Explaining the Trinity—Does it Matter?

All Things Catholic with Dr. Edward Sri

Ascension

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5 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 2 October 2017

⏱️ 16 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Imagine a non-Christian friend asking you to explain the Trinity: “How does 3=1? Do you believe in three Gods? Or is it just like three different names for the same one God?” How would you respond? And does it really matter?

Does it really make a difference whether we believe in just a solitary divine being or a God who exists as Father, Son and Holy Spirit? Absolutely! In fact, understanding the Trinity is the key to understanding what love is, where our happiness is found and the purpose of our lives. For we are made in the image and likeness not of some vague higher power, but of the God who is love (1 Jn 4:8)—the God whose very inner life is all about total self-giving love. As St. John Paul II taught, we are stamped with a “Trinitarian character,’ meaning we are meant to live like the Trinity in self-giving love. Only when we live self-giving love for others and for God will we find our happiness.

Show Notes

For more on how to explain the Trinity and the importance of this central mystery for our lives, see chapter one from Edward Sri’s book, “Love Unveiled: The Symbolon Book” (Ignatius Press).

For full shownotes, visit Ascensionpress.com/Allthingscatholic, or text ALLTHINGSCATHOLIC to 33-777 for weekly shownotes sent to your inbox.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Edward Sree, and welcome to all things Catholic Catholic where real faith meets real life.
0:17.0	So imagine a non-Christian friend of yours comes up to you and asks a question about our faith, one that gets right to the heart
0:25.2	of our faith, about who God is. He asks you about the Holy Trinity. So Christian, what is this all about?
0:31.9	This idea that there are three persons and only one God?
0:35.6	What does that mean? Three equals one. Does that mean they're really just three persons?
0:39.6	So that means there's three different gods? Or is it more like there's just one god but you give
0:44.8	them three different names you know kind of like people may call me Edward they may
0:48.3	call me Ted they may call me Dr Sri but there's really just one me I just have three different names people call me and maybe that's what you Christians do with your God. So there's just one God, but sometimes you call them Father, sometimes you call them Son, sometimes you call them Holy Spirit. Is that what you mean by the Holy Trinity? What would you say to your friend? How would you explain the belief in the Trinity and what difference does it make? Does it really make any difference whether there is a Trinity or not?
1:15.2	Whether we believe that God is just one, one solitary God or whether he exists as Father,
1:19.1	Son, and Holy Spirit, a Trinity, or if he exists as a quadrity or do it?
1:23.2	Does it really matter?
1:25.1	We're going to be looking at that in this week's episode here.
1:27.9	And I am today in Newark, New Jersey, where I'm doing a retreat for the missionary of charity sisters here in the eastern
1:34.9	region. This is Mother Teresa's order. They do such amazing work giving their lives completely
1:41.5	to the poorest to the poor throughout the world. So if you can say a prayer
1:44.0	for them and for our retreat, I'd greatly appreciate it. But we're going to be
1:47.5	talking about the mystery of the Trinity today and I want to stress it is a
1:52.2	mystery. This is not something that our minds can fully
1:56.2	grasp here on Earth. We're not going to fully exhaust the mystery of the Trinity in this
2:00.4	episode. We're not going to be able to exhaust it if we had all of the rest of
2:05.2	our lives to contemplate it we're really spending God willing we'll be spending all of
2:10.1	eternity contemplating and adoring the Holy Trinity.
	...

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