Holy Trinity B
Sermon by Rev. Robert Klonowski
Faith Lutheran Church, Homewood, IL
May 30, 2021
WE Believe
This is Holy Trinity Sunday, the only Sunday of the church calendar that is given over – in our appointed Bible lessons, in our hymns, and in our preaching – to an unchanging doctrine of the Christian Church. And isn’t that exactly what got you out of bed this morning to watch video worship? Just couldn’t wait, to hear all about ancient Church doctrine, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three-in-one and one-in-three.
Yeah, I know: The idea of doctrine that somebody else made up, and the idea of reciting an unchanging creed, is to say the least suspicious to modern ears. Why in the world would you sign up to be part of something that is some kind of mystery that you don’t even understand very well, parts of which you don’t even agree with? You ever think about that, when you are reciting that creed? You know, this weekend isn’t Holy Trinity weekend – it’s Memorial Day weekend, when we remember people who died so that we can think freely, think on our own; people who died so that none of us would ever have to think what somebody else thinks for us.
All week I’ve been conducting a little thought experiment. “Holy Trinity Sunday coming up!,” I’ve been telling people. “Who really gives a rip?” And all week people have been laughing a little nervously, thinking they probably should give a rip when the truth is that they do not. All week, that is, until Wednesday of thi week, when somebody gave me an answer that was different. Quite different. More about that different answer later.
Before we get there, though, I want to begin work on redeeming doctrines and creeds for 21st-century Americans with a little bit about their history. Because there was history before people like us ever thought freely and made up our minds and formed our own opinions, you know.
There are two great doctrines of the Church: The Holy Trinity, and the Doctrine of the Two Natures of Christ (divine and human). The formulas that we know as the creeds of the Church that articulate these doctrines were hundreds of years in the making, driven more by argument than by agreement. The doctrines and creeds were deemed necessary to codify the basic truths of the rapidly developing new Christian religion – to answer Jesus’ question: Who do you say that I am? It is interesting and probably important to know that the doctrines and creeds pre-date the composition of the Bible as we know it. For that matter, our liturgy does, too. Christians were clarifying their thinking and writing creeds, and they were worshiping, for a long time before they were ever studying Bible!
The Nicene Creed is the only statement of faith accepted within the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant branches of Christianity. It was drawn up at the first global meeting of the Christian church in the year 325, the Council of Nicea (though it was only solidified 56 years later at the Council of Constantinople!). “We believe,” says the creed, and the use of the first person plural – plural! – is deliberate. We believe in one God; Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We believe in Christ as truly God and truly human. We believe, Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant. We believe, in Asia, South America, and the USA. We believe, and the words of this creed have been spoken by believers of every time, from the Emperor Justinian to 9th-century Irish monks to Thomas Aquinas to Martin Luther, and from Mother Theresa to Dietrich Bonhoeffer to Dorothy Day to Martin Luther King, Jr., to the beloved mother who used to bring you to church, to every single person who has ever shared their faith with you. WE believe, and these words are said on this Holy Trinity morning in the languages of every people on this earth.
We believe, and I’m hoping that the historical depth and the global reach and the universal truth of that “we” is giving you some sense that your own opinion might not matter quite as much as you usually think. The things of God might just be bigger than you! And a good thing that is, too, for if God is reduced to what you think of God then your God is in the first place way too small and in the second place way too similar to a person who is not one of the persons of the Trinity – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – but instead a person who looks way too much like you.
The only creed that’s worth anything, then, is the creed that challenges your thinking. The only creed worth its Godly salt is the creed that can bring you a faith with which you can regularly and perhaps often disagree. Remember, the creeds were historically driven more by argument than by agreement. In that way they reflect the very nature of our faith in God.
I remember when this huge, creedal scope of Christian faith struck home for me. I was in a college class on early Christian theology taught by an Orthodox priest, which is a very good person to have teaching you early Christian theology. I was sharing with the good father that I have trouble on Sunday morning saying some of those things in the creed. (I still do, by the way!) He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t understand why that matters,” he said. “It’s not your faith you’re confessing there, like some individualistic American consumer. It’s the faith of the Church,” he said. We believe.
It’s not something as small as my faith I’m confessing there, and that’s very good news for me. Because one thing about my faith is that it fluctuates. There are ups and downs and hot spots and cold spots and boredom and all the rest. So it’s a good thing that I am not asked on any given Sunday, hey, what is it that I believe today? No, that’s not what I’m being asked on a Sunday morning. What I’m being asked is, “Are you a member of a community that has for hundreds and hundreds of years confessed, ‘We believe in one God’?” “Are you a member of a global community of Christ that says this morning in every language under the sun, ‘We believe’?” “Are you a member of Faith Lutheran Church, a community that across all their differences comes together of a Sunday morning to say together … ‘We believe’?”
And it’s right there – that coming together across our differences part – that is one of the most powerful pieces of doctrinal, creedal faith. When, some ten years ago now, our strand of Christianity, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, affirmed the place of gay and lesbian folks among our ordained clergy leaders, our Lutheran sisters and brothers in places like Kenya and Tanzania – where there are a lot more Lutherans than in the US! – and in places like Latvia and Estonia went ballistic. How can we remain in communion with you? And the US church responded, this is how we answer when Jesus asks, “Who do you say that I am?” And we have remained in communion, confessing together “We believe” even as we contemplate the mystery of what that belief can mean.
So it is around here at Faith, too. We have come to laugh about it, some of you and I, the mystery it is to me that you can hold to the Christian faith and vote the way you do, for president, or for governor. But I am not nearly as interested in mutual self-righteous condemnation than I am in exploring that mystery together. “Help me understand that,” I’ve told you, “in the light of the Gospel.” And I mean it. Help me understand. Light of the gospel. Gather with me around Bible and sacrament and creedal faith, the faith that we hold and share. We believe. We believe.
I submit that doctrinal, creedal faith is as counter-cultural in present-day American society, and is as redemptive in present-day American society, as anything can be. America thinks we have moved so far beyond benighted creedal faith, when we move into the individualistic, the divided, the siloing, and that mutual self-righteous condemnation that passes now for community discourse. But the fact is America needs creed – we all need creed! – more than ever.
“Holy Trinity Sunday coming up!,” I’ve been telling people all this week. “Who really gives a rip?” And Wednesday somebody thought for a moment and replied to me, “Maybe God does. Maybe God cares about this.” And all I could think of was, yeah, I’ll just bet God does. I’m betting that God cares, when the community of God’s people looks upon everything that God has done and responds with the words of doctrine and creed: “We believe.”