This Sunday, June 15, is Trinity Sunday, when it is traditional for priests and pastors around the world to preach a sermon that neither they nor their congregations will understand!  Hopefully, that will not be the case for us at St. Catherine’s…. although when it comes to talking about God as Trinity – three-in-one and one-in-three – it is easy to get ourselves tied up in knots!  How can God be one (Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord, is one) and yet three?  How can God be human as well as divine in Jesus?  And what about the Holy Spirit? – Two is problematic enough without adding a third!

Trinity Sunday marks a change in the seasons of the church.  We move from the Easter season, which came to an end on Pentecost Sunday last week, and enter a new season in the church.  It was once called “Trinity Season” and later became known as the “Season After Pentecost,” as if it didn’t have a name but had to be defined by what came immediately before it.  It is also known as “Ordinary Time” (yes, there is such a thing!), which also doesn’t really tell us very much.

Trinity Sunday could just as well be called “God Sunday” and the Sundays that follow known as the “God Season,” because in a way that’s where we are at.  The whole of the church year leading up to Pentecost has all been about Jesus, beginning with Advent and the anticipation of the birth of Jesus.  Then comes the birth and the Christmas Season – perhaps it should be called the Incarnation Season as it is about God becoming a human being, God with us.  Then comes Epiphany when we begin to think about what the incarnation really means – who Jesus is and what his significance is.  Then Lent and the journey towards Holy Week and Easter culminating in the giving of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.

What comes next?  The “God Season” when we think about what it means to be believers in God and followers of Jesus and how the Holy Spirit is at work in the world and in our lives.  Wait, what?  God, Jesus, Holy Spirit?  What’s that all about?  So, we begin the God Season by thinking about God and, specifically in the Christian tradition, the Godhead as three persons.  So far, so good.  But after that, it is very easy to tie ourselves up in knots.  Perhaps I should stop now and hope we can do better on Sunday!

Our readings for Trinity Sunday are Proverbs 8:1-4, 22-31 in which “wisdom” is personified as being with God before the creation of the world  (obvious parallels with “In the beginning was the Word…”); Psalm 8 about the sovereignty of God; Romans 5:1-5 in which Paul speaks of having peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ and that God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit; and our Gospel reading is John 16:12-15 in which Jesus at the last supper (again) with the disciples tells them “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now.”  I wonder what they might be and whether there are still things that we are unable to hear (or bear to hear)….

Come on Sunday as we explore all these things together!  I look forward to seeing everyone who is able to be there in person and welcoming others via the livestream.

Trinitarian blessings+ to you – in the Name of God the Creator, Redeemer and Sanctifier,

Angus

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This Sunday June 15, 2025 will hosting a Traditional Service

Here is the link to the downloadable bulletin:
Sunday June 15, 2025

Presider and Preacher: Rev. Angus Stuart
Our Guest Musician is: Hyejung Oh and Choir 

To access the livestream, click on the button below.
Previous livestreamed services and sermon notes can be found on the website here.

Image: James Tissot, 1836-1902, Vanderbilt 

*The office will be closed Wednesday June 18 and re-open at it's regular time on June 19