Love, Belief, and Eternal Life in the Trinity

On the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, this homily breaks down the Trinity not as a distant theological puzzle but as a living reality centered on three words drawn from John 3:16 — love, belief, and eternal life.

Love is the Trinity's defining characteristic. Every act of love we give or receive — like a father waking at 4am to provide for his family — reflects the inner life of the Trinity itself. Belief isn't merely intellectual agreement or moral effort; drawing on Pope Benedict's Deus Caritas Est, it's a personal encounter with Jesus that reshapes your whole life and leads you to entrust God with your faith, family, finances, fears, and future. And eternal life speaks to our deepest longing — to be truly seen, known, and loved forever. The Trinity is the home we were made for; we're not quite there yet.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:23

Good afternoon. Before I begin with my homily today, I just want to let you know that this Thursday, we are going to be having our second uh monthly 24-hour adoration, uh, praying for an increase in vocations to priesthood, religious life, and married life. And I've shared previously that you know the church is in great need of vocations to priesthood, right? I probably some of you are aware about this. There's not too many priests going around nowadays, and so that's why I mentioned previously they put young and inexperienced priests in charge of parishes. Um and so there's a great need to pray. And that's why, you know, at the end of the mass, we pray that prayer for vocations, right? We're praying for an increase in vocations to priests in religious life. So I'd just like to encourage you and invite you, if you have some time this Thursday, to either sign up for an hour or just to come and pray with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. It'll be in Hall C this Thursday. Okay, so today uh the church celebrates the great solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, the whole the whole church. Uh, Mary Lou, who's in charge of our uh environment, has put out this uh image here. This is the famous icon of the most holy trinity. It's an Eastern uh work of art. If you ever have a chance, maybe after the Mass or something like that, you can just come and check it out. This is a very famous uh work of art. And when we think about the Most Holy Trinity, sometimes we can think, wow, okay, God, the Father, Son, Holy Spirit, three persons, one God sounds a little bit mysterious, sounds a little bit distant. How can I connect that with my daily life, with my daily living? And I think the key can be found in the gospel passage that we heard today from John 3.16. So I'm gonna pull that uh passage onto the screen. And as usual, I'd like to invite us to read uh this scripture passage together. God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. If I were to sum up the Trinity into one word, I would use this word to describe the Trinity. It's up there. What do you think it is?

unknown 2:45

Love.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Love? I agree. Love. If I were to describe Trinity in one word, that word would be love. The Trinity is a communion of love. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And for this homies today, I'm gonna explore a little bit of that word love, as well as two more words that we find up on the screen. Uh God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that those who believe in him will be the second word. And the last um uh two words or last uh words, they are two words, eternal life. So love, belief, and eternal life, and how that's connected to the Trinity and how it's going to apply to our own lives. That's what I'm gonna do for the hominy today. Okay, let's begin with the first word love. Now, another famous passage in the scripture says, God is now you complete the sentence for me, right? God is love. God is love. When we receive love and when we give love, that's a reflection of the love of the Trinity. You know, in a few weeks we're gonna be celebrating uh Father's Day, right? That's maybe three uh weekends from now. And now, as I was reflecting on this homily today, I thought about my dad. My dad, um, in the year 1975, you guys know what happened in 1975 in Vietnam? The fall of Saigon, right? So he was part of that. He was uh wrapped up in all of that, and so after the fall of Saigon, he uh fled Vietnam, and many of you guys know about all the boat people, right? All the boat people that escaped um war in Vietnam and was trying to find another place, and many people came here to the United States. My dad was one of them, and he came over here with nothing. No money, no possessions, no family, nothing. And and he and he scraped his way up to try to find a living, uh try to find a home, try to find a place of belonging. And finally he did. And and and I remember as we were growing up as children, you know, he would always take us to church after school. We go to school, he'd pick us up, he'd take us over to church. And and I and I hated it. I hated it. I hated it. Um I want to go home because there was uh Jackie Chan Adventures playing on the TV in cartoons. So, oh, I've got to go to church. Oh my goodness. Look at me now. And so I remember taking always to church and pray. Thank God for all the blessings that we received as a family. I think about all the, you know, you wake up at 4 a.m. in the morning just to go to work. He'd take us to church, you know, to help teach us how to pray. And he'd be tired coming home from break. He cooked dinner for us, you know, check our homework to make sure, you know, we were doing our homework right. Many of your parents have a similar experience, yes? Okay. My dad was a reflection of the love of God. He was a reflection of the love of the Trinity. If I were to ask you, can you think of examples of how you've experienced that intense experience of love, receiving love or giving love? I imagine many of you would have examples, right? Just like my dad. Sacrificial love. When we receive love and when we give love, that's a reflection of the love of the Trinity. So that's the first word I would share with you is love. Okay. Second word is belief. God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. Some people think that belief is um, you know, I subscribe to just a religious worldview or that I try to live a moral life. But listen to what Pope Benedict, you guys remember Pope Benedict? So right now our Pope is Pope. Leo before him was Francis before him was Benedict. Okay. Pope Benedict, he wrote a um encyclical called Deus Caritas Es, which translates to God is love. And he said this about this idea of belief. Can we read these words of Pope Benedict together? Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction. Somebody asks you, what's Christianity all about? What's Catholicism all about? Pope Bendic says it's an encounter with a person. Who is that person? Jesus. That's what Christianity is all about. That's what Catholicism is all about. An encounter with the person, the person of Jesus, and therefore an encounter with the communion of the Trinity. Now, uh last week I shared that when we have this encounter, it leads to a place of belief. And what does belief mean? And I said this last week. I said belief means this. It says, Lord, I give you permission to lead and guide my faith, my family, my finances, my fears, and my future. You see what I did there? Okay. I give you permission, Lord, lead my faith, my family, my five, my fear, my future, everything. That's belief. Lord, I give you permission to guide all of that. So the second word related to the Trinity is belief. Okay, we're gonna go to the last um word here, or last couple words, which is eternal life. God so loved the world that I gave his only begotten son that those who believe in him might not perish but might have eternal life. You know, over the course of my priesthood, I've been a priest now for um about seven years. It's not that long comparative to other priests, seven years. Over my seven years, I can't tell you the number of funerals that I've celebrated. I've lost I've lost count. I've lost count of the number of funerals that I've celebrated. I've celebrated funerals for that those that were long expected, you know, that this was going to happen. I've celebrated funerals that were sudden, that were unexpected. I've celebrated funerals for those who were past a hundred years old. I've celebrated funerals for those who are still in the womb. From womb to tomb, from beginning to end. And I've lost count of the number of funerals I've celebrated and the people that I've laid to rest in in cemeteries. And when I'm at a funeral, I remind myself, and I remind every everybody that's here. In fact, this morning I I celebrated funeral mass, just this morning, uh, for a man 55 years old. Heart attack. He just uh in his sleep and didn't wake up. And and and I remind myself and remind everybody listening like we're not home yet. We're not home yet. In this life, we're still pilgrims on a journey. And our home. Where's our home? It's in heaven. Our home is with the Trinity in heaven, eternal life. We're not home yet. And sometimes we we live as if this is our home. I know I do. I have to remind myself, I'm not home yet. Home is in heaven. Okay. Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. Three words connected with the Trinity. The first word is love, because God is love. Okay. Second word is belief. We believe, we entrust everything to Him. The last word is eternal life. That's our home. And every time that we make the sign of the cross, we remember how these are connected to the Trinity. Love, belief, and eternal life. So I want to conclude just by inviting us to very consciously make the sign of the cross together, very deliberately, remembering what we believe in and remembering these words. Let's make the sign of the cross together very consciously, very deliberately. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.