The Holy Spirit and the Holy Trinity

In a minute

The third paragraph of the creed begins "I believe in the Holy Ghost" (the older English for Holy Spirit). Christians believe the Holy Spirit is God present and at work now: in creation, in the prophets, in Jesus, in the Church and in each believer's heart. The Spirit is not a force or an "it" but God himself, "the Lord and giver of life" (Nicene Creed).

Putting the three paragraphs of the creed together, Christians speak of one God in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This is the Holy Trinity. Christians say it is a mystery, not a puzzle: not a contradiction to be solved, but a truth about God too deep to be fully grasped, which they believe God has shown them.

What it is and how it's lived

The Spirit in the Bible

The Hebrew word ruach and the Greek pneuma both mean breath, wind and spirit. In the first verses of Genesis the Spirit of God moves over the waters. The Spirit inspires the prophets, comes upon Jesus at his baptism "as a dove" (Matthew 3:16, WEBBE), and leads him into the wilderness.

At the Last Supper Jesus promised his friends "another Counsellor… the Spirit of truth" (John 14:16–17, WEBBE). Fifty days after Easter, at the Jewish festival of Shavuot (in Greek, Pentecost), the disciples were gathered in Jerusalem when "there came from the sky a sound like the rushing of a mighty wind… They were all filled with the Holy Spirit" (Acts 2:2, 2:4, WEBBE). Christians celebrate this at Pentecost, sometimes called the birthday of the Church.

The Spirit in a Christian's life

Christians believe the Spirit:

gives faith and new life, beginning in baptism;
helps them pray, even when they have no words (Romans 8:26);
teaches and reminds them of what Jesus said (John 14:26);
gives gifts for serving others, such as wisdom, teaching, healing and encouragement (1 Corinthians 12);
grows character, which St Paul calls "the fruit of the Spirit": "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, and self-control" (Galatians 5:22–23, WEBBE).

The Trinity: one God, three persons

Christians did not set out to make God complicated. The first Christians were Jews who prayed the Shema daily and held, as they still hold, that God is one. Yet they found themselves praying to God as Father, worshipping Jesus as Lord, and experiencing the Spirit as God's own presence among them. Jesus sent his disciples to baptise "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (Matthew 28:19, WEBBE): one name, three persons.

Over the next centuries, the Church found words to hold this together. The Nicene Creed (325, 381) says the Son is "of one substance with the Father" and the Spirit is worshipped "with the Father and the Son together". Christians mean:

One God: not three gods, and not three parts of God. Each person is wholly God.
Three persons: the Father, the Son and the Spirit are truly distinct, in a relationship of love. "Person" here does not mean three separate individuals as humans are, and not three roles or masks either: the one God eternally is Father, Son and Spirit, each truly distinct, each wholly God.
Love at the heart: if "God is love" (1 John 4:8), then love is not something God began to do after creating the world; it is who God eternally is, Father, Son and Spirit giving themselves to one another.

Christian teachers often use pictures, while warning that every picture falls short: the sun, its light and its warmth; a spring, a river and a lake; St Patrick's three-leafed shamrock (a later legend ).

Its inner meaning

For Christians the Trinity is not mainly a theory but a way of life. They pray to the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit. Many services end with "the grace", a blessing from St Paul: "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, God's love, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen." (2 Corinthians 13:14, WEBBE). Every baptism is in the threefold name, and many Christians make the sign of the cross "in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit".

Key texts

"But the Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things, and will remind you of all that I said to you." (John 14:26, WEBBE)

Greek (John 14:26, opening): ὁ δὲ παράκλητος, τὸ πνεῦμα τὸ ἅγιον — ho de paraklētos, to pneuma to hagion. Paraklētos means one called alongside: a helper, advocate or comforter.

"In the same way, the Spirit also helps our weaknesses, for we don't know how to pray as we ought. But the Spirit himself makes intercession for us with groanings which can't be uttered." (Romans 8:26, WEBBE)

"There is one body and one Spirit, even as you also were called in one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in us all." (Ephesians 4:4–6, WEBBE)

"Go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," (Matthew 28:19, WEBBE)

From the Christian tradition

St Gregory of Nazianzus (4th century) wrote that he could not think of the One without being surrounded by the radiance of the Three, nor distinguish the Three without being carried back to the One (paraphrased; Oration 40.41) .
St Augustine described the Father as the Lover, the Son as the Beloved and the Spirit as the Love between them, while insisting that every comparison fails (paraphrased; On the Trinity, Book 8) .

Common misunderstandings, answered gently

"Christians worship three gods." Christians firmly reject this; the Nicene Creed begins "I believe in one God". They see the Trinity as a way of describing the one God, not adding to him.
"The Trinity is Father, Son and Mary." No. Christians honour Mary as Jesus' mother, but she is not part of the Trinity and is not worshipped.
"The Spirit is just an energy or force." In Christian teaching the Spirit is personal: he teaches, guides, and can be grieved.
"The word 'Trinity' isn't in the Bible, so Christians made it up." The word is not there, and Christians agree; they see it as a summary word, first used in the 2nd century, for the pattern of Father, Son and Spirit that runs through the New Testament.

Across the churches

All the main churches confess the Trinity. One historic difference concerns the Spirit: the Western version of the Nicene Creed says the Spirit "proceedeth from the Father and the Son" (the filioque), a phrase added in the West and not used by the Orthodox, who say "from the Father". Pentecostal and charismatic Christians, now a fast-growing part of world Christianity, especially stress the gifts of the Spirit in worship today.

Reflection

Christians speak of God as a relationship of love. What do your closest relationships teach you about love that gives itself away?

In the other traditions

Judaism: Jews affirm God's absolute oneness in the Shema, "the LORD is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4), and speak of God's ruach ha-kodesh (holy spirit) and Shekhinah (indwelling presence) as ways God acts, not as distinct persons.
Islam: Muslims affirm tawhid, God's absolute oneness, "He begetteth not nor was begotten" (Qur'an 112:3, Pickthall); the Qur'an says "say not 'Three'" (Qur'an 4:171, Pickthall), and Muslims understand the "Holy Spirit" (Ruh al-Qudus) as the angel Gabriel.

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