The title of the New York Times article on May 31 2020, “Two Crises Convulse a Nation: a Pandemic and Police Violence,” though thoughtfully written, seems to me a bit misleading, if not lacking the true reality of our current state. Two crises that are convulsing our nation are the pandemic and racism, not merely police violence. The murder of George Floyd by the four police officers sparked the recent upheavals of major cities in our nation, yet we shouldn’t forget the murder of Ahmaud Arbery and another murder of Breonna Taylor by plainclothed officers. While condemning police brutality, it’s not just about police as we know. The deeper seated issue really is our nation’s original sin of racism which pervades every aspect of our lives and sickens the world. While we focus on the real issue of racism, we also want to be both critical and mindful of the violent upheavals to which the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. speaks, “A riot is the language of the unheard.”
Our hearts are wounded as we face the deaths of those who died of Covid-19 and the deaths of Black Americans. We continue to lament for all these tragedies, and I feel like our Lenten season this year has never ended. Though Easter Sunday came to us like a monthly billing statement, we’re still hoping for the resurrection in our time here. We celebrated the indwelling breath of the Spirit in all human beings on Pentecost Sunday, yet we heard the voice of the crucified, “I can’t breathe.” Then comes Trinity Sunday today. In our head, we know that the Trinity is something that all Christians are supposed to believe in, but does this peculiar and often ineffable doctrine that is supposed to be the truth about God help us deal with the two crises of our nation? It does. Then how? It’s certainly not by understanding the doctrine of the Trinity intellectually. The Trinity is not something to be taught but to be experienced in our lives through our triune experiences of God. Rather than using the more common trinitarian language of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Saint Irenaeus in the 2nd century contemplates on the Trinity as “God-the glorious Transcendent; the powerful, illuminating, and transforming Holy Spirit; the divine knowing and intelligent Wisdom of the Creator and Logos, each revelation being the fullness of God.” God the Trinity is the Transcendent, the Logos/Wisdom, and the Spirit. When you pray or meditate in deep silence and focused concentration, you experience God within. This experience of God within is one experiencing the Spirit who is illuminating and transforming. When your heart is scarred by our recent tragedies, the Spirit within you grieves and weeps for all the suffering. When you encounter the beauty of nature, we are in awe of the Wisdom of God who knows and creates all. There is no place in this world that God isn’t. God is revealed through nature and all creation as the Wisdom. What about that awesomeness of God who we see as that which transcends time and space, life and death, light and darkness? All these triune experiences of God that become unitive base our encounter with the Trinity. All baptized Christians are the beneficiaries of today’s gospel lesson. Jesus tells his friends who are sent (literally what an apostle, apostolos means in Greek) to make disciples, baptizing in the name of the Father (Transcendent), of the Son (Wisdom/Logos), and of the Holy Spirit and teaching them to follow Jesus’s way of love. Our baptism reveals our triune experiences of God, and our duty to be present to the presence of the Trinity puts us on the way to the cross. If your hearts are aching and bleeding for the murders of Black Americans, be assured you are present to the Trinity. And see where you are led from there and be courageous to go where God suffers with our neighbors. Breathe in your compassion to those who can’t breath. Awaken the conscience and consciousness of those who cannot see the beauty of God’s humanity that is colored in black, brown, red, yellow, white, and rainbow. Transcend the superficial and fictional divides of supremacy or inferiority. Whether or not we see the fruit of our joining in the mission of God, Jesus promises one thing, “Remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Remember, Christ is risen. So we continue to walk to the cross. Amen. |
Paul"...life up your love to that cloud [of unknowing]...let God draw your love up to that cloud...through the help of his grace, to forget every other thing." Archives
January 2025
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