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Prayer
Father, I thank you for the Son,
Son, I thank you for the Spirit,
Spirit, I thank you for the Church,
Father, Son, and Spirit, I praise you as Love.
Quote
only the Son is incarnate. Both the Father and the Spirit are involved in history, but only the Son becomes history.
John D. Zizioulas, Being As Communion
Comments
As we anticipate Trinity Sunday, we are faced with this wonderful insight spoken of above into the nature of Christ, and its relationship to the incarnation, the Father, and the Holy Spirit. The Son of God, or the Preexistent Christ, becomes in history, and as history, Christ Jesus, or Jesus Christ, or Jesus of Nazareth. The Word becomes history, while the Father, or Source, and the Holy Spirit are only involved in history. The Father and Spirit participate in history; the Son is history.
What is the history that the Word takes upon itself? The history is full identification with the flow of historical succession, as the Word moves from transcending history to being clothed with the flesh of history and embedded within history.
The Son is begotten by the Father, eternally, and is the Cosmic Christ from eternity. The Cosmic Christ is the Word pervasive in Creation, animating creation with life and wisdom, but does not become history and creation until the incarnation.
The Holy Spirit, or sacred Spirit, is the beyond history, and when he acts in history he does so in order to bring into history the last days, the eschaton, writes Zizioulas. That is, as seen in the realized end-time, or realized eschatology, of the Gospel of St. John, the Holy Spirit is working in history, but not as history, for the present realization of the full consummation of the emergence of Creation toward the goal of divine fullness, the return to the Father of all Nature.
The Church becomes the body of Christ, embedded in history, as the Body of Christ, the continuance of the physicality of Jesus Christ. The Church is the continuance of Christ Jesus clothed with history and as history. Thus, the Church becomes a means of mediation between now and then, the meeting of the present into which, by the Holy Spirit, the end times are realized in the moment, and progressively to the extent the Holy Spirit is allowed to bring the end into the present. That is, the Church, as all persons in Christ, is not only history, as continuance of Jesus Christ, the Church is the means of the emergence and creation of the end toward which all Creation tends, and that tending is brought into the now by the Holy Spirit.
Therefore, the return of Creation to the Father, through the Son, and by the agency of the Holy Spirit, is a Trinitarian Event transcending conceptuality and dimensionality. As Trinitarian Event, it is an Event-ing, indeed, an eternal act of salvation that transcends history, thus is prior to and after history, yet, at the same time, incarnated in history.
The Church carries on the becoming history of the Eternal Son of God, the Son of Man, the Word, or Logos. Therefore, we, in that Son, and through the Holy Spirit, become and are becoming the Eternal Son, or Word. The Church is becoming history, the meeting place of the present and the end time, when Creation returns in Perfection to the Source, the Eternal Father, or Eternal Outflower of all living things.
Reflection
What does eschatological mean?
How does the Son of God, or Preexistent Word, relate to the Son of Man, or Incarnation of the Word?
What is the Church in regard to Jesus Christ?
Spiritual Exercise
Write a hymn or poem or prayer to the Holy Trinity.
Keep spending at least twenty to thirty minutes daily in Silence, resting in the Lord of Love.
Explore the website www.sacredspace.ie offered by the Irish Jesuits and do some of the meditation exercises offered at the site.
Consider, if you are not already, sponsoring a child through Compassion International. You can find out more about Compassion International by going to www.compassion.net to read about sponsoring, in the name of Jesus, children living in poverty. Thanks! Brian K. Wilcox
To contact Brian, write briankwilcox@comcast.net .
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