Explaining The Holy Trinity

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Arturo_Ortiz

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I have to say I don’t fully understand The holy Trinity. I understand that it’s dogma. What I know is that it’s three entities in one being. Hopefully I am saying the truth.

Can someone explain the church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity with a good explanation please?
 
I like the anology of a family, husband, wife and son - 3 persons in 1 family.
 
Keep these parts of the Nicene Creed in mind especially:
I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages. God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God. Begotten not made, consubstantial to the Father, by whom all things were made. …] I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord and Giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who together with the Father and the Son is to be adored and glorified, who spoke by the Prophets. …]
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What I have read essentially says you must make a distinction between what we as humans can do and what God can do.
Our thoughts are imperfect, scattered, abstract;
God’s thoughts are perfect, infinitely focused, truly REAL
With that in mind, consider before time and space existed, GOD the FATHER IS; He expressed Himself in Divine Word (sort of like He was making a Divine Statement, “This is Who I AM”) and because God expresses Himself so perfectly,the result was that this Divine Word was then with GOD, and that Word was GOD. Because of this relationship of the Father begetting the Word, we call the Word, the Son of God (or more clearly: God the SON of God the FATHER)
Now the Son, being just as perfect as the Father, knowing the infinitely wonderful God perfectly, infinitely Loved the Father before all time, and the Father loved His Son, because He was infinitely perfect (it can seem egotistical, but if you can accept that God is the only perfect Being in all existence, then for Him to do anything less than love Perfection would make no sense). Their Love for each Other is so perfect and infinite, this very Love that proceeds from the Father and the Son, It, in and of Itself, is GOD. God is Love (1 John 4:8).

As a side note, all expressions of love are nothing more than the image and likeness of the relationship between the Father and the Son.​

In any case, that is one explanation I’ve heard. If you can perfectly describe the Trinity, then you perfectly know God, and well…to describe the Infinite GOD would take all eternity to describe…maybe we can attend that class in Heaven 👍

PLEASE CORRECT ME IF I’M WAY OFF ON THIS!
 
Arturo_Ortiz said:
I have to say I don’t fully understand The holy Trinity. I understand that it’s dogma. What I know is that it’s three entities in one being. Hopefully I am saying the truth.

Can someone explain the church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity with a good explanation please?
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Every anology falls short, but basically it comes down to the concepts of person and nature(substance).

There are three Divine persons, but one Divine nature. The person, the “I” posses the nature and the person cannot exist without nature. The nature decides what I can do(human nature, good natured etc.) the person denotes who I am. Each Divine person( Father, Son, Spirit) posses the one, eternal, infinite Divine nature(‘Godness’ if you will) in its totality. I Know that this is a philosophical answer but I hope it’s of help.
 
The following two books give an in depth explanation, and both can be read online (and downloaded).

“Theology and Sanity” by Frank Sheed, 1947 edition:
www.katapi.org.uk/TandS/ShortContents.html

The pictures certainly weren`t in the original! 😃

Ignatius Press publishes a 1978 edition, but the two are almost the same.
From the Ignatius Press edition back cover:
Of Sheed`s many books, this is my favorite, not just because** it includes the clearest explanation of the Trinity ever put on paper**, but because it proves that only the Catholic view of reality can satisfy our mental hunger. Karl Keating (!)
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The second book is “Reality” by Fr Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange. Its subtitle is “A Synthesis of Thomistic Thought”. Saint Thomas Aquinas is the Church`s Number 1 Doctor.

www.thesumma.info/reality/index.php

The book can be purchased through Amazon.

Both books are a bit hard-going, but they`re more than worth it, and they cover more than “just” the Blessed Trinity.

The relationship between Christ and His Bride, the Church, and marriage and family life are reflections of the inner Life of God. The Blessed Trinity is the Divine Family.
 
Well, there’s everybody’s favorite comparison to water, ice and steam, three forms, one substance, but I heard an even better one recently: comparing the Trinity to an apple. An apple has a skin, the “meat” and the core of the apple, three parts that are at the same time one whole, individual thing.
 
Instead of using the word ‘person’, try ‘dynamic’ - One God, of Three equal and complimentary dynamics.

Dynamic One - the Giver, the Originator, the Father.
Dynamic Two - the Receiver, the Responder, the Son
Dynamic Three - the Gift, given & returned, the Holy Spirit.

Yes, I agree that ‘dynamic’ is impersonal, but useful as a mental exercise.

More prayful;

The Father loves the Son,
The Son is loved & returns the love to the Father,
the Holy Spirit is the Love - Of them both, given to each other.

Or:

The Logos, the Word. But before a Word is spoken, it is an idea. So, the Logos is God’s idea of Himself, His image of Himself, His expression of Himself.

To have seen Jesus is to have seen God’s fullest expression of Himself on earth - a loving, suffering servant who gives Himself so we, the unworthy, might received.

We have been given the gift of Belovedness.

If we could understand God in this World why live Eternally? 🙂
 
Arturo_Ortiz said:
I have to say I don’t fully understand The holy Trinity. I understand that it’s dogma. What I know is that it’s three entities in one being. Hopefully I am saying the truth.

Can someone explain the church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity with a good explanation please?
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The Trinity can not be fully understood. But you’d be surprised how far we can get in understanding the Trinity before our limited natures cut off our thinking.

God is perfect. God is one. But God is also, in some perfectly fundamental way, a God of love, and by “love” we mean altruistic love – giving love, love aimed at another.

But those words have a problem built into them. If God is an Altruistic Lover in a fundamental way, but alone because “God is one,” then God is an incomplete entity – an altruistic lover of other with no love object. He would be a God with a need. And a God with a need is imperfect.

Therefore, the one God Who is an altruistic lover of other must somehow, in a way which does not violate His oneness, have a love object within Himself
Who in some amazing way is simultaneously an “other” – NOT HIM.

That love object is the Second Person of the Trinity, Jesus.

But the altruistic love isn’t “love” unless it somehow ACHIEVES something – unless it somehow, in some sense, “GOES FROM POINT A TO POINT B.”

When God the Father and God the Son have a perpetual altruistic love relationship between themselves, love arises between them. That love is God the Holy Spirit. The love between the Father and the Son somehow, in some way we can’t fully understand, causes the Holy Spirit to “proceed out of” the Father and the Son. And so, in Catholicism, we say that “the Holy Spirit PROCEEDS OUT OF the Father and the Son.”

When God created humanity, and made the nuclear family, with dad, mom and kids, the fundamental organizational shape of humanity, He in effect made the nuclear family an earthbound “picture” of the Trinity. Dads are a picture of God the Father. Moms are a picture of the divine love object, God the Son. The children arising from the love between Dad and Mom are a picture of the Holy Spirit proceeding out of the union between the Father and the Son.
 
Arturo_Ortiz said:
I have to say I don’t fully understand The holy Trinity. I understand that it’s dogma. What I know is that it’s three entities in one being. Hopefully I am saying the truth.

Can someone explain the church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity with a good explanation please?
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Meditate as you make the sign of the cross(which is the trinity sign): you first point at the mind, then the body and then to left(heart) and right(spirit). it all means that god dwells in you.

God the Father = Mind, the creator
God the Son = Body, Flesh, physical
God the Holy Spirit = Spirit that holds everything together

When explaining it casually, it is the 3 aspects or components of God.

Fire for example can be explain as

God the Father = Flame
God the Son = Light
God the Holy Spirit = Heat

Mental, Physical, Emotional…

Sun, Earth, Moon…

Explosion of Light, Material/Physical/Corporeal matters in our galaxy, Gravity

smaller scale:
neutron, proton, electron

Try to meditate on them as you can see the marks of the Trinity on his creations.
 
Arturo_Ortiz said:
I have to say I don’t fully understand The holy Trinity. I understand that it’s dogma. What I know is that it’s three entities in one being. Hopefully I am saying the truth.

Can someone explain the church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity with a good explanation please?
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Not to be critical, but the way you put this is precisely wrong!

The Trinity is not three entities. It is exactly ONE entity! God is a personal being, and one entity, but in that one entity are three Persons. A person is not a distinct entity, any more than your personhood is a distinct entity from your being. (Otherwise you would be two entities, not one!)

For a more in depth analysis, I recommend Frank J. Sheed’s books “Theology for Beginners” and “Theology and Sanity.” They are pretty easy to read.
 
je333 said:
Meditate as you make the sign of the cross(which is the trinity sign): you first point at the mind, then the body and then to left(heart) and right(spirit). it all means that god dwells in you.

God the Father = Mind, the creator
God the Son = Body, Flesh, physical
God the Holy Spirit = Spirit that holds everything together

When explaining it casually, it is the 3 aspects or components of God.

Fire for example can be explain as

God the Father = Flame
God the Son = Light
God the Holy Spirit = Heat

Mental, Physical, Emotional…

Sun, Earth, Moon…

Explosion of Light, Material/Physical/Corporeal matters in our galaxy, Gravity

smaller scale:
neutron, proton, electron

Try to meditate on them as you can see the marks of the Trinity on his creations.
Click to expand...
Correction: Meditate as you make the sign of the cross(which is the trinity sign): you first point at the mind, then the body and then to spirit(heart)left and then right. it all means that god dwells in you.
 
Though we can never comprehend the greatness and splendor of the Holy Trinity, we can describe it in simple words. My grandfather was once explaining to me the Holy Trinity and he said to imagine God as the sun, Jesus as the rays that come from the sun and the Holy Spirit as the light that radiates from the sun. Three distinct parts of the sun that form one individual thing! Is this right?
 
je333 said:
Fire for example can be explain as

God the Father = Flame
God the Son = Light
God the Holy Spirit = Heat
Click to expand...
I think this one makes the most sense to me especially if we use the Sun as an analogy. The Sun is a distance away from us. It sends forth its light which reaches the earth, and the heat follows.
 
The best possible explanation is this:
Think of your self. You have 3 natures. Body, Mind, Spirit. These 3 are equal. One is no more “you” then the other. Lets say your name is Bob. The body is truly and fully Bob. The mind is Bob too. And the spirit is just as much Bob as the others. There are not three “Bob’s” There is one Bob. Fully represented in his entirety in 3 persons.
👍
 
danielt44 said:
The best possible explanation is this:
Think of your self. You have 3 natures. Body, Mind, Spirit. These 3 are equal. One is no more “you” then the other. Lets say your name is Bob. The body is truly and fully Bob. The mind is Bob too. And the spirit is just as much Bob as the others. There are not three “Bob’s” There is one Bob. Fully represented in his entirety in 3 persons.
👍
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👍👍

which describes the holy trinity essence as
God the Father = invisible
God the Son = visible
God the Holy Spiritand = spirit 😉
 
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