Feast of the Most Holy Trinity

Dear faithful,

We read in the very beginning of the book of Genesis of how God made mankind: And he said: Let us make man to our image and likeness. [Gen 1,26]. Man was created in the image and likeness of God.

When we speak of something being the image of something else, it brings to mind a portrait or a painting. The artist will have before his mind a scenery or a person and will apply color to the canvas to make an image. An image should be a copy, or rather a translation of something from one medium to another. A picture of course is not a man, but it can be an image of a man. The picture is something completely different, vastly inferior to a human being, but nonetheless the picture can be an image of a person. An image can show us what a man looks like, but it is not a man. Thus when Holy Scripture says that man was created in the image of God, it means that man is somehow an imprint or has some sort of characteristics that reflect in some way what God is. Though of course a human being is completely different from God, just like a portrait is a completely different thing than a living person, nonetheless there is something similar, something that says to us that this image is an image of God, just like we can say that this statue above the altar is a statue of Our Lady - it is an image of Our Lady. Of course it isn’t the person of Our Lady, but it is an image, a sort of reflection, such that we can look at the statue and recognize the features of Our Lady.

Thus if man is an image of God, there is something in man that reflects who God is. When we look at a portrait, what forms the image and makes it reflect the characteristics of a person are the colors and lines which the artist imprints upon the canvas. So we see also in the book of Genesis the work of an artist: And the Lord God formed man of the slime of the earth: and breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living soul. [Gen 2,7]. This living soul which God imprinted upon the clay is what makes man the image of God.

These considerations, my dear faithful, bring us to the contemplation of the mystery which we celebrate today, the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. It is this feast that teaches us most profoundly Who God is: He is one God in Three Divine Persons. God is one, as there is only one divine nature, there is only one perfect being. We know that there can only be one God as if there were two, there would have to be something to distinguish them from each other. One of them would have to have something that the other did not, and thus would not be perfect from this lack. Thus thus there can only be one God. And yet God is in Three Divine Persons who are distinct: the Father is not the Son, and neither of them is the Holy Ghost.

Perhaps the best way to truly understand this mystery is to look upon the image of God which He created. Just like you can begin to know someone by a portrait that someone makes of them, so we can know something of God by that image which God made of Himself, namely the human soul.

A human soul belongs to one human being - just like there is only one Divine Nature, there is only one human being for each immortal soul. And yet the human soul, which is spiritual, is gifted with two powers, two spiritual powers that are what make it truly human: the power of reason, and the power of love. The power of reason makes the soul universal in the sense that we can know things, other things outside of us can enter our minds and we can grasp their nature and understand them. What is even more astonishing is that we can even know ourselves, come to some knowledge of who we are and of our own human nature. The power of language is exactly to express this interior knowledge that we have of ourselves to others. The power of love is that attractive force that pulls us towards the thing loved - we want to be united with it, we want good for it, we want to possess it. Whereas mankind has many other faculties and powers, these two are what makes him human, created in the image of God.

God is a spirit, and as God is spiritual God Himself also knows and loves yet in a manner infinitely greater than ourselves. God knows all things, and He also knows Himself in a perfect manner. God also expresses Himself, expresses this knowledge that He has of Himself but in a way that is infinitely greater than our poor language can do. Whereas we have to use many phrases and words to express our interior life and interior knowledge of ourself, God does so in one Unique Word: the Word of God. This Word is something distinct from the person Who expresses it - and yet expresses the exact nature of God. This Word is eternal like God is, and it is the same nature as God, and yet it is another Person. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. This is the second Person of the Most Holy Trinity, the Son of God.

And from the Father and the Son there is likewise an infinite love, an infinite attraction between them that is united by the fact that they share the very same nature. The good wished for each other is likewise that infinite and perfect Good, the Divine Nature. This love is however something distinct from the Father and the Son, as Our Lord announced that Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from the Father. He is sent by the Father and the Son as from one principle, being Himself the substantial Love of God. This distinct Person is the Holy Ghost, the divine love of God proceeding from the Father and the Son.

What is most astonishing, and even more mysterious, my dear faithful, is that we read in the book of Genesis that God created man not only in His image, but also in His likeness. Likeness is much more than an image. A likeness is a comparison that presupposes something equal, a nature that is equivalent. For instance, one can say that your daughter is similar to your wife, or that your son is similar to your grandfather. You would not say however that a dog is similar to a cat. There is something of an equivalence of nature in a likeness, that what is like another must have something in common.

And God created man in His image and likeness. This likeness of God was infused in the soul of Adam from the very moment of his creation. It is this likeness that rendered Adam pleasing to God and also which entitled him to eternal life, that is to say to a life like to that of God. This likeness is what we call sanctifying grace, the grace that makes us children of God. It is this grace that renders us pleasing to God and even able to enjoy God for all eternity as St. John says: we shall be like to him: because we shall see him as he is. [1 Jn 3,2]. It is for this reason that we receive grace and are baptized, according to the command of Our Lord in the Gospel of today: in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. [Mt 28,19]

This life of God, my dear faithful, this eternal happiness of God is what we were made for, as we were first created not only in His image but also His likeness. This likeness we can lose however by sin. Sin destroys this likeness of God in our souls and renders us impossible to be happy like God for eternity. Our Lord suffered His Passion and Sin in order to pay the price of the loss of this grace - as this likeness of God is so precious that the Son of God Himself must pay the price with His own life. There is truly only one evil in this world, dear faithful, and it is the infinite evil of sin, for by sin we lose the likeness of God Himself. In fact we lose God Himself as this likeness is nothing less than the indwelling of the Holy Trinity in our souls.

Our Lord said to us: If any one love me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him, and will make our abode with him. [Jn 14,23]. The Holy Trinity, the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost whom they send into our hearts crying “Abba, Father” [Rm 8,15], dwell in us when we are in the state of grace. This mystery that we celebrate today, the infinite interior life of God, is something that it accessible to us my dear faithful, it even becomes a part of us if we obey the words of Our Lord.

And so, my dear faithful, with these considerations let us look always to that which is most precious, most important. The state of grace is in reality the only true reality, the only truly important thing in our lives. With the state of grace we have everything, even God Himself. Let us then do all in our power to keep this state of grace, and if we have the misfortune to lose it, to find it again as quickly as possible by a good confession. Let us keep always in our hearts and our minds, in our knowing and our loving, this presence of the Most Holy Trinity, that this presence might blossom on the day of our entry into eternity as a happiness without end, Amen.