The Rev. Cynthia K. R. Banks; Trinity Sunday—Year B; Isaiah 6:1-8; Psalm 29; Romans 8:12-17; John 3:1-17
Trinity Sunday and our Rite of Passage for 13-year olds—what a day! And I think these two occasions actually illuminate each other.
The Bishop wrote about Trinity Sunday in his weekly reflection this past Wednesday. He quoted St. Augustine who said, “If you don’t believe in the Trinity, you will lose your soul. But if you try to understand it, you will lose your mind.” Bishop Taylor went on to say that “at its heart it is a paradox: three in one; one in three,” and yet, “it’s crucial that we hold onto the Trinity for a lot of reasons, chief among these reasons is that it keeps us from idolatry. God is not a thing. God cannot be another person that we can easily name.” Bishop Taylor goes on to note that “what we can say is this—at the heart of God is relationship.” He concludes, “Therefore the way to celebrate Trinity Sunday is not to think our way through this mystery (Augustine had a point). Instead we celebrate Trinity Sunday by deepening our relationships with one another and with all of creation.”
I think Bishop Taylor is right. The Trinity is the essence of mystery; we can’t comprehend it with our minds, but we can gaze upon it and recognize it and intuit that it is true. What is the nature of God? Our minds can’t fathom it, but our hearts leap forward with the answer—it is love, it is relationship, it is giving and receiving, it is filling and spilling over, it is participating in the dance, it is being in the flow. And all of this energy within God and throughout all of creation spins round and round generating life and power, helping what is living to find life in dying, helping what is dying to be born anew. It bends our minds, but our hearts and our spirits know that when we touch this, we are touching the essence of reality. It is not that the Trinity is too complicated a doctrine to unravel; it’s that the Trinity is too big a truth for that rational part in our left brains to comprehend. The Trinity will ask more of us than assent; the Trinity asks us to join the dance, to participate, to be all in.
The Trinity also illuminates what lifegiving relationship actually looks like. Each member of the Trinity is fully at home in their own unique being, and yet, is fully available to be connected in relationship. In the traditional language, the Father doesn’t have to be exactly the same as the Son who doesn’t have to be exactly the same as the Spirit, and yet, they all share the same divine DNA. They each bring something wonderful and unique to the table, but it is in the giving and receiving of the gift that the really good stuff gets generated. This is the essence of healthy and lifegiving differentiation. When I do premarital counseling, I often recommend the book Passionate Marriage by David Schnarch. He does a great job unpacking just what this differentiation looks like. Most of us see differentiation on a continuum with emotional connection, with each of these holding down the one of the end(s).
But he says that differentiation is actually a “higher order” process that involves balancing both connection and autonomy, like this:
Schnarch notes: “Differentiation involves balancing two basic life forces: the drive for individuality and the drive for togetherness. Individuality propels us to follow our own directives, to be on our own, to create a unique identity. Togetherness pushes us to follow the directives of others, to be a part of the group…Differentiation is your ability to maintain your sense of self when you are emotionally and/or physically close to others—especially as they become increasingly important to you… Emotional fusion is connection without individuality…The opposite of differentiation is neither connection nor lack of connection—it’s a different kind of connection.”
Okay, let me translate that—my words now: differentiation is about being who you are with all the uniquely wonderful uniqueness with which God made you while at the same time being in relationship with others. It’s not about being solely autonomous, independent, individual me, and it’s not about being emotionally fused with another—it’s about being able to be who I am while at the same time being connected to you. To stand and live in this place in all of our relationships is a lifelong task and one that begins writ large in adolescence, which brings us to the other occasion we mark today—the Rite of Passage.
These 7 soon-to-be or already-turned 13-year olds and their parents stand before us as a living icon of this dance of differentiation. Parents who have raised these young people, nursed them, fed them, comforted them, and guided them have to loosen their hold. Young people who have been so very dependent are moving in ever wider circles to discover who they are in their own right. And the trick for both, the elegant dance that each must do, is to allow the other to blossom in their own unique way while at the same time staying connected. And this isn’t just true of the parent-child relationship, but it also holds true in our partnerships and intimate relationships, this holds true in friendships, and in all the other configurations of relationships that we experience—family, work, church. Schnarch gives us one picture of the task before us, the Trinity icons for us what this life looks like.
There will surely be missteps along the way—parents holding too close or not close enough, young people pushing too hard against in an effort to claim their individuality, or not claiming their voice strongly enough.
Young people, being an island unto yourself, doing your own thing because it’s your own thing is not the goal—being the wondrous, gifted, blessed son and daughter of God that you are fully engaged with the rest of the world is.
Parents, holding them close in an effort to spare your child suffering is not the goal—we are a death and resurrection people—as parents, we have to continually let the images we have of our children die if they are to be born anew into the person they are becoming.
And for all of you, parent and young person—the goal is to stay connected while each of you continues growing into the full stature of Christ. You are all on a journey, each and every one of you. And as with the Trinity, we don’t do any of this in isolation, but we always do this journey in community; we make our way together.
You are never alone—God is always flowing around you and through you, drawing you into the circle, in one moment holding you close, in the next releasing you to dance your unique step, but you are always connected, even when you are soloing because God is the dance itself.
So, Rebecca, Galen, Riley, Maggie, Alice, Bailey, and Emma—we welcome you to this season of your life. It will be full of adventure, steps forward and steps back. Welcome to ever-widening circles of life and experience and to dances that are more intricate and complex.
Always remember this flow of love that sustains you—flowing in and through God, flowing in and through your parents, and flowing in and through this community of faith. And parents, remember this same flow of love is sustaining you, always, as Jesus said, “Even to the end of the age.”
Thank you for giving us a living breathing icon today of the work that we all are to be about—living the Trinity with our whole hearts—celebrating the glory of God that lives inside each one of us made that much more glorious for sharing it with one another, watching the wheel of love go round and round, birthing life and creation itself as it goes.
Our blessing goes with you as you now step out in faith. Be patient with those of us who don’t know all the new steps, but also be open that we might be able to show you a step or two—old school isn’t all bad.
It takes all of us to dance this great and glorious dance, and in the dancing, we will know God, not by a name that we can speak, not by a doctrine that we can comprehend, but by the rhythm of love that beats in our hearts, in our souls, across creation, across the realms—within us, beyond us, between us. Don’t lose your mind trying to understand this mystery, just dance it until you feel it in your bones. Amen.
The Rev. Cynthia K. R. Banks
St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Boone, NC
May 31, 2015