlining the commandments the people are to observe, reminds them of the experience of God that lies behind them and the extraordinary privilege that Israel enjoys as a people chosen, rescued, singled out and addressed by God. The Lectionary appears to want to relate the sense of a people who “heard the voice of the living God speaking from the heart of the fire” to the revelation of God as Trinity that has come to us through the incarnation of the Son. Just as Israel’s commitment to the Law (Torah) flowed from that experience of God, so the experience of being grasped by God as Trinity stands behind the way of life incumbent upon Christian believers.
Though there is no explicit mention of the Trinity in the New Testament, there are a surprising number of places in the Letters of Paul that feature a Trinitarian pattern. Today’s Second Reading, Rom 8:14-17, is one of these. The Spirit communicates to believers a sense of the intimacy with God the Father that is theirs, as sons and daughters of God, in union with Christ. Jesus seems to have addressed God as “Abba – the informal address to the male parent in Aramaic (= “Dad”). Hitherto unknown, as far as we can judge, in Judaism as an address to God, Jesus’ usage in this respect made such an impression upon the early disciples that they retained the original Aramaic even when they moved into Greek-speaking regions. More striking still, they found that the Spirit was impelling them to address God in the same way (Rom 8:15; Gal 4:6)—a sure testimony to the fact that they now shared the intimacy and closeness of Jesus’ relationship to the Father. The upshot is banishment of the fear that would be associated with a servile relationship to God and the gaining of the confidence and freedom that comes from a sense of being “one of the family.” The reading concludes on a note of hope. The sense of being God’s sons and daughters leads naturally to that of being heirs, with the destiny to eternal life that such a status entails. Since everything depends upon believers’ union with Christ as principal Son and heir, it also implies a sharing with him in the paschal mystery: sharing his sufferings in order to share his glory.
The Gospel, taken from the concluding scene in St. Matthew’s Gospel (28:16-20), ends upon what is perhaps the most explicitly Trinitarian note in the New Testament: the command to baptize “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The risen Lord, having completed his mission on earth, claims “all authority in heaven and earth.” Empowered with that authority the Church is to go to the nations of the world and “make disciples of them”, communicating to them a sense of the outreach of divine love into the world, and the conquest of sin and death represented by the whole mission of Christ. When people who respond positively to the Gospel receive baptism in the name of the Trinity they undergo an experience akin to that of Israel in the Exodus. Through the waters of baptism they become members of a people liberated from slavery to enjoy the privileged closeness to God described with reference to Israel in the First Reading but now immensely deepened through the intimacy gained in Christ. The “commandments” they are taught to observe flow from this relationship and give expression to it in everyday life.
All told, the scriptural offering for today’s feast should communicate a dynamic sense of Christian life as a participation in the outgoing communion of love that is the Holy Trinity.
Brendan Byrne, SJ, FAHA, taught New Testament at Jesuit Theological College, Parkville, Vic., for almost forty years. He is now Emeritus Professor at the University of Divinity (Melbourne). His commentaries on the Gospels can be found at Pauline Books and Media