Brothers and sisters 

May the Lord give you peace! 

This Sunday the Church celebrates the solemnity of the “Most Holy Trinity”. Here in Cyprus we also celebrate the feast of St. Barnabas…. However, the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity takes precedence. Therefore, today the Church celebrates God. So: in our faith we affirm that there is only one God. But our God, although One, is also Triune. “When I was a child a priest tried to explain to us and wrote on the blackboard: 1 plus 1 plus 1 equals = 1…. And it made us even more confused”. That is: there are three Persons who are called: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And how is this possible? How to explain? As Saint Augustine said: trying to understand God, to understand the Holy Trinity, is like putting sea water in the hole we make in the sand on the beach. 

Yes, brothers and sisters, the key, the secret to understanding this mystery, has been taught to us in the Gospel of St. John that we have heard: “love”… (Agapa). God loved the world so much: that he gave his son…. Only those who love will be able to understand God, only love opens us to the knowledge of Trinitarian love. For Muslims we are idolaters, for Jews we are a scandal, for others we are just good, pacifists… And here we ask ourselves: If God is love, he must love someone, right? Behold, the Father has always loved his Son… The solemnity we celebrate today reveals to us that God is not alone, that he is a community of love, in the Holy Spirit. And beware brothers and sisters: it is unity, in the Trinity… it is not a fusion: they are three distinct persons. Trinitarian love teaches us that unity is not fusion… the great risk is to confuse Trinity, unity with fusion. And Fusion is certainly confusion. 

First of all, the Trinity reminds us of the equal dignity that every person has. Yes, brothers and sisters… celebrating the Holy Trinity is celebrating the greatness of God, who reminds us that we were created in his image and likeness. Therefore, our true image is Trinitarian. And we are the perfect image of God when we are in relationship: when a man and a woman get married, have their children, they become the perfect image of God… when we are selfish, we think only of ourselves… we disfigure the image of God …. But be careful: unity, not fusion….Every person has dignity. She is created in the image of God and for her God gave himself. Do we remember it? Each person, starting with those close to us (e.g. family members). In families: children are not all the same…. They are to be respected… in any relationship…. in the community…. 

The Holy Spirit is present in every brother and sister… Every brother and sister is the image of God, a spark of God. And He gave his son, out of love for every man, every woman. Yes, my value, your value is the cross of Christ. It is the life of the child of God… We find the answer in Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians: the promise of Love is fulfilled with Jesus (the Son of God) who, by dying and rising for us, allowed us to spend all Eternity with God. Yes, love makes us saints… it changes us…

I remember when I was in Argentina. In the city of Corrientes, an elderly lady visited a young man in the prison every Sunday. She brought food, clothes, read the bible to him, brought the priest to talk to him… who was this young man? He was the man who had killed her son. I asked this lady: why did she do this, and why did she forgive? That lady replied: yes, father I have forgiven, true forgiveness is Jesus’ forgiveness, it is God’s love for him, for me, for the whole world. 

And I would like to conclude this homily with a question: are we really in love with the Trinity? Am I in love with the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit? Because God, the Lord is in love with each of us. And I really conclude with this prayer: 

O divine Trinity, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, present and active in the Church and in the depths of my soul, I adore you, I thank you, I love you! O Mary, mother of the Church and my mother, who live in the presence of the divine Trinity, teach us to live, in intimate communion with the three divine Persons, so that my whole life may be a “glory to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit”. Amen.