Franciscan Fractal: “Advent Revisited: Part 4”
Contemplating Today’s Culture through the Eyes of St. Francis & the Trinity
Restore us, O God of hosts;
show the light of your countenance,
and we shall be saved. Psalm 80:7
The arrival of Jesus Christ is like a small child entering the home of a group of people for a party. The child has carefully wrapped gifts for the host and all the guests. One person then asks, “How did you get here? Did your parents bring you? I’ve never met your mother and father. What are their names? By the way, what is your last name?”
So many questions, and no easy answers. Jesus arrived in the womb of his mother, Mary. Alongside her was his earthly father, Joseph. All had the last name of “House of David.” Those are the answers to the rudimentary questions. Answers that indeed prompt more questions, requiring more answers.
We profess that Jesus was human and also divine. Most of us understand what it is to be human, since we have grown up as a human being and not as God. We can easily say that Jesus was the “Son of God,” but what does that really mean? If you and I attempt to describe God, we are left speechless after trying to repeat phrases from our catechism days.
If we say that God is a “rock” upon which we stand, or a “light” to the world, we already know that this description does not encompass the totality of God. We are simply using metaphors to describe God who is beyond words. We end up with no real insight into the meaning of God.
According to Pseudo-Dionysius — a Greek author, Christian theologian, and philosopher — God is incomprehensible, beyond language and imagination, and beyond anything we can describe. The only way for us to enter into the mystery of God is to give up using words, and access God in silence.
If we want to talk to God, the irony is that we need not say anything at all. According to Episcopal Priest Cythnia Bourgeault, our prayers are too often, “projections of our own needs and desires, and we give God little room to enter into the conversation. Talking all the time to God without ever listening is like a phone conversation with constant static; it is deafening to God. Silence is a language God can speak without being constantly interrupted because God is a mystery of incomprehensible love, and love speaks for itself.”1 In support of this concept of silence, it is no wonder that the hymn “Silent Night,” has become the most celebrated Christmas hymn around the world.
By waiting in silence, we begin to see that the birth of Jesus Christ also brought the other persons of the Trinity with him, that is, the Creator or the Father and the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ can be thought of simply as a visible outflowing of the whole Trinity in a dynamic of never-ending love. The persons of the Trinity are so united in love that everything the three do — creation, redemption, salvation — they do together in love, out of love, and for love.
God is all encompassing love. Thus, God must also reveal the Trinity. The Trinity does not separate into parts in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ. Rather, the entire Trinity is revealed in the birth of Jesus Christ. Stars, angels, shepherds, and holy men from afar proclaim the Creator of the Universe. Songs of angels, shepherds traveling to a manger, and Magi being drawn by the love of a star attest to the attracting power of the Holy Spirit.
Everything comes together in love at the same time. God cannot divide God’s self into the Creator or the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We do that in our own thinking. God remains as Trinity which is beyond our most creative imaginations, beyond the limits of our language, and beyond any idea we can conceive. This is the mystery flowing out of the birth of Jesus Christ.
Yet, God is not beyond our human experience because God is personal. God comes to us in love and in humility. Through Jesus, God shows us, not an abstract concept of love, but a real person that is so concerned about us that he would appear as we are — vulnerable, dependent, often lost, forsaken, confused, and misplaced. God deeply loves everyone who dwells in this rough and tumble world.
In these last days of Advent, take on the challenge of becoming still and silent. Let the unfathomable God of love enter your heart in a new way. Listen to the voice of God speak to you in the silence. And, do not be afraid. For God, in Jesus Christ, is bringing to you good news of great joy — a joy of love which has been seeking you since the beginning of time.
Remember: “Be still and know that I am God!”
Prayers and Blessings,
Fr. John
1Delio, Ilia. The Humility of God: A Franciscan Perspective (p. 29). Franciscan Media. Kindle Edition.
