05/31/2026
Homily by Fr. Bryan Brooks for Mass on the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, (Year A), May 30, 2026.
Scripture Readings: Exodus 34:4-6. 8-9, Daniel 3, 2nd Corinthians 13:11-13, John 3:16-18
Welcome to all on this last day of May, the Month of Mary. It is also the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The One True God is revealed to us as a community of Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, to which as we proclaim today from the Book of Daniel, “Glory and praise forever!’.
Welcome to all guests here today. You are always welcome here. To all who are new to the area and looking for a parish home, it is my prayer that you find it here at St. Benedict. To those here returning to Mass in-person for the first time in some time, Welcome Home! It is indeed a day to cry out, “Glory and praise forever!”.
We gather today as we enter our summer schedules. School is out so yea students, yea teachers. We have now also entered Ordinary Time on the Church’s liturgical calendar. We begin Ordinary Time with a series of special observances that reveal God’s profound love for us in Jesus Christ. Today the observance is the Holy Trinity, next Sunday is the celebration of Corpus Christi. The entire month of June is dedicated to the celebration of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.
On June 11, our nation will be consecrated to the protection of that Most Sacred Heart. There are multiple ways to participate in this consecration. You are welcome to see the Sunday bulletin for details. With each of these observances we are invited, like Mary, the Mother of Jesus, to ponder their meaning in our hearts.
It was two years ago this month that I began a three-month pastoral sabbatical. The first month was spent on a 30-day Ignatian retreat. The second month was making the pilgrimage walk known as the Camino de Santiago in Portugal and Spain. The final month was spent mostly as a chaplain at the Sanctuary in Lourdes, France. I will always be grateful to Bishop Konderla for granting me permission to take the sabbatical and for your prayers on my behalf.
Among the many blessings were the unexpected welcome I repeatedly received by complete strangers. I was welcomed into their company and for a time was part of a community, whether it was with fellow pilgrims on the Camino or brother priests.
One such unexpected blessing came on the Camino. After a long day’s walk of nearly 15 miles, I arrived in a small town in Portugal. I discovered that the hostel I had planned to stay at was closed. With few other options, I walked to a nearby Jesuit Retreat House. I rang the bell at the front gate.
The man who came to the gate spoke little English and I can speak only a few words of Portuguese. Fortunately, he was able to contact Fr. Samuel, the director of the retreat center. Fr. Samuel, or Fr. Sam, as he liked to be called, had studied in the U.S. and spoke English. Without question he welcomed me in. I was given a room, then shown the location of the chapel and dining area. That evening I joined the members of that community, two other Jesuit priests and several lay staff members for prayer and dinner. They made a point of speaking English so that I could participate in the conversion.
This was the first of many such experiences, first on the Camino and then later. Each became an opportunity for unexpected grace. Unlike the first experience with Fr. Sam, with the ones that followed I was invited in without asking. Groups of fellow pilgrims invited me to walk beside them, eat with them, stay with them and offer Mass for them.
Among them was a woman born in Poland who was traveling with her two teenage sons. When she learned that I was a priest, she said, “God has sent you to us! When is Mass?” In each of these experiences a community was formed.
We usually define the word “community” as a group of individuals unified into a body, a group. The word “communion” is similar. It means to be in union with others. On this Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, we observe that God, who is one, is revealed to us a community of Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
There is God the Father, the Creator. God the Son is the Word of God, the Redeemer, the creative action of the Father. God the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier, is the Divine Love that exist between the Father and the Son. Three Persons in One God.
It is not up to us to figure out all the nuts and bolts of how exactly this works. It is tempting to try, as if the Holy Trinity was a piece of machinery that can be taken apart. But the Holy Trinity is not a piece of machinery. It is a mystery, or profound reality, of faith. In our limited human understanding we cannot fully comprehend the details. And we do not need to. Instead, today’s observance invites us, like Mary, the Mother of Jesus, to ponder such things in our hearts, and there is much to ponder.
Chief among them is that we are invited into this community of the Holy Trinity, the Divine Mercy and Love that is God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. God is not distant or disinterested in us. As I said last Sunday on Pentecost, we are not left as orphans to fend for ourselves. The very life of God is made available to us. We are invited into this Divine life so that our life will be complete.
This is the life that we are invited into through the gift of the Sacraments. We are first welcomed into the community of the Holy Trinity and the community of the Church on the day of our baptism. By water and the Holy Spirit, we are made one with Christ and one with the community of the Church.
This invitation and welcome are renewed every time that we approach the altar in the Sacrifice of the Mass. By receiving Holy Communion (in union with Christ and each other) in a state of grace, meaning free of serious sin, Christ Himself enters us so that our life is transformed, to be more in union with His and the Divine Love of the Holy Trinity. In such a sacred union our lives become complete.
This invitation is proclaimed to us in the Scriptures today. On Mount Sinai through Moses the people of the Exodus are invited into a covenant, or sacred relationship with God. We too are indeed often a “stiff-necked people”, blind and stubborn in our sins. God’s response to our sins is to be “merciful and gracious”, “slow to anger and rich in kindness and fidelity”.
The intensity of God’s mercy and graciousness is revealed in this familiar verse of John 3:16. Jesus, God the Son, enters the world through the Incarnation, the Word of God becoming flesh to live in us. He comes not to condemn but to offer to all who believe to have the gift of eternal life. Through Jesus, God the Son, we are invited into the community of the Holy Trinity. We are unified into a community of believers, the Church.
This unity, or communion, in which we are the Church, is not temporary. It transcends the limits of time and space. We are in sacred union with every disciple who has lived before us and every disciple who will live after us. We are in union with each other at this present moment.
We are in communion with our brothers and sisters in Christ who are now in Heaven, the saints. Their lived witness to this Divine Life offered to us gives us hope. The saints are not made of wood, plaster or stone, but of flesh and blood, the same as you and me. Their lived witness of entering the community of the Holy Trinity gives us hope. We ask for their prayers for us.
There is much to ponder and give us cause to give glory and praise to God in the Divine Love revealed to us in the Holy Trinity. St. Paul the Apostle today tells us to rejoice. By God’s invitation, may we mend our ways, meaning be open to that on-going repentance and conversion that marks our lives as disciples. May we seek to encourage one another to accept God’s invitation of that often-unexpected grace. In doing so, may the God of love, revealed in the Holy Trinity with us now and forever.
God bless and keep you safe.
