Each time we make
the sign of the cross, as we did at the beginning of this celebration, we say:
"In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit."
But do we truly understand what we are saying? I don’t think so... The reason
for this is that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit we invoke compose
what we must call a Mystery: the Mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. Now, a
mystery is precisely something that one does not understand. This does not mean
that we are unable to express anything at all concerning this reality; on the
contrary, we are able, thanks to what Jesus told us, to describe this mystery a
little and to grasp it through comparisons and images.
The Mystery of
the Most Holy Trinity, which we celebrate today, consists of this: the Father
is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three
gods, but only one God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is the Mystery of the Trinity of
Persons in the one God. If one were to seek for a comparison in order to
try to grasp a little of this mystery, the only one that is completely adequate
is that which Jesus himself gave us, when he said: As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so he
who eats me will live because of me[1]
This is a comparison between the Most Holy Trinity and the union of the various
persons who make up the Mystical Body of Christ.
… Yes, I know all
this is complicated or even complex; we cannot understand it in a few minutes
in a homily and on one Sunday, [I mean] be closer to the mysteries of our faith
is the work of all our lives, the way we walk as Christians. The point I want
to focus today is very simple: invite each one to think how much we appreciate
and know our Catholic faith. Last week, on Pentecost, we celebrated the
birthday of the Church and the feast of the Holy Spirit and we left the parish saying
hallelujah twice; we turn off the paschal candle... But what next?
Now comes in the
liturgy of the Church something called Ordinary
Time[2]
which runs from next Sunday until November, when we will celebrate Christ the
King and prepare for Advent. And so another year ends and begins the liturgical
cycle. What cannot happen to us is that we do not feel the Spirit over our
lives. That would be a tragedy! My brother, my sister, the routine in the spiritual life is the worst thing that can happen.
If we allow
boredom to enter our lives and see Sunday Mass as a moment in which we seek
entertainment, little by little we are becoming numb and turned this into a
religious service agency, not a place where the soul and God have a
conversation, a place where the soul receives the grace of its creator, a place
where souls come to receive, say so, gasoline
for the rest of the week.
One of my
biggest concerns as pastor of this community is to help that my people, my
sheep, rediscover the meaning of the
sacred. This fact –the loss of the sense of the sacred, the devaluation of silence-
is one of the greatest tragedies of our country: we do not find God in the
street, we do not find God in the world of sports, we do not find God in the
world of film and art, so parishes
should be then that place where
every Sunday people can find their God.
Dante, the great
Italian poet, said this in a great way: «The strongest desire of everything,
and the one first implanted by nature, is to return to its source. And since God is the source of our souls and
has made it alike unto Himself, therefore this soul desires above all things to
return to Him"[3]. There is one place where we can begin to
rediscover the sacred: our parish, the Eucharist, the celebration of the
mystery of our faith.
My brother, my
sister, let us ask our blessed Mother for her help to accomplish this important
task in our Christian life, more than a task, the essence of our Christian life
■
[1] Jn. 6:57
[2] The English name "ordinary
time" translates the Latin term Tempus
per annum (literally "time through the year"). Since 1970 in the
ordinary form of the Roman rite in the Catholic Church, Ordinary Time comprises
two periods: one beginning on the day after the Feast of the Baptism of the
Lord (the end of the Christmas season) and ending on the day before Ash
Wednesday, the other beginning on the Monday after Pentecost (the conclusion of
Eastertide) and continuing until the Saturday before Advent Sunday (the First
Sunday of Advent). The Church numbers the weeks of Ordinary Time, although
several Sundays bear the names of feasts or solemnities celebrated on those
days, including Trinity Sunday and the Feast of Christ the King. The liturgical
color normally assigned to Ordinary Time is green.
[3] Durante degli Alighieri,
mononymously referred to as Dante (1265–1321), was an Italian poet, prose
writer, literary theorist, moral philosopher, and political thinker. He is best
known for the monumental epic poem Commedia, later named La divina commedia (Divine
Comedy), considered the greatest literary work composed in the Italian
language and a masterpiece of world literature. In Italy he is known as il
Sommo Poeta ("the Supreme Poet") or just il Poeta. Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio are also known as
"the three fountains" or "the three crowns". Dante is also
called the "Father of the Italian language".
