The Gospel for Trinity Sunday (May 22, 2005)
Matthew 28:16-20
Meanwhile the eleven disciples set out for Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had arranged to meet them. When they saw him they fell down before him, though some hesitated. Jesus came up and spoke to them. He said, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations; baptise them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all the commands I gave you. And look, I am with you always; yes, to the end of time.’ -- The New Jerusalem Bible. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1995, c1985
The Last Meeting
Some of them hesitated because they didn't recognize Him. He told them to baptize and teach. And He assured them.
A Reflection
Some of them did not recognize Him. Most of us don't recognize Him today, and all of us fail to see Him all the time He appears to us in our sisters and brothers.
The last order He gave was simple and direct: welcome everyone into Jesus' followers, baptize them, and teach them to follow the commands He had given -- and there were only a few.
And then He assured them that He would always be there with them, something we can verify today just by asking for His comfort.
I am bothered today by how the church has reacted to Jesus' commands given in the Canonical Gospels. For example, today is "Trinity Sunday." It is supposed to celebrate the mystical concept of a Triune God: the three in one, three distinct personae, yet one in being.
But take a few centuries and dig through the gospels and find that concept somewhere? No thanks.
Yet the filioque controversy is one of the huge wedges that separates the Eastern church (the so-called "Orthodox") from the Roman church (the so-called "Catholic"). The filioque controversy centers on whether the Nicene Creed should proclaim that the Holy Spirit "proceeds from the Father [stop here if you're Eastern] and the son [stop here if you're everyone else]".
Now, finding the Biblical roots for that controversy are about as easy as finding the ones for the Trinity discussions that have resounded in ecclesia and ecclesial academia for years. Men and women have been martyred over them. Children [the littlest ones, the least of these] have lost parents over them.
Yet churches have paid scant attention to the things that Jesus said to do, and almost all their attention to the ones He never mentioned.
And we laity are supposed to line up and pay our money for the privilege of being branded with a certain denomination's logo?
For the money that has been spent in the last two years debating and politicking over Gene Robinson's consecration (Jesus never consecrated any bishops, by the way), or same-sex marriage (Jesus never married any couples that we know of, and polygamy was the rule of the day in Israel)....
.... for all that money, how many children could have been fed so that they could learn in school? For all that money, how many people in Darfur, Sudan, could have been evacuated to safety?
Shall we call what we in the church today do "following His commandments"?
The Collect
Almighty and everlasting God, you have given to us your servants grace, by the confession of a true faith, to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity, and in the power of your divine Majesty to worship the Unity: Keep us steadfast in this faith and worship, and bring us at last to see you in your one and eternal glory, O Father; who with the Son and the Holy Spirit live and reign, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
8:12:53 PM 
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