“God so loved the world that he gave his only son…God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again.” John 3, 16-18
There is a statement in today’s very brief gospel-reading that almost every Christian knows by heart. That statement reads: “Yes, God loved the world so much that God gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not be lost but may have eternal life” (John 3: 16). I dare to suggest that those words express the tenet of Christian faith that is the foundation of all Christian theology and all Christian theological research and speculation. That assertion makes it very clear that God, in creating our world and all of us who have lived and continue to live in it, was and is motivated by love. Elsewhere, in his First Letter, John the Evangelist stated categorically that “God is love” (1 John 4:8). Sending Jesus to live among us and to share fully in our humanity was yet another expression of the Love that is God. A direct consequence is that we, who identify ourselves as followers/disciples of Jesus, have a vocation and mission to relate lovingly to everyone we encounter, to everyone beside and with whom we live, work and pray. Theology is a subject of study and a body of knowledge that helps us to understand and appreciate something of the God who loved us into life and how and why that love has been and continues to be lavished upon us.
An interesting aspect of today’s readings is that they make no mention of the word “Trinity”. The closest reference to God as Trinity is in the blessing that concludes the second reading from Corinthians: “The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Corinthians 13: 13). Today’s gospel-reading reflects to us the relationship that exists between God and God’s Son, Jesus. Only later in his Gospel does John give attention to the Holy Spirit, sent by the Risen Jesus onto his disciples. Theologians down through the centuries since then have struggled to shed light on the relationship that exists between Father, Son and Spirit. That has been very largely an intellectual pursuit and has left us Christians acknowledging that God is a mystery we will never fully fathom. But Christianity and the Gospel are about an active way of living, loving and relating rather than adherence to a set of beliefs. As we all know, we will be assessed as Christians by the way in which we relate to one another and to our world and by the way we minister to Jesus alive in our sisters and brothers, especially those who are overlooked, rejected and despised. Our effectiveness as disciples will be judged on how we live the Gospel not on the theological beliefs and concepts to which we adhere.
Ordinary lay Catholics down through the centuries have discussed and argued over religious beliefs and doctrines. For instance, discussion ran wild in the early 4th Century when a popular Catholic priest named Arius was ministering in Alexandria, Egypt. He contested that Jesus was just an ordinary human being and not divine. His views were argued and debated across the known world and were eventually dismissed by the Bishops gathered at the Council of Nicaea in Bithynia in 325. At the time, one seasoned Bishop complained that he couldn’t even go to the public baths on a Saturday night without being interrogated by the pool manager with questions like: “Are you on the side of those who think the Son is divine, or of those who think he is just another creature?” Centuries later, the Australian-born soapbox orator and lay preacher Frank Sheed, who frequently entertained crowds in Hyde Park, London (mainly throughout the 1920s and 30s) observed that members of his audiences would argue to the death about how the members of the Trinity related to one another. At the same time, they gave little attention to contemporary topics like the budget and upheavals in the world of politics. Sheed also dedicated his skills to explaining theological topics in language accessible to run-of-the-mill lay people. Two of his books, Theology and Sanity and Theology for Beginners are still readily available. He was dubbed “The Prophet of Hyde Park” and was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by the Catholic University of Lille, France in 1956.
Today’s gospel-reading points out that Jesus, with whom we members of the Christian Community are familiar, came among us not as a visiting emissary but as one who embraced our human condition fully, as Emmanuel, God-with-us.
In stressing that God loves the world irrevocably and holds out to all humanity, with no exceptions, the promise of life eternal, John does not forget to remind us that that same world had in various times and places responded to God’s promise of love with arrogant rejection and, even, hostility. Despite its long history of division, warfare, violence and destruction, that world and its peoples do not cease to be loved and treasured by God. Jesus Christ is the personification of God’s irrepressible love. In today’s second reading from Corinthians, Paul reminds us that once we come to know that in the very depths of our being, we, with the help and inspiration of the Holy Spirit, can begin to reflect something of that love to everyone we encounter. Let’s not forget that we have been made for love!