Memorial of Saint Gregory the Great, Pope and Doctor of the Church

 Lectionary: 435

For in him were created all things in heaven and on earth,

    the visible and the invisible,

    whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers;

    all things were created through him and for him.

He is before all things,

    and in him all things hold together.

I have recently returned to a fascination of several years ago by rereading a book on the doctrine of the Holy Trinity (Retrieving Nicaea). I have dipped a toe into Saint Augustine's last great work, "On the Trinity." 

It's fascinating to me how intensely the Church struggled through the fourth and fifth centuries to define the doctrine. From the perspective of many centuries later the Trinitarian definition seems obvious in the New Testament. It leaps off every page and out of every chapter. But that seeming is deceptive for, as the saints understood so well, knowing God is being drawn into an unspeakably beautiful, inexpressible, and demanding Truth. 

To approach today's first reading we have to notice the prepositions; especially in, through, and for. These connecting words describe the role of Jesus in our creation and salvation. Every Catholic is familiar with the final words of our Eucharistic prayers. As the priest holds aloft the Body and the Blood of Jesus, we hear those important prepositions: 

Through him, and with him, and in him, O God, almighty Father, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, all glory and honor is yours, for ever and ever.

We know God as creator, redeemer, and sanctifier; and we know that the three persons of the One God act as one, and yet we can speak of God the Father as the creator; God the Son as the redeemer; and God the Holy Spirit as the sanctifier. Although their equality is absolute, we join the heavenly choir of saints and angels when we give glory to God the Father through Jesus and in the Holy Spirit. 

Reading the New Testament we notice how Jesus obeys God whom he calls Father, while his title is not God but Lord (Kyrios), a word which was used in the Greek Bible to translate the most sacred and never-enunciated name of God, which we call the Tetragrammaton. 

Similarly, we pray in the Holy Spirit whom we know as God. Saint Augustine enjoyed mocking the Macedonian heresy which insisted that the Spirit is not equal to the Father and Son. He reminded them that the human body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit; and then he asked, "Should we adore that which is less than God in this temple?" 

In today's passage from Saint Paul's Letter to the Colossians, this song celebrates the creation of the universe in, through, and for the Son. Even as the Father creates the universe he does it for the Son. "So which is superior? The Father who created or the Son for whom creation was created?" the Church might ask of the heretics, to their confusion. In fact they defer to one another, as we should toward one another.  

Saint Augustine knew that understanding the doctrine of the Trinity is neither an accomplishment nor a goal, it is a quest and a pilgrimage. We can carefully wrap our language and understandings in prepositions as we approach this mystery, with the confidence that God welcomes, understands, and knows us. And if we say "We know God."  it really means, "We are known by God."