Corrado Gnerre
Dear friends, I have recently converted to this beautiful Catholic faith. However, I do not deny that there are issues that are still not clear to me. First of all, that of the Trinity. How can God be unique and triune at the same time? Can’t understand this mystery. Thanks for the answer you will give me.
Dear (…), can’t you understand the mystery of the Holy Trinity? Don’t worry. Not only is it not worrying, but you are also in good company. Furthermore, the whole Church (that of two thousand years of history!) gives her support, because she tells her that if you want to understand the mystery of the Trinity, then you must recognize that you do not understand it. It is not a play on words. That’s it. On the other hand, if this were not the case, the mystery of the Trinity would not be a mystery.
Rather, dear (…), we must understand well what a mystery is in the context of the Catholic faith. It is certainly something that is beyond human understanding, but it is not something irrational. It is beyond reason, but it is not against reason. Let me give an example: reason makes us understand unequivocally that God can only be one. Well, if the mystery of the Trinity told us that there is not only one God, but three, then yes there would be an evident contradiction with what reason can understand.
But this mystery does not say this. Rather, it says that God, while being one and unique, is mysteriously distinct in three Persons and these three Persons do not compromise the uniqueness of God. Uncreated is the Father, uncreated the Son, uncreated the Holy Spirit. The Father is immense, the Son is immense, the Holy Spirit immense. Eternal is the Father, eternal is the Son, eternal is the Holy Spirit. Almighty is the Father, almighty is the Son, almighty is the Holy Spirit. But there are not three uncreated, three immense, three eternal, three omnipotent; but an uncreated, an immense, an eternal and an omnipotent. How this happens is difficult for us to understand, even if we can intuit it.
There is a simple example that can be done. We take three candles, light them and place them at a certain distance from each other. Well, there are three flames. But if we brought the candles close to one another, we would notice that the flame would become one. Here, then, is how in reality uniqueness can be conjugated with the Trinity: there are three candles, the flame is one. Of course it is a simple example that explains and does not explain, but suggests something.
Rather, dear (…), do you know that this Mystery is important in order to have clear judgments on some problematic issues?
Let’s take the interreligious dialogue that is increasingly fashionable to do in an excessively forced way, to the point of affirming that all in all Christianity, Judaism and Islam would believe in the same God. The Trinitarian element, in fact, is not an accidental element in God, but a substantial one. It is not a habit that if God takes off, He still remains what He is. No. God is Trinity in his substance!
The other question, dear (…), on which the mystery of the Trinity enlightens us is that of the family. Today, an attack of dissolution of the fundamental cell of society is manifesting itself at full capacity. An attack on the moral, political, social and economic level. Well, the mystery of the Trinity makes us understand that God is essentially “family” and that if we ignore this community element, nothing is conceivable … starting with the nature of man.
(From La buona battaglia. Apologetica cattolica in domande e risposte, 2019©Chorabooks. Translated by Aurelio Porfiri. Used with permission of the publisher. All rights reserved)(Image: Holy Trinity, fresco by Luca Rossetti da Orta, 1738–9, St. Gaudenzio Church at Ivrea. Source: Wikipedia. Photo by Laurom. Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2126728)
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