SERMON Fathers

The Holy Trinity (A) Genesis 1:1-2:4a; Psalm 8; 2 Corinthians 13:11-13; Matthew 28:16-20

Today is special.

It is special because it is Father's Day. Father’s Day was a long time in coming. If Wikipedia is accurate, the first observance of Father's Day actually took place in Fairmont, West Virginia on July 5, 1908. It was organized by Mrs. Grace Golden Clayton. All the credit for Father's Day went, however, to Sonora Dodd from Spokane, who invented independently her own celebration of Father's Day just two years later. Throughout the years and fearing commercialization, Congress steadfastly rejected bills that would have established Father’s Day as a national holiday. Finally,

[i]n 1957, Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith wrote a proposal accusing Congress of ignoring fathers for 40 years while honoring mothers, thus "[singling] out just one of our two parents" In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued the first presidential proclamation honoring fathers, designating the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. [It was not, however, until] [s]ix years later, the day was made a permanent national holiday when President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1972.

National holiday or not, we all grew up observing Father’s Day. My mother always remembered her father, my grandfather. My father whose own father had been killed when he was two remembered his grandfathers, both of whom were surrogate fathers. And, over the years, I learned about my grandfathers both living and dead as well as my great grandfathers. Father’s Day was and remains special.

But this Father's Day is also special because today is Trinity Sunday. Trinity Sunday is one of only six appointed festivals on the church calendar -- and the only one celebrating a doctrine. Now, for those of you who have not been here on Trinity Sunday before, be prepared! This is the only Sunday on which we recite the Athanasian Creed. And, if you have never said it before it is probably not at all what you expect.

This is a creed that was written in the western church (the eastern church has never recognized it), probably by an individual in the sixth century, after the great councils of the fourth and fifth centuries had struggled with and officially resolved the relationship of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It was one last attempt to explain -- really explain -- a correct understanding of the Trinity -- and to mince no words about the everlasting fate of those who do not share that understanding. We will read it antiphonally, and it is a fun thing for us to do once a year.

But it is also serious -- if for no other reason than it was so serious for those fourth and fifth century Christians.

The Trinitarian controversies of the fourth and fifth centuries were a little like the evolutionary controversy that rages today -- not the controversy between evolution and creationism (although that's sometimes involved too) -- but the controversy within evolutionary thought -- something we were reminded of this week with news articles relating to possible bias in a book about bias written by the late Stephen Jay Gould . Bias or not, Steven Jay Gould was a brilliant paleontologist and teacher as well as an avid Yankees fan. He was also a fantastic writer.

Until Stephen Jay Gould came along, almost everyone thought he or she knew what evolution was. Almost everyone just assumed that evolution was linear. You can picture the time line, can't you? The tadpole crawling from the swamp morphing into a bird, becoming a dinosaur, turning into an ape, turning into a Neanderthal, emerging as a man. All in a progression. All in straight line. Looking at actual fossils, however, Stephen Jay Gould popularized the theory that evolution is not linear but more like a tree with many branches, some of which survived and some which did not. Change came (and comes) in fits and starts. Two very different ways of explaining evolution. And not the only explanations. And nothing has been resolved for certain -- yet.

Which is sort of the way it was in fourth century Christianity. Everyone had assumed that they knew what was meant by Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But then it turned out that some people believed that Father came before Son. Others believed that the Father adopted the Son. And still others felt that, in both cases, that made the Son less than the Father. Others thought the Holy Spirit was a third wheel.

The realization that not everyone agreed started the churches to look at the whole Father, Son, and Holy Spirit relationship and to meet jointly at councils called by the whole church. At these meetings, the eastern church (in which Greek was spoken) tended to think in philosophical terms, while the western church (where Latin was spoken) tended to think in legal Roman terms. Like Father’s Day, the Nicene Creed was very slow in coming.

What emerged in the Nicene Creed is a doctrine of the Trinity -- a doctrine stated in its extreme in the Athanasian Creed -- a doctrine that affirm that God is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- a doctrine that has, like evolutionary theory, produced all sorts of diagrams. There's one on the cover of today’s bulletin. It is, in fact, pretty straight-forward diagram of the Athanasian Creed.

And, in all this, the prevailing parties at those council meetings used today’s readings and gospel -- the creation account from the first chapter of Genesis, Paul's concluding commendation to the Corinthians, and Jesus' great commission from Matthew -- as proof tests for the existence of the Trinity.

The magnificent priestly creation account from Genesis refers to "the wind of God" -- identified by the prevailing parties as the ruach of Pentecost that we heard about last week. Recall, it is God's word that creates. That adds the Son. The final piece of proof is found in the account of the sixth day, when God says, "Let us make man in our image" -- establishing, it was argued, a triune nature of the Godhead. Similarly, it was argued that Paul's reference to the "grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit" and Jesus' commission to the disciples to "make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" were proof positive for a doctrine of the Trinity.

"Proof positive"? Not quite. As apt as they might have seemed, neither God's creating, Paul's commending, nor Jesus' commissioning has anything to do with triune doctrine.

What we have translated as "In the beginning when God created," should just be translated, "When God began to create heaven and earth. . . . " The emphasis is not on God's being, but on the act of creating and on the creation -- a creation that was good. (Luther was once asked by a student what God was doing before creation, and Luther responded, "Making whips to use on people who ask impertinent questions like you!" Luther had it right!) This emphasis on God's sole creating and the goodness of the creation is a complete re-write of the Babylonian creation myth on which it was patterned, and the use of the plural "Let us make man in our image," is part of the re-write -- one that reflects a non-pagan heavenly court.

Paul's commendation to the Corinthians -- one that we hear every Sunday -- is not even strictly Trinitarian referring, as it does, to the grace of Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit. Christ is not "the Son" nor is God "the Father." As was true of the Genesis creation account, what this commendation is about is not about God's being. Rather, it is about God's grace and love in dealing with humanity and about the believer's -- the church's -- participation in the Holy Spirit. Living in the now of the Holy Spirit.

It is, finally, only at the end of Matthew when the resurrected Jesus commissions the disciples that he uses the triune formula when he tells them to baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But not even that formula -- obviously used in Matthew's early church to baptize -- reflects a doctrine. Instead, it is an action. Baptism was baptism into the name of the Messiah. As used here, it "describes an entrance into the fellowship with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit." (Albright, 1971, 362) It describes God's action and a way of living.

And all this is the Trinity that we know. A God who does. A God who creates. A God whose grace and love through Jesus are made real in word and sacrament. A God whose spirit is present and transforming. A God who commissions and sends us out to proclaim, to heal, to teach, to make disciples.

And what about the Athanasian Creed? Well, I think that it is particularly appropriate to recite it on a Trinity Sunday that falls on Father's Day. I learned to appreciate and know the great grandparents and the grandfather I never knew in part because of my parents’ observance of Father’s Day. From their observances, I understand and appreciate the passion and conviction of our Christian forebears -- our Christian fathers in the faith -- who formulated a doctrine that reflects the reality of the one God who creates, redeems, sanctifies, and sustains us all. In reciting the Athanasian Creed today, we honor those fathers, and thank God for their witness. Amen

June 19, 2011

Ruth VanDemark, pastor

Wicker Park Lutheran Church

Chicago