Trinity Sunday: Let St. Gregory Teach Us Again
Most Catholics will not hear a substantial homily on the Trinity this Sunday. That is understandable. The mystery of one God in three Persons stretches language to its limits. Yet the Church has spent two thousand years contemplating this mystery. Rather than attempting something new, let us listen to one of her greatest teachers.
St. Gregory of Nazianzus (c. 329–390), known simply as “the Theologian,” devoted his life to defending and contemplating the mystery of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Nearly sixteen centuries later, his words still illuminate what our own explanations often struggle to express.
In his Fifth Theological Oration, Gregory writes:
“To us there is One God, for the Godhead is One… When we look at the Godhead, or the First Cause, or the Monarchia, that which we conceive is One; but when we look at the Persons in Whom the Godhead dwells… there are Three Whom we worship.”
Gregory refuses both confusion and division. God is One. Yet the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are truly distinct Persons, equal in majesty and united in one divine nature.
Elsewhere he describes the mystery with striking imagery:
“When I bring the three together in contemplation, I see one torch and am unable to divide or measure the united light.”
Gregory understood that the Trinity is not a puzzle to be solved but a reality to be adored. The closer he drew to the mystery, the more his language became worship.
In an age that prizes easy answers and instant clarity, Trinity Sunday offers a different invitation. It calls us to humility before truths greater than ourselves. We do not fully grasp God; we are grasped by Him.
Perhaps that is why the Church calls the Trinity a mystery. Not because it is irrational, but because the infinite life of God exceeds the full reach of finite minds.
On this Trinity Sunday, let us do what Christians have done for centuries: worship the Father as God, the Son as God, and the Holy Spirit as God—Three Persons, One God, blessed forever.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
Sources
St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Theological Orations 31.14; Oration on the Holy Lights 39.11; Oration on Holy Baptism 40.41.
English translation from Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 7.
Featured image inspired by the Holy Trinity icon traditionally attributed to Andrei Rublev (c. 1411–1427)