Saint Rita Catholic Church and School in Webster, NY - An Introduction to the Sunday Scripture Readings

“For God So Loved The World, He Gave His Only Son . . .”

The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity always falls on the Sunday after Pentecost. It celebrates the most central mystery of our faith, the mystery of “God in Himself” (CCC 234). While this is a mystery that is beyond our understanding, God still reveals himself in ways that we can understand. One of the most prominent ways God reveals Himself is through Scripture, both the Old Testament and the New Testament. We see in all of our readings today evidence of the revelation of the Holy Trinity.

In our first reading (Exodus 34:4-6, 8-9), we hear the story of Moses going back up Mount Sinai with new tablets after he destroyed the first tablets of the ten commandments because of the Israelites infidelity. Reading this passage in light of what we know of the New Testament, we see evidence of the Trinity revealed—God the Father, hidden in the cloud (a representation of the Holy Spirit), and the Lord “stood with Moses” as prefiguring Jesus, the Son of God. The name LORD capitalized in the Old Testament was typically a representation of the unspoken “YWYH” or Yahweh.

In our Epistle reading (2 Corinthians 13:11-13), we hear the conclusion of St. Paul’s second letter to the Church in Corinth. In this letter, Paul was correcting some of the divisions and false teachings and attitudes of the early Christians. In his concluding prayer, we hear one of the clearest representations of the Holy Trinity in all of the New Testament.

In our Gospel reading (John 3:16-18), we hear one of the most famous passages of the New Testament, “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.” We see here clear reference to God the Father and God the Son.

Every time we dip our fingers in holy water and bless ourselves, we celebrate the sign of the cross; and we celebrate the mystery of the Holy Trinity— ”In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”. At the beginning of every Mass, we always hear the greeting of the priest taken from today’s Epistle reading, “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with all of you.”

bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/053126.cfm