IS IT NECESSARY TO BELIEVE IN THE TRINITY?
Is it necessary to believe in the Trinity? Can we? Is it any good? Is it an unnecessary intellectual construction? Does it change our faith at all if we don’t believe in the trinitarian God? Two centuries ago, the famous philosopher Immanuel Kant wrote these words: «From a practical point of view, the doctrine of the Trinity is perfectly useless».
Nothing could be further from the truth. Faith in the Trinity changes not just our vision of God, but also our way of understanding life. To confess the Trinity of God is to believe that God is a mystery of communion and of love. God isn’t a closed off and impenetrable being, unmoving and indifferent. God’s mysterious intimacy is just love and communication. As a result: in the final base of reality, giving meaning and existence to everything, there’s nothing but Love. Everything that exists comes from Love.
The Father is originating Love, the source of all love. The Father begins love. «Only God begins to love without motives; what’s more, it’s God who from always has begun to love» (Eberhard Jungel). The Father loves from forever and for forever, without being obliged or motivated from outside. The Father is the «eternal Lover». The Father loves and will keeps loving forever. The Father will never take love and faithfulness away. From the Father only love springs forth. As a result: we are created in God’s image, we are made to love. Only by loving are we established in existence.
The being of the Son consists in receiving the love of the Father. He is the «eternally Beloved», before the creation of the world. The Son is the Love that welcomes, the eternal answer to the love of the Father. The mystery of God consists, then, in giving and also in receiving love. In God, letting ourselves be loved isn’t less than loving. To receive love is also divine! As a result: in being created in that God’s image, we are made not just in order to love, but in order to be loved.
The Holy Spirit is the communion of the Father and the Son. The Spirit is the eternal Love between the loving Father and the beloved Son, the one who reveals that divine love isn’t the jealous possession of the Father nor the selfish hoarding of the Son. True love is always openness, gift, overflowing communication. That’s why God’s Love doesn’t end up within God Self, but is communicated and extended to God’s creatures. «God’s love has been poured forth in our heart by the Holy Spirit who has been given to us» (Romans 5,5). As a result: in being created in the image of that God, we are made to love each other, without hoarding or closing ourselves in to fictitious and selfish loves.
José Antonio Pagola
Translator: Fr. Jay VonHandorf
