The month of June starts with the Feast of the Holy and Undivided Trinity (to give it its full title). So far the Church's year has been marked by feasts that are tied to a particular historical event, like Christmas, Easter and Pentecost. Trinity, on the other hand, celebrates a feature that is independent of time and place - like God himself.
The concept of God as Trinity is one we find difficult to understand. How can someone be one and three at the same time? But even the fact that we do not understand is telling us something important about God. Religious faith is often regarded as an attempt to find meaning in our lives and to make sense of existence. There is truth in this but there is also the danger of thinking that our faith is primarily about understanding or that everything about it can in fact be explained or that if we read the Bible often enough we will understand it, and so on.
It would be more accurate to say that religious faith is concerned with things that cannot be explained. St Paul writes of "the peace of God which passes understanding" (Phil 4:7) and in the Book of Exodus Moses only sees God from behind. This side of the Second Coming much of God - and indeed much of life - will remain a mystery to us.
Trinity Sunday is a good time to be reminded of this and also to alert us to the fact that we gather in church, not to be given neatly packaged explanations but to acknowledge the mystery.
Metropolitan John Zizoulias, a Greek Orthodox theologian, has written several works about the importance of koinonia (community, fellowship) in the Church. He bases his teaching on the fact that God the Holy Trinity is by definition a community in himself. Each of the three persons of the Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit) does not act independently of the others but acts in such a way that maintains their fellowship with each other. Zizoulias applies this thinking to ecumenical relations but it applies equally to relations within an individual congregation. We are made in the image of God the Holy Trinity and we are therefore called to be not individual Christians but Christians living in koinonia.
A very famous portrayal of God as Trinity is an icon by the 15th century Russian painter Rubliev. He shows three figures sitting round a table on which a chalice has been placed, a good image of our mission to find common ground on which to meet.
Peter Potter