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Karl Rahner, the 20th-century Jesuit theologian, opined in his book, “The Trinity” (1970), that for the average Catholic, one could dispense with the entire doctrine of the Blessed Trinity and few would notice in their daily lives. This statement has always bothered me tremendously, but in many ways, for the average Catholic, the doctrine of the Most Blessed Trinity does not play an explicit part in their daily life. This is true even for us priests and deacons, especially when we are called to preach on Trinity Sunday. How many times have we heard the homilist simply proclaim this as a mystery, yet no real attempt is made to engage this most essential element of our faith, namely, who God is in himself!

The week’s celebration of Trinity Sunday reminds us of the truth of the matter. We as human beings are called to communion. We need communion with each other because the God in whose image and likeness we are created is, in Himself, a communion of love and knowledge. In the Most Blessed Trinity, we see how we are called to live and to love as Christians in the world. 

Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI in a Sunday Angelus in 2009 said: “Three Persons who are one God because the Father is love, the Son is love, the Spirit is love. God is wholly and only love, the purest, infinite and eternal love. He does not live in splendid solitude but rather is an inexhaustible source of life that is ceaselessly given and communicated. To a certain extent, we can perceive this by observing both the macro-universe: our earth, the planets, the stars, the galaxies; and the micro-universe: cells, atoms, elementary particles. The ‘name’ of the Blessed Trinity is, in a certain sense, imprinted upon all things because all that exists, down to the last particle, is in relation; in this way we catch a glimpse of God as relationship and ultimately, Creator Love.”

We as human beings, in our very nature, mirror that inner life of the Triune God and in no greater way is that expressed than when we strive to live lives of communion with one another. Listen to the words of the epistle offered to us this Sunday from Saint Paul to the Corinthians. The Apostle Paul exhorts us to love one another, to greet each other with a holy kiss, in other words, to live a life of harmony. 

One of the more interesting films of the past 20 years or so, Tom Hanks’ “Castaway” (2000) was the story of a man, Chuck Nolan, whose FedEx freight airplane crashes on a desert island. Thanks be to God, Hanks’ character, Chuck, was on an airplane that was carrying almost everything one could need to survive. And survive he does, learning how to cook, clean, build a shelter, even in one particularly harrowing scene, do minor dental surgery. He has everything that one could need to survive except for company.

In one of the more interesting parts of this movie, there is complete silence, no dialogue. Chuck is just trying to survive. Yet he is longing for someone to dialogue with. He needs companionship. So, if there is no one to talk to, what can one do? Well, in the case of this character, he meets Wilson. Wilson functions as the “Man Friday” to Chuck’s Caruso, with one telling exception. Wilson is a volleyball! Granted, Wilson is a volleyball with a bloody handprint for his face. And the character played by Hanks forms a relationship with Wilson. They even have arguments, at least in the lead character’s head, leading to one of the more heartbreaking scenes in this movie — while on a raft at sea during an attempt to escape, Wilson floats away. When Chuck notices this, it is too late, leaving him to shout, “Wilson, come back, I’m sorry!” 

Why do I mention this film? For one reason: we can have all of the basic necessities of life and still not have what we need to be fully human. We need community! Why do we as human beings need community? Because almighty God in Himself is a communion of Three Persons, yet one Godhead. 

You might say that being in communion with others is built into who we are as human beings, created by God in his image and likeness. We are called to communion because God is a communion!

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