Returning Catholic Needs Clarification

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Hello all. I was born and raised Catholic but stopped beleiving after high school. last year I rediscovered my faith (I am 47) and am reading the Bible for the first time in my life! There is one thing that confuses me and I cannot explain to others…the Holy Trinity.

My understanding is that the Holy Trinity IS God. The three who are one. Yet Jesus says he is the Son of God, and the NT says God sent his Son, etc. words that seem to say that God and Jesus are two different entities. Can someone please clarify this for me? How can God be all three but refer to Jesus as his son?

Thanks;
Henry
 
One traditional way of explaining the Blessed Trinity is this diagram:



As you can see, the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. But the Three Persons of the Trinity are still distinct Persons, so in response to your question, the Father is not the Son.

Sometimes in the New Testament, “God” refers to the whole Trinity, but sometimes it refers to the Father, such as when you read “God sent His only Son.”

I hope that helps. You should get a catechism. I recommend starting with a St. Joseph’s Baltimore Catechism or the Youcat (though you might find the latter a little juvenile, it’s good for beginners.)

Also, you should talk to your priest. He will almost certainly want you to go to confession before you present yourself for Holy Communion again, and I’m sure he’d like to help you find your footing.

You’ll be in my prayers.
 
Rich_C said:
One traditional way of explaining the Blessed Trinity is this diagram:

http://catholic-resources.org/Images/Trinity-Is-IsNot.jpg

As you can see, the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God. But the Three Persons of the Trinity are still distinct Persons, so in response to your question, the Father is not the Son.

Sometimes in the New Testament, “God” refers to the whole Trinity, but sometimes it refers to the Father, such as when you read “God sent His only Son.”

I hope that helps. You should get a catechism. I recommend starting with a St. Joseph’s Baltimore Catechism or the Youcat (though you might find the latter a little juvenile, it’s good for beginners.)

Also, you should talk to your priest. He will almost certainly want you to go to confession before you present yourself for Holy Communion again, and I’m sure he’d like to help you find your footing.

You’ll be in my prayers.
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Wow that’s an excellent post.

To the OP, remember that in Matthew 28:20, Jesus tells the apostles to go around the world baptizing all nations in the name of the Father, Son, Holy Spirit.

In Acts, we see how the Holy Spirit plays a major role
 
Or a 3 way Adapter which has a lead on it with a plug that fits into the main Socket.

You can put your Computer, Side Light, Land line phone into the 3 Sockets, all 3 will work, as the lead has a plug attached to the main socket in the wall.
 
holyforge said:
Hello all. I was born and raised Catholic but stopped beleiving after high school. last year I rediscovered my faith (I am 47) and am reading the Bible for the first time in my life! There is one thing that confuses me and I cannot explain to others…the Holy Trinity.

My understanding is that the Holy Trinity IS God. The three who are one. Yet Jesus says he is the Son of God, and the NT says God sent his Son, etc. words that seem to say that God and Jesus are two different entities. Can someone please clarify this for me? How can God be all three but refer to Jesus as his son?

Thanks;
Henry
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When with questions, it’s always best to turn to the Catechism of the Church
vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s2c1p2.htm
 
holyforge said:
Hello all. I was born and raised Catholic but stopped beleiving after high school. last year I rediscovered my faith (I am 47) and am reading the Bible for the first time in my life! There is one thing that confuses me and I cannot explain to others…the Holy Trinity.

My understanding is that the Holy Trinity IS God. The three who are one. Yet Jesus says he is the Son of God, and the NT says God sent his Son, etc. words that seem to say that God and Jesus are two different entities. Can someone please clarify this for me? How can God be all three but refer to Jesus as his son?

Thanks;
Henry
Click to expand...
There is an interesting commentary by Fr. Barron on Augustine’s reflection on the Trinity that may be instructive for you.

youtu.be/lGUo00j9qvw

Pay special attention to the section from 3:38 on.

Also this collection from Word on Fire.

wordonfire.org/WOF-TV.aspx?tagid=682
 
Welcome Home!

The mystery that is the trinity is a mind bender, but one I’m sure we’ll be able to better understand, if it is to be understood, when staring God in the face.

I think a good way of evaluating the mystery, is essentially to evaluate the word ‘love’.

Three in one, better than one of one, can display what love is to creation as we relate ‘love’ to relationships.

Seeing this in Father, Son, and HS.

Love must be very important to a God of three person’s in one.
 
youtube.com/watch?v=KQLfgaUoQCw

This video probably doesn’t help to explain it… it’s just a funny way to conclude that the trinity is a great mystery of the faith that is pretty difficult to explain with analogies. It suffices to say that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, but the Father is not the Son and the Son is not the Father, and so on… 👍
 
While countless of books and articles have been written these past 2,000 years about the Holy Trinity we cannot fully explain it because God has chosen to reveal what He has, and not more. It will remain a Mystery – not fully understood – until we enter Heaven. But we do know enough to accept there are 3 separate persons in one God.

I think the following verses describe The Oneness of God - The Holy Trinity without stating the label Holy Trinity:

John 14: 6-11
John 14: 15-26
John 15: 26
John 16: 7-15

I am sure there are other Biblical references, but I think these are sufficient to show the relationship between God The Father, God The Son, and God The Holy Spirit.

To compare, albeit too simply, we can see a man as a teacher without ever seeing him acting as a father. We can know the man well enough to carry with us his teachings although we no longer can see him because he left the scene. But having learned his teachings, the spirit of his teachings can come back to our mind and we remember what he told us.

If we can understand how we can relate to this ONE man in three different ways - Father, Teacher, Spirit - then it should be easier to understand how God can be three persons in ONE God - the Holy Trinity.
 
I am reading through a detailed patristic (early church fathers) commentary on the gospel of John.

Page after page, it was same-o, same-o but really interesting of course.

But, then I got to the commentary on the tenth chapter of the gospel of John, and the early church fathers had a theological field day, pointing out how to explain the relationship of the Father and the Son.

There were some WILD ideas in the early centuries of the Church, and the council of Nicea and later Constantinople were convened to express the faith of the Church, which at least the Catholics and Orthodox recite in many liturgies (ignoring for now the “filioque” problem).

The simplest explanation in human words is that the Father and the Son are of the same substance (“consubstantial” as we say in the Nicene Creed at Mass) but they are not the same “person” – there are three persons in God, but only one God.

There are all sort of heretical variations of this: that there are three gods, that there are two gods, that Christ did not have a human nature, etc.

Nobody understands it completely, all this is only attempting to describe what scripture says about the matter. John Chapter Ten.

The Jews were really mad at what Jesus said and were determined (contrary to the law of Moses that they were so proud of) to murder Jesus. That is part of the testimony of Jn 10 that Jesus DID claim to be God. THEY knew what he claimed and they did not like it.
Scripture tends to be so compact; the commentary I read spreads this all out nice and neatly to see it in detail.
 
I’m not sure if the videos from Fr. Barron graciously provided by Peter Plato cover this, but you can make some sense of the Trinity by realizing that God possesses infinite knowledge and love and then drawing analogies from human personhood to divine personhood. In humans, our ability to know allows us to form conceptions of ourselves. We can form a mental conception of ourselves and try to stand outside of this conception and analyze it. Suppose you are doing an examination of conscience for confession and you think about how you committed a certain sin and then you exclaim “oh what was I thinking when I did that?!” That’s you having a conception of yourself.

Now human knowing is finite, so this conception never exists outside of our minds. God is able to know Himself as well, but since His knowing is infinite, His self conception is equally perfect and unlimited as He Himself is, which means His conception is as much of a Person as He is. Hence the Father-Son relationship. Also, I think this may be the reason why the Second Person is referred to as the “Word of God.” Words express ideas. The Second Person is God’s Idea of Himself.

Humans also have the ability to love or hate this conception we have of ourselves. But since our loving is finite, and the object of our self-love is finite (the self conception), this self-love is limited. But in God, His loving is infinite, hence the Father and Son love each other infinitely. Now when one loves another, one is said to “pour out their being” into the other person (kind of like how the love between husband and wife typically manifests as a third person, the child). Since the Father and Son pour out their infinite beings into their love for each other, the love manifests as the Holy Spirit, which is why the Holy Spirit is said to be the “spirit of love.” I hope this helps somewhat.
 
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