The Most Holy Trinity
VOCATION: Jesus calls us - He calls you to follow Him, to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and become a missionary disciple....
“Blessed are You, O Lord, God of our
fathers and
blessed is your glorious and holy name.
Alleluia!”
Dear Sisters and
Brothers, two weeks ago, on the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord, I
invited you to do a spiritual exercise – “God’s Sacred History with Me”. Did
you try to do it? If you did, how did it go? Did you have any trouble
remembering or identifying moments in your life when you were touched by God,
by his power to save, by his love and mercy, by his healing grace? If you
didn’t try to do it, I invite you to look into your heart to see – why not?
Of course, we are
not obliged to remember when God blessed us; nor are we obligated to have a
relationship with God our Creator, our Father, nor with Jesus, Our Lord, nor
with the Holy Spirit. But then, why would we not want, not only to have, but also to develop a personal relationship
with each of the three Divine Persons of the Most Blessed Trinity?
“Blessed
are you in the temple of your holy glory,
and to
be extolled and highly glorified forever. Alleluia!”
It all begins with believing that Jesus, the son of Mary, is the One
sent by God the Father to come into the world to reveal to us that the Father
loves us as his very own children, but more than that. Jesus is the One who
reveals the Father to us; He makes it possible for us to come to know the Father
personally, and that He loves me personally; He loves each of us personally.
“Blessed are you on the throne of your
kingdom,
and to be extolled and highly exalted forever. Alleluia!”
So, how does it
happen, exactly, that Jesus reveals the Father to us? It all begins with us
deciding to believe in Jesus, not only that He is the son of Mary, but also
that He is the Son of God the Father, and that it is the Holy Spirit who caused
Mary to conceive in her womb the baby boy whom she and Joseph would call a holy
Name, Yeshoua in Hebrew. Jesus, in English, means “God
saves”. Believing in Jesus as son of Mary and at the same
time Son of God, we look at Him. We look at Him on the cross, in an image, or
in our imagination – and, looking at Jesus, we contemplate Him – and we realize
He is already looking at us with love. We accept and welcome his loving look, and
He pours into us the fire of his divine Love, the Holy Spirit.
“Blessed
are you who look into the depths from your throne on the cherubim. Alleluia!”
Have you ever
suffered from the painful impression that what you think doesn’t matter to
anyone? It is a very common human experience to feel that no one cares about
what I think. It is also true that the greatest pain experienced by people who
are itinerant, living on the street, is feeling invisible because people
passing by very rarely look into their eyes. St. Paul tells us to “greet
one another with a holy kiss.” The person in front of me
will feel that I care when I look into their eyes with love. They will feel
that their thought matters if I listen to them express it.
“Blessed are you in the firmament of heaven, to be
sung and glorified forever. Alleluia!”
“Moses
quickly bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped” in the presence of God. He made room for God in his
thoughts and in his heart. Jesus made lots of room for his Father by spending
many hours in the silence of the night watching and listening. St. Paul tells
us to “agree
with one another”. This just means making room for one another in our mind and
heart. We don’t have to agree with others, and they don’t have to agree with
us. But it is an act of love to make room for the other in my mind and in my
heart. Then, the Holy Spirit actually uses others to teach me about them, about
life, about myself, and about God.
“If now I have found favour in your sight, O Lord, I
pray, stay with me forever. Alleluia!”
We have been blessed with
50 days of Easter and today we celebrate the wondrous mystery of the Most Holy
Trinity – that our Creator God is actually a divine community of 3 Persons –
and that we all come from God and are all returning to God. We can feel confused
or afraid in the face of the unknown – whether it’s a strange or different or
unknown human being or God. We have nothing to fear from God, who wants nothing
but our good and our eternal happiness. But God’s ways are not our ways, and in
the ways of the Lord, the unpleasant experiences of life – storms, accidents,
illness, pain, misunderstanding, conflicts, temptation, and sin – all can be
used by God to help us become the person we are meant to be, the person we want
to be.
“If now I have found favour in your
sight, O Lord, I pray, stay with me forever. Alleluia!”
I have placed on my website a spiritual exercise to
help you go back over the moments when you were touched by the love of God. The
people of God reflected on their sacred history with God; that’s the Bible. You
also have a sacred history with God. On the Internet, look for my name – Gilles Surprenant
blog – that
will open a link Father Gilles Surprenant. Click on the link and you’ll come to my home page. There,
you will see several navigation links; look for the link Fr. Gilles’ English
Homilies and
there you’ll find today’s homily with a link to:
SPIRITUAL EXERCISE – “GOD’S SACRED HISTORY WITH ME”
https://fathergillespages.blogspot.com/2023/06/christian-prayer-gods-sacred-history.html
“If now
we have found favour in your sight, O Lord, we pray, stay with us forever.
Alleluia!”
“Mary
Mother of God, St. Joseph, walk with us in
the steps of Jesus. O my
Jesus, I trust in You! Thank You; You who are God, the
Father, + the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
In silence now, the Holy
Spirit helps us to lay down our offering together with that of Jesus….
https://frgilleshomilies.blogspot.com https://homeliesabbegilles.blogspot.com
