The enigmatic Trinity

This postoperative free time is just what the doctor ordered. I like to see it as a blessing in disguise, though the pain from an Anterior Cruciate ligament reconstruction surgery can be quite excruciating sometimes ;).  Anyways, moving onto the topic of today ‘s blog:

The Trinity.

The Trinity that I am writing about today is NOT the Trinity from the movie Matrix but the Christian concept of a triune God.  (though both have similarities). Trinity is the idea of one God coexisting in three different entities: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. So, why did I choose to write on the Trinity today? The concept of trinity is so fundamental to the Christian belief but at the same time is a very obscure concept. I have often found myself (I still do) looking like an idiot trying to explain this concept. Through this blog, my hope is that I can provide you with reasons to be okay with not being able to understand the depths of this concept. 

The problem with the doctrine of Trinity is that the very definition comes across as self-defeating – Why introduce a triune God in a monotheistic(one God) setting? But it is this hard to understand concept that gives credibility to the Christian faith. If the creators of the Christian faith were just interested in getting as many followers as possible, I am sure they could have made their doctrine simple and less confusing. However, this is not the case with Trinity. We do not even find the word Trinity in the Bible but it is a doctrine developed by the early Christians to explain the facts of God as found in the Bible.

Second, a mysterious concept does not necessarily mean it is false.  We have widely accepted “obscure”  concepts in Science a.k.a Theology’s best friend. The wave-particle duality and the Schrodinger’s cat thought experiment are examples where two different entities/states are proposed to exist at the same time. According to the wave-particle duality of light, light is expected to be a particle or a wave depending on the physical phenomenon of interest. Light is assumed to be a particle to explain the photoelectric effect while light is assumed to be a wave to explain diffraction, interference. Though the concept of light being both a particle and wave is not well interpreted/explained, the wave-particle duality of light is widely accepted.  The Schrodinger’s cat analogy follows a similar dilemma. My point here is not to say that we should accept doctrines that are not completely explained because we have some “not so easy to understand ” theories in science, but that this can be an encouragement to keep an open mind when dealing with trinitarian belief.  

Lastly, maybe our minds have not reached the level of sophistication that is able to explain a phenomenon like Trinity without being obscure. For example, we are all restricted to 4 dimensions(at the moment). Imagine a hypothetical scenario where we live in a two-dimensional world. If I was the only one who has access to a 3 dimensional object, say, a flower vase. Despite my best attempts at describing the vase (using my drawing skills), the existence of this vase in 3 dimensions is not easy to comprehend for people who have not experienced the third dimension. This is exactly how explaining the Trinity would feel like. It is just a dimension beyond our comprehension. 

Though mysterious in its nature, it is undeniably a doctrine that sets apart Christianity from the rest. C.S Lewis in his BBC talk says 

Christianity is the only religion that introduces a personal God and it is the doctrine of the Trinity that makes it possible for a limited human being to experience an infinite God in a personal way. It is God the Holy Spirit that prompts us to draw near to God the Father and communicate to him through the understanding we have received because of God the Son. 

Finally, I want to give credit to C.S Lewis whose work has profoundly impacted this blog. In fact, much of the reasoning here can be found illustrated in this video. Also, I want to give credits to my friend Nareen Molugu whose thoughts have been put to use in this blog. Keep pursuing the truth! God bless.