This week's readings Week of June 15 - 21 Sunday, June 15, 2003 The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity Reading I: Dt 4:32-34, 39-40 Reading II: Rom 8:14-17 Gospel: Mt 28:16-20 Monday, June 16, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 6:1-10 Gospel: Mt 5:38-42 Tuesday, June 17, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 8:1-9 Gospel: Mt 5:43-48 Wednesday, June 18, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 9:6-11 Gospel: Mt 6:1-6, 16-18 Thursday, June 19, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 11:1-11 Gospel: Mt 6:7-15 Friday, June 20, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 11:18, 21-30 Gospel: Mt 6:19-23 Saturday, June 21, 2003 Reading I: 2 Cor 12:1-10 Gospel: Mt 6:24-34 Pope's Prayer Intentions June General Intention Respect of human values: That the faithful in public life may be guided by the Gospel and the Church's social teaching to promote respect for human values. June Mission Intention Testimony of full unity in the various Christian traditions of India: That those who belong to various traditions may be drawn together to offer a testimony to full unity and communion in the one Spirit.

Thrice-Holy God:
Life and love for his people

		Word of God  Word of Life  Fr. John G. Stillmank

The mystery of the Triune God who is One in being and yet Three in Persons is a mystery whose depths we can never hope to plumb.

All our categories of theology, philosophy, scientific knowledge, language theory, and the contributions of other disciplines can help us to understand, to a point, the nature of God's divine life as the Trinity. But as finite human beings with limited intellect we can never fully grasp God, although we can draw ever so close.

"So God gives us this new vision, to see the Father as our father, to see the Son as our own brother, to see that it is the life of the Holy Spirit which is breathed within us and around us."

Through the final revelation of God in his Son, Jesus Christ, we see the greatness of the Lord who is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. He who created the world does not disdain to love his creatures. He who redeemed the world by his suffering and death on the Cross does not fail to teach us how to love. He who sanctifies the world fills us with many gifts so that we, in turn, can become gift to all we meet.

This is our God who is our Father, and who makes us his very own children. As such, we are brothers and sisters of Jesus, co-heirs of the Kingdom of God. The Father and the Son send the Holy Spirit to lift us up beyond our narrow mortal sight to see the world, ourselves, and our neighbor in a new light, with a new spiritual vision.

Readings for The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity (June 15, 2003) Deuteronomy 4:32-34, 39-40 Psalm 33:4-5, 6, 9, 18-19, 20, 22 Romans 8:14-17 Matthew 28:16-20

"Was it ever heard of," Moses asked, that a people should hear God's voice and that they should become his people? Was it ever heard of, we might say, that the Lord of heaven and earth should be our Father, our "Abba"? Was it ever heard of that people should come to know their God as a brother, as the very gift of life and breath?

So God gives us this new vision, to see the Father as our father, to see the Son as our own brother, to see that it is the life of the Holy Spirit which is breathed within us and around us.

As Moses taught, the Lord is God in heaven above and on earth below - there is no other. But this Lord, our God, does not hide from his creation. He is within us, close to us, loving and caring for us each moment. Our Father is not some distant deity unconcerned with what he has made, but he is right beside us, loving what he has made with a tender love.

Our brother Jesus is no distant relation but is closer to us than we are to ourselves. Through him all things were made, including human beings. And the Holy Spirit, that breath of God's divine life within us, is never apart from us - so long as we do not part from him.

How can we hope to understand this mystery? Only through faith, the gift of the Lord Jesus to his Church. Only through hope, which relies in trust on God and his promises. Only through love, binding us together as God's holy people and enabling us to love in a way not possible without God's grace and life within us.

"Of the kindness of the Lord the earth is full," we sing in the psalms. That includes us, too. The Lord's loving-kindness fills us with life and goodness. And it is our mission to take that loving-kindness to all peoples everywhere, by teaching them what Jesus has taught us, by sharing his divine life through baptism and the Eucharist, and by allowing the love of the Thrice-Holy God to become our way of loving and living in this world and in the Kingdom to come.

Fr. John G. Stillmank is Moderator of the Curia for the Diocese of Madison and pastor of St. Andrew Parish, Verona, and St. William Parish, Paoli.