Today, 1 June 2015, the first day after Pentecost, the Romanian Orthodox Church celebrates the Holy Trinity. This feast is the dedication day of Radu Voda Monastery of Bucharest too. On this occasion, His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church, visited the monastic community over here and attended the Divine Liturgy celebrated by His Grace Timotei Prahoveanul, Assistant Bishop to the Archbishop of Bucharest, assisted by the group of servant priests of the monastery.
It is through the Holy Spirit that the love and life, happiness and joy, peace and light of the Most Holy Trinity are shared to the humans
In the end of the celebration His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel delivered a sermon in which he showed the relationship between the feast of the Descent of the Holy Spirit and the Holy Trinity: “This feast has a special significance and it was scheduled just after the Descent of the Holy Spirit, because it is through the Holy Spirit that the love and life, happiness and joy, peace and light of the Most Holy Trinity are shared to the humans. The Holy Spirit is sent by the Father at the request of the Son. The Holy Spirit shares the divine-human life of the Christ Crucified, Raised from the dead and Ascended in glory, to the humans. This is why the Holy Spirit was not given to the world in fullness before Christ Ascended in Glory because He gives us not only the earthly life of Christ, but also the heavenly life of Christ. This work of the Holy Trinity in the Church is done now through the Holy Spirit who does not complete or compete with Christ, but confirms and communicates Christ. Thus, the Holy Trinity lives in us through the Holy Trinity.”
The Mystery of the Holy Trinity is gradually revealed
The Mystery of the Holy Trinity is gradually revealed, His Beatitude said: “First, an anticipation of the Holy Trinity appears in the Old Testament. The name of God Himself, Elohim, is a form of mysterious plural. We also see that when God decides to create the human He stops, somehow, while creating the world and consults somebody. He does not consult the angels, earth or heaven, but some other persons or at least one more person: Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness. This mysterious plural, which is very hard to explain by the theologians of some other religion, shows us that man is made in the image of an eternal communion of Persons, in the image of some eternal Persons in perfect communion of love and life”.
The appearance of the three angels in front of Abraham at the oak tree of Mamre is another anticipation of the Most Holy Trinity
“In chapter 18 of the Genesis book we see that three men suddenly appeared in front of Abraham at the oak tree of Mamre, at noon time. Nobody saw them coming, but they suddenly appeared in from of Abraham. If we read the text attentively, we notice something unusual in the conversation between Abraham and the three men who turned out to be angels. Abraham uses either singular or plural when he addresses them. The Holy Fathers of the Church have also noticed the mysterious presence of the Holy Trinity in this alternation between singular and plural”, His Beatitude Daniel said.
His Beatitude has also spoken about the best known icon by the Russian painter Andrei Rubliov
“When the Russian painter Andrei Rubliov painted the icon of the three angels who visited Abraham near the oak tree of Mamre, he did not name the icon the Holy Trinity, but the Hospitality of Abraham. In fact, in the first century of Christianity, the Holy Trinity was not painted because they risked understanding there were three Gods. There is only one person sitting on the High Throne in the Holy Altar, Christ, the High Priest, because He showed Himself in the world as human being, but the Christ on the High Throne is not separated from the Father and from the Son, because the Persons of the Holy Trinity are not one near another. That could mean that there are three Gods, that there are three Persons separate or exterior one to another. The Saviour shows us that the Father is in the Son, the Son is in the Father, the Holy Spirit is in the Father and in the Son, so that naturally, the Persons of the Holy Trinity must not appear one near another, as if they were separated. They are distinct, but not separated, but we cannot think outside space and time and this is why in iconomy the three angles are painted as an anticipation of the Most Holy Trinity”, His Beatitude explained.
The Persons of the Holy Trinity emphasise the common work
“This devoted love of the Persons of the Holy Trinity shows that every Person wants to emphasise the other Person, to affirm His work. Thus, the Holy Spirit wants to show the work of love of the Father for the Son and to introduce us in the love of the Father for the Son and to adopt us. This is why when we are baptised in the Holy Spirit and water we receive the gift of adoption. The Holy Spirit adopts us through grace so that we should become children of God-the-Father because we believe in God-the-Son, Jesus Christ, and we love Him. This is why the books of scholastic theology reduced the Baptism to the forgiveness of the ancient sin and of the personal sins if the person baptised is adult, and to the inclusion in the Church as well. Or, Saint Paul the Apostle emphasises not only the forgiveness of the sins, but also the gift of adoption, especially in the Epistles to the Romans and to the Galatians. He sent the Spirit to His Son, in our hearts, who shouts AVA, namely Father and so we feel we are children of God according to the grace”, His Beatitude said, according to Trinitas TV.
The Holy Trinity is present in all the life of the Church
“All our services are celebrated in the name of the Most Holy Trinity, while the Holy Sacraments begin with the words “Blessed is the Kingdom of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”, but for the Confession which is a preparation for the Eucharist. That means that we foretaste the love and joy of the Heavenly Kingdom of the Most Holy Trinity through the Holy Sacraments, and, certainly, see that all the religious services, and all the hierurgyas too, are celebrated in the name of the Holy Trinity, through the work of the Holy Spirit for the glory of the Most Holy Trinity and for our salvation. This is why Orthodoxy can be really called the Church of the Holy Trinity”, His Beatitude also said.
The Mystery of the Most holy Trinity is the mystery of perfect love
“The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the mystery of the perfect love in which each Person does not live for himself, but for the others. This mutual inclusion and devotion was named perihoresis in the theology of the Holy Fathers. These Three Holy Persons appeared in the mysterious form of three lights, as a three times repetition of a truth. More direct, the Holy Trinity was revealed through the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, the Saviour, One in Trinity, the Eternal Son of the Father, who made the Father known and who made the Holy Spirit known too. Although He appeared as a divine power or energy in the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit also appeared here as Comforter, showing He has memory, that He is the One who always guides to truth, that He is the Spirit of Truth. He confirms the love of God-the-Father for the Son and the love of the Son for God-the-Father. He eternally reminds the Father that He has an eternal Son, and the Son that He has an Eternal Father. Thus, the Holy Spirit is the Gift Person of the Father to His Son, shown as Person through the fact that Christ calls Him Comforter”.
After delivering the sermon, the Patriarch of Romania congratulated Radu Voda Monastery for its spiritual, missionary, cultural and philanthropic activity and offered Abbot Nectarie Sofelea several liturgical books recently published by the Romanian Patriarchate.
His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel received an omophorion and an embroidered epitrachelion of the images of Saint John Casian and Gherman of Dobrudgea on behalf of the monastic community of the Monastery.
