Symposium Resources

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Additional resources will be added as they become available.

  1. Why Trinity? presentation on the symposium theme
  2. Resources for personal reading on the Trinity (bibliography) Updated 9.8.2020
  3. Theological reflection resources on the Gerhardinger intranet (password required)
    1. English version (PDF)
  4. Theresa and Caroline References to the Triune God
  5. Images of the Trinity by Sister Ines Camiran, SSND
  6. The Development of the Trinitarian Doctrine, a video series presented by Sister Sandra Ann Weinke, SSND
    Parts 1 & 2
    Parts 3 & 4
    Study Guide

BOOKMARKS – highlights and notes on resources for personal reading

September 2020

Wright, Robert. The Evolution of God. (New York, NY. Little, Brown and Company, 2009)

Wright takes us on a sweeping journey through history, unveiling a discovery of crucial importance to the present moment: there is a pattern in the evolution of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and a “hidden code” in their scriptures. Wright shows that, however mistaken our traditional ideas about God or gods, their evolution points to a transcendent prospect: that the religious quest is valid, and that a modern, scientific worldview leaves room for something that can meaningfully be called divine as well as offer the possibility of future harmony.

Karen Armstrong. A History of God: The 4,000-Year Quest of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. (New York. Alfred A. Knopf, 1994)

Why does God exist? How have the three dominant monotheistic religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—shaped and altered the conception of God and influenced each other? Understanding the ever-changing ideas of God in the past and their relevance and usefulness in their time, Armstrong says, is a way to begin the search for a new concept for the twenty-first century. It is a natural aspect of our humanity to seek a symbol for the ineffable reality that is universally perceived.

July 2020

Schaab, Gloria. Trinity in Relation: Creation, Incarnation, and Grace in an Evolving Universe, (Winona, MN. Christian Brothers Publications, 2012)

Gloria Schaab is one of our speakers for the Symposium. In this book, she looks at the question, if relatedness is the essence of all life—cosmic, human, and divine—then how is God present and active within the unfolding history of Creation? She says, “To answer this question in the twenty-first century, we must take into account a worldview shaped by insights of the sciences, especially those of evolutionary biology and quantum physics.” (p 11)

In Part I, she explores Cosmic Being, Human Being, Divine Being as Relation and Divine and Cosmic Being in Relation. Part II reflects on Creation as Relation, Incarnation as Relation, and Grace as Relation in an evolving Cosmos. She ends with living in Trinitarian Relation.

In summary, she holds that people, by “living deeply in relation to cosmic, human, and divine life,” become a symbol of relation in the Image of the Triune God. And she attests that those who do become a “symbol that transforms human and cosmic existence through the values of compassion, justice, and right relation.” (p 330)

If you are looking for a book based on current twenty-first century science and cosmology and expanding your understanding of all in relationship in an evolving cosmos, this is the book for you.

June 2020

Beatrice Bruteau. God’s Ecstasy: The Creation of a Self-Creating World, (Crossroad, 1997).
“It is the presence of the Trinity as pattern repeated at every scale of the cosmic order that makes the universe the manifestation of God and itself sacred and holy.” The Trinity is a dynamic, generative principle stamped into the very nature of created reality; it is both cosmic law and creative template. Because the Trinitarian template is built right into the dynamism of the universe itself, Bruteau sees no need to seek philosophical recourse in an extrinsic creator God, “above” and “beyond” creation itself; it is all there in the Trinitarian dynamism itself.

Bourgeault, Cynthia. The Holy Trinity and the Law of Three: Discovering the Radical Truth at the Heart of Christianity, (Boulder, CO. Shambhala Press 2013) “Trinity is an energy field arising out of the interplay of three independent forces (affirming, denying, reconciling).

May 2020

Edwards, Denis. Deep Incarnation, (Maryknoll, NY. Orbis Books, 2019)
This book has had a tremendous impact on me. Drawing from theologians from the early Church fathers like Irenaeus and Anthanasius to Karl Rahner and Elizabeth Johnson, Denis Edwards highlights how the mystery of the Word becoming flesh includes not only humanity but all creatures and all matter as well. I was deeply touched by the passage that asserts that no creature dies alone. The divine presence accompanies all creatures in their suffering and that somehow that presence makes a difference to both the creature and to God (p.15). All creation, therefore is included in the ongoing paschal mystery that is gradually bringing the universe to its eschatological fulfillment where God will truly be all, in all.

April 2020

Haught, John F. What is God: How to Think About the Divine, (New York, NY. Paulist Press, 1986)

As a resource for the Symposium on the Trinity, this book is invaluable. It does not treat the Trinity itself, but is a perfect foundation for understanding how we come to a notion of God in the first place. Instead of asking Who Is God? and getting tangled in the problem of ‘persons’ and ‘personhood’ in God, the ‘what’ question leads the reader to deeper insights into the nature of the divine.

Underlying our human quest for ‘depth’, ‘future’, ‘freedom’, ‘beauty’, and ‘truth’, is the mystery of the divine for which we long. These are the chapters in Haught’s book.

This book will forever change the way that you think about God, and I cannot recommend it enough.

THINK ON THIS: The unavailability of the divine creates a longing for God that is never fully quenched. Haught says: God’s absence may be considered essential for the sake of nearness….The divine must withhold presence precisely in order to bestow INTIMACY.

March 2020

Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator. Theology Brewed in an African Pot, (New York: Maryknoll, Orbis Books, 2008.)

Among other topics such as God, trinity, creation, grace and sin, Jesus Christ, Church, Mary and saints, as well as inculturation and spirituality, the author highlights the differences between an African view (denotes sub-Saharan Africa) of religion and a more Eurocentric one. An “eye opener” to those who want to understand the developing contours of Christian faith in the rapidly growing African Church, he invites us to “taste and see” the richness and theology “brewed in an African pot.” I appreciate his simplified understanding of Trinity drawn from familiar African and feminine experiences (pp. 26-34). Currently, the author teaches Theology and Religious Studies at Hekima College Jesuit School of Theology and Institute of Peace Studies in Nairobi, Kenya and is President of the Jesuit Conference of Africa and Madagascar. 

Power, David and Downey, Michael. Living the Justice of the Triune God. (Collegeville, MN. Liturgical Press, 2012)

In Living the Justice of the Triune God, David N. Power, OMI and Michael Downey make clear to contemporary believers why a spiritual and sacramental life that is ordered by its trinitarian orientation must include the desire for justice. In short, it is an ethic of social justice that springs from contemplation of the Divine Trinity in the world. In Chapter 5, Eucharist, Trinity and Justice, they make the connection between Eucharist, Trinity and All Creation, essential elements of SSND spirituality.

“In the act of receiving the gifts of the Body and Blood, there is signified and includes the mutual service of the congregation to one another, in the true spirit of discipleship which is mandated in the Johannine account of the washing of the feet as the proper access to the table of Christ. It is in this typical ecclesial communion that the work of the Trinity is perfected, and it is around and from this table that the naming of God occurs.” (pp. 132-133)

Delio, Ilia. The Unbearable Wholeness of Being

“If God is at the heart of this physical, evolving cosmos, then love is the energy that makes everything precious and alive.  God is the ultimate wholeness and depth  of love, the inner Omega of everything from the smallest quark to the largest galaxy…  Every created being is held in being by the breath of divine love whose infinite depth exceeds the capacity of any finite being to contain it; hence, every being stretches toward its own self-expression, its longing to love as it is loved, reaching out toward more being and more life.”

This dynamic personal relatedness of infinite love means that creation is not a mere external act of God, an object on the fringe of divine power; rather it emerges out of the innermost depths of Trinitarian life.  Evolution is the process by which Trinity becomes cosmos, and cosmos becomes christified; that is love unto love becomes more personal and unitive.  The drama of creation is the drama of Trinitarian life. (pp. 69-70)

February 2020

Boff, Leonardo. Holy Trinity: Perfect Community

“It is not a matter of removing the veil from the mystery of God, but rather of grasping the divine movement so that we may better experience the presence and activity of the Blessed Trinity in the world and in our personal journey.”  (p. 47)

I found this book to be an easy read and very inspiring.  It also has a great appendix of definitions regarding the Trinity in the back of the book.

Hunt, Anne. The Trinity: Insights for the Mystics (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2010)

Anne Hunt offers us a rich look at eight mystics, particularly women mystics, who provide us with profound insights into our Christian trinitarian faith. By examining the life and works of these mystics, Hunt gives us a means to deepen our own trinitarian faith in ways that go beyond many of the philosophical and theological issues that surround the explication of the doctrine of the Trinity. Currently, Anne Hunt is Dean of the Faculty of Theology and Philosophy at Australian Catholic University, Brisbane Australia, and she is an accomplished Catholic theologian who has written extensively on trinitarian theology.

de Chardin, Teilhard. The Divine Milieu (Harper and Row, 1960)

Teilhard de Chardin dedicates his book, The Divine Milieu to “those who love the world.”   While this book is not noted for its explicit references to the Trinity, the title and the dedication are themselves a reflection on the Triune God whose presence and activity are experienced in the world. His book proposes, “a way to see” and a “practical attitude” (p. 46) to see God everywhere as we contemplate the universe. His belief is that as we fall in love with the universe, we fall in love with God. “God truly waits for us in things, unless indeed [God] advances to meet us there.” (p. 47)

To be fully human and fully Christian, we must grow in our awareness of the influence of the cosmos: “’we live at the centre of the network of cosmic influences as we lie at the heart of the human crown or among the myriads of stars, but without alas, being aware of their immensity.” (p. 58)

Our human work and endeavors, no matter how small or seemingly insignificant, draw the universe toward its wholeness and completion in Christ. In this, we are drawn into the unity of God’s creative power.

God is the universal milieu because all realities come together in God. The essence of everything is “the radiance of the focus of the universe” (p.114). Though the divine milieu appears vast, it is essentially a center where absolute and final power is to unite and to complete all things within itself.

January 2020

Johnson, Elizabeth A. Quest for the Living God: Mapping Frontiers in the Theology of God (New York, NY. Continuum International Publishing Group, 2007)

In her book, “Quest for the Living God,” Elizabeth Johnson shares multiple images of the Triune God from non-personal imagery, personal, and some a combination. Pages 219-221 are full of possible images for reflection. I was struck by Anthony Kelly’s expression of the Triune God as Being-in-Love. This Being-in-Love as a giver, a gift, a giving.

  • How do I ponder this gift becoming incarnate in my life, in our world, in the universe?
  • Am I open to receive this gift?
  • How can I share love as giver, gift, and a giving?

May our Triune God draw you into this incomprehensible mystery of love!