Trinity

[Annabelle41415]

I believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but seem to seperate them but know they are all one. The reason is that in the Creed that seems to seperate them “I Believe in God, the Father,…and in Jesus Christ, His only Son…ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God.” When Jesus prayed at Gethsemani he said “Father, if it be possible,…Your will be done.” I pray to all three, but not as three God’s, as one God, but oh it is so hard to describe. Does anyone have this nonunderstanding, but yet you do?

Thank you for your comments.

Kim

 

[PJM]

=Annabelle41415;6969892]I believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but seem to seperate them but know they are all one. The reason is that in the Creed that seems to seperate them “I Believe in God, the Father,…and in Jesus Christ, His only Son…ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God.” When Jesus prayed at Gethsemani he said “Father, if it be possible,…Your will be done.” I pray to all three, but not as three God’s, as one God, but oh it is so hard to describe. Does anyone have this nonunderstanding, but yet you do?

Thank you for your comments.

Kim

Keep in mind Kim, that Jesus possess TWO Complete natures. Divine and human. He often used His human nature when praying.

The TRINITY is the way God chooses to make Himself known and present to us. Perhaps bcause God is soooo EVERYTHING GOOD and Perfect, that as “one person” we might not be able to grasp the realities and some of the awesome complexity of God.?

Matt. 3: 13-17"Then Jesus came from Galilee to the Jordan to John, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, “I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?” But Jesus answered him, “Let it be so now; for thus it is fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness.” **Then he consented. And when Jesus [Son of God] was baptized, he went up immediately from the water, and behold, the heavens were opened and he saw the Spirit of GodGod the Holy Spirit] descending like a dove, and alighting on him; and lo, a voice from heaven, saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.” [God the Father] **

Believe; because God wants us too.

Love and prayers,

 

[azerty]

Hello

I think St Augustine’s analogy of the soul with the Trinity will help you have a better understanding of the Trinity.
Nicolas of Cusa’s analogy of the circle (center, radius, circumference as the 3 persons of the Trinity) also helps understand the unity and diversity within the Trinity.

Chapter 11.— In Memory, Understanding [or Intelligence], and Will, We Have to Note Ability, Learning, and Use. Memory, Understanding, and Will are One Essentially, and Three Relatively.

1. Putting aside, then, for a little while all other things, of which the mind is certain concerning itself, let us especially consider and discuss these three— memory, understanding, will. For we may commonly discern in these three the character of the abilities of the young also; since the more tenaciously and easily a boy remembers, and the more acutely he understands, and the more ardently he studies, the more praiseworthy is he in point of ability. But when the question is about any one’s learning, then we ask not how solidly and easily he remembers, or how shrewdly he understands; but what it is that he remembers, and what it is that he understands. And because the mind is regarded as praiseworthy, not only as being learned, but also as being good, one gives heed not only to what he remembers and what he understands, but also to what he wills (velit); not how ardently he wills, but first what it is he wills, and then how greatly he wills it. For the mind that loves eagerly is then to be praised, when it loves that which ought to be loved eagerly. Since, then, we speak of these three— ability, knowledge, use— the first of these is to be considered under the three heads, of what a man can do in memory, and understanding, and will. The second of them is to be considered in regard to that which any one has in his memory and in his understanding, which he has attained by a studious will. But the third, viz. use, lies in the will, which handles those things that are contained in the memory and understanding, whether it refer them to anything further, or rest satisfied with them as an end. For to use, is to take up something into the power of the will; and to enjoy, is to use with joy, not any longer of hope, but of the actual thing. Accordingly, every one who enjoys, uses; for he takes up something into the power of the will, wherein he also is satisfied as with an end. But not every one who uses, enjoys, if he has sought after that, which he takes up into the power of the will, not on account of the thing itself, but on account of something else.
2. Since, then, these three, memory, understanding, will, are not three lives, but one life; nor three minds, but one mind; it follows certainly that neither are they three substances, but one substance.
   Since memory, which is called life, and mind, and substance, is so called in respect to itself; but it is called memory, relatively to something. And I should say the same also of understanding and of will, since they are called understanding and will relatively to something; but each in respect to itself is life, and mind, and essence. And hence these three are one, in that they are one life, one mind, one essence; and whatever else they are severally called in respect to themselves, they are called also together, not plurally, but in the singular number. But they are three, in that wherein they are mutually referred to each other; and if they were not equal, and this not only each to each, but also each to all, they certainly could not mutually contain each other; for not only is each contained by each, but also all by each. For I remember that I have memory and understanding, and will; and I understand that I understand, and will, and remember; and I will that I will, and remember, and understand; and I remember together my whole memory, and understanding, and will. For that of my memory which I do not remember, is not in my memory; and nothing is so much in the memory as memory itself. Therefore I remember the whole memory. Also, whatever I understand I know that I understand, and I know that I will whatever I will; but whatever I know I remember. Therefore I remember the whole of my understanding, and the whole of my will. Likewise, when I understand these three things, I understand them together as whole. For there is none of things intelligible which I do not understand, except what I do not know; but what I do not know, I neither remember, nor will. Therefore, whatever of things intelligible I do not understand, it follows also that I neither remember nor will. And whatever of things intelligible I remember and will, it follows that I understand. My will also embraces my whole understanding and my whole memory while I use the whole that I understand and remember. And, therefore, while all are mutually comprehended by each, and as wholes, each as a whole is equal to each as a whole, and each as a whole at the same time to all as wholes; and these three are one, one life, one mind, one essence.
   newadvent.org/fathers/130110.htm

 

[azerty]

Here St Augustin talks about Jesus human nature and why it is inferior to the Father

Chapter 7.— In What Manner the Son is Less Than the Father, and Than Himself.

1. In these and like testimonies of the divine Scriptures, by free use of which, as I have said, our predecessors exploded such sophistries or errors of the heretics, the unity and equality of the Trinity are intimated to our faith. But because, on account of the incarnation of the Word of God for the working out of our salvation, that the man Christ Jesus might be the Mediator between God and men, many things are so said in the sacred books as to signify, or even most expressly declare, the Father to be greater than the Son; men have erred through a want of careful examination or consideration of the whole tenor of the Scriptures, and have endeavored to transfer those things which are said of Jesus Christ according to the flesh, to that substance of His which was eternal before the incarnation, and is eternal. They say, for instance, that the Son is less than the Father, because it is written that the Lord Himself said, “My Father is greater than I.” But the truth shows that after the same sense the Son is less also than Himself; for how was He not made less also than Himself, who “emptied Himself, and took upon Him the form of a servant?” For He did not so take the form of a servant as that He should lose the form of God, in which He was equal to the Father. If, then, the form of a servant was so taken that the form of God was not lost, since both in the form of a servant and in the form of God He Himself is the same only-begotten Son of God the Father, in the form of God equal to the Father, in the form of a servant the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; is there any one who cannot perceive that He Himself in the form of God is also greater than Himself, but yet likewise in the form of a servant less than Himself? And not, therefore, without cause the Scripture says both the one and the other, both that the Son is equal to the Father, and that the Father is greater than the Son. For there is no confusion when the former is understood as on account of the form of God, and the latter as on account of the form of a servant. And, in truth, this rule for clearing the question through all the sacred Scriptures is set forth in one chapter of an epistle of the Apostle Paul, where this distinction is commended to us plainly enough. For he says, “Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God; but emptied Himself, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: and was found in fashion as a man.” The Son of God, then, is equal to God the Father in nature, but less in “fashion.” For in the form of a servant which He took He is less than the Father; but in the form of God, in which also He was before He took the form of a servant, He is equal to the Father. In the form of God He is the Word, “by whom all things are made;” but in the form of a servant He was “made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law.” In like manner, in the form of God He made man; in the form of a servant He was made man. For if the Father alone had made man without the Son, it would not have been written, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.” Therefore, because the form of God took the form of a servant, both is God and both is man; but both God, on account of God who takes; and both man, on account of man who is taken. For neither by that taking is the one of them turned and changed into the other: the Divinity is not changed into the creature, so as to cease to be Divinity; nor the creature into Divinity, so as to cease to be creature.
   newadvent.org/fathers/130101.htm

 

[FCEGM]

I believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but seem to seperate them but know they are all one. The reason is that in the Creed that seems to seperate them “I Believe in God, the Father,…and in Jesus Christ, His only Son…ascended into heaven, and sits at the right hand of God.” When Jesus prayed at Gethsemani he said “Father, if it be possible,…Your will be done.” I pray to all three, but not as three God’s, as one God, but oh it is so hard to describe. Does anyone have this nonunderstanding, but yet you do?

Thank you for your comments.

Kim

Kim, a book that’s frequently recommended on CAF for its excellent and readable presentation on the Mysteries of the Most Holy Trinity and the Incarnaton is Frank Sheed’s Theology for Beginners; I think you would find it very helpful.

 

[Chopstick]

I don’t think we can really understand the Trinity in a complete way; it’s like describing something you don’t have words for.

 

[thistle]

Kim, a book that’s frequently recommended on CAF for its excellent and readable presentation on the Mysteries of the Most Holy Trinity and the Incarnaton is Frank Sheed’s Theology for Beginners; I think you would find it very helpful.

I second that. Its written in an easy to understand way.