"Most Holy Trinity, Glory to You!"

"Most Holy Trinity, Glory to You!"

HOLY TRINITY: in the Heart of the Feast of Pentecost and on the Sinai Summit

The Great Doxastikon of the Feast of the Holy Spirit contains the entire theology of the Orthodox faith in one majestic paragraph – revealing not just the knowledge of the Holy Trinity, but the meaning of the Holy Trinity in the personal reality of our own lives.

 

“Holy God, Who created all things through Your Son, in the synergy of the Holy Spirit. Holy Mighty, through Whom we know the Father, through Whom the Holy Spirit came to dwell in the world. Holy Immortal, the Comforting Spirit, Who proceeds from the Father and rests in the Son. Most Holy Trinity, glory to You!”

Saint Anastasios of Sinai goes so far as to say that humans were made in the image and likeness of God solely so that they would not hesitate to accept the mystery of the Holy Trinity, being able to discern the elements of the trinitarian relationships of God within their own soul. God became man so that man could become god, teach the Orthodox saints, not through the loss of his rational powers, but through their illumination by the Holy Spirit.

As Archbishop Damianos has remarked, knowing we are created by God means not only that God knows our limits, but that we know He understands them. There is great rest to our souls in this knowledge, which empowers us to truly love God by keeping His commandments: Nothing is beyond our abilities, because, knowing our limits, God Himself supplies whatever strength we are lacking....

A novice nun went climbing in the mountains with her sisters, hiking up to a chapel tucked under a high cliff overlooking the Aegean. It was a breathtaking experience – until the tiny chapel came into view, on the opposite side of a steep slope covered with loose shale. It was all too clear that a single false step could easily send one sliding over the cliff on a very long descent into the sea. Worse, everyone else crossed the treacherous slope with aplomb. 

What was to be done? Trying not to think, she began putting one foot in front of the other, too afraid to breathe, when all of sudden she felt her hand disappear into the enormous grasp of a shepherd who had spent his life on that mountain. Knowing this was nothing to him, suddenly it was nothing to her. She continued across the slippery slope fearlessly, inexpressibly comforted by the powerful synergy of Another’s providence, strength, and consolation – all made known, and transported to her inner world, by the ineffable love of a kind shepherd. ...