What has The Trinity to do with Christmas?

A Meditation for Advent

First of all, we note that neither the expression "The Trinity" nor the word "Christmas" is found in the biblical narratives concerning the birth of Jesus who was called the Christ. This is true both of the New Testament (Matthew 1, Luke 1, John 1) and of the passages in the Old Testament regarded as prophetic of this birth (e.g., Isaiah 8:14).

"Christmas" is a noun used in the Church to speak of the festival of the birth of Jesus, son of Mary and Son of God the Father, who is the Christ [Christ-Mass]; while "The Trinity" is the Name given by the Church to the One God, who by self-revelation has made it known that He exists eternally as Three Persons [the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost].

This said, The Trinity (as the Christian word for Deity) has much to do with that which is celebrated in the festival of Christmas. Let me explain.

In the Gospel accounts of the birth of Jesus and its meaning we certainly read of "God the Lord" [Jehovah/Yahweh], of the presence of "the Holy Ghost/Spirit" of and from this God [who is the God of Moses, David and the Prophets], and of Jesus who is called "Emmanuel" [God with us]. Further, "God the Lord" is also called "the Father" and Jesus is called "the Word made flesh" and "the Father's only [begotten] Son."

We may say that what we have in the New Testament are doctrines about God as the Father, about Jesus as his Son, about the Holy Ghost as the Spirit of the Father and the Spirit of the Son. In the narratives and the doctrines of the N.T. are examples of how each of the Three acts in human redemption in relation to the Others and in relation to mankind. So the Father loves the Son and the Son obeys the Father. The Holy Ghost causes the conception in Mary's womb which is also simultaneously the assumption by the eternal Son of human nature/flesh. And so on. Yet in the NT we have not reached any fixed or settled way of stating the unique equality and unity of the Three and of how they are a plurality in unity so that there is only one God.

From this teaching and evidence, and through her ongoing experience of God as One yet Three, the Church by the 4th century created what we call the dogma of the Holy Trinity [Nicene Creed]. This is first of all a statement about God as God is in and unto Himself - He is a Trinity in Unity and a Unity in Trinity: One God and three Persons. There are not three gods but there is One God (one Godhead, divine nature/substance) who eternally exists as three Persons [the Father & the Son & the Holy Ghost]. For Western Christians the fullness of this dogma is declared most succinctly and powerfully in the Creed we know as the Athanasian Creed [the Quincunque Vult].

Then from this dogma of The Trinity (known to theologians as the doctrine of "the immanent Trinity") the Church created what is called the doctrine of the Economic Trinity [God the Trinity acting in relation to the world and to the human race]. That is, with the insights from the dogma of the immanent Trinity, and using the biblical material, the Church spoke of the action of God in space/time and especially in the economy or action of salvation/redemption. This sophisticated talk of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost (the Economic Trinity) engaged in the creation and redemption of the world is found in sermons and liturgies from the Early Church and is the most basic level of the language in the classic liturgies of the Church through time. For example, it underlies all statements in the Anglican Book of Common Prayer (first edition 1549). In the historic Divine Liturgy of the Orthodox Churches we have marvelous presentations of both the Dogma of the [immanent] Holy Trinity (one Substance/three Persons) and of the doctrine of the Economic Trinity based upon that Dogma and interpreting the biblical doctrines and narratives for the purpose of doxology.

Thus what occurred in the original historical actions that we commemorate in the Festival of Christmas is, we may say, an Event of the Holy Trinity. The Father sends His Only Son, the Word, into space and time, and in that coming the Holy Ghost causes Him to assume human nature and flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary and to be born from her. Though there are specific actions of each of the Three [the Father, Jesus the Son and the Holy Ghost], in and through all these actions is the action of the One Godhead, the One Deity. Thus we celebrate the action of a Trinity in Unity and a Unity in Trinity as the essential background to the very human story of a young woman giving birth to her first child, a son, and giving him a name, Jesus [the Lord our salvation]. By and through this son who is also the incarnate, enfleshed Son of God the Father, the Trinity has devised and will accomplish the salvation of the world.

To continue this meditation -- we see in all the great saving events of the life of Jesus the revelation of the Holy Trinity - e.g. in his baptism at the Jordan, in his Transfiguration on the Mountain, in his death on the Cross and in his Resurrection from the dead. The Incarnate Son is never alone for he is in Communion with the Father; and the Holy Ghost rests upon him and indwells his human nature. Further, at the deepest level He is the Second Person of the Holy Trinity and shares the one and identical divine nature with the Father and the Holy Ghost.

The LOVE that came down at Christmas is movement from the Love of the Father for the Son in the Holy Ghost, the inter-Trinitarian love, focused upon human sinners and their need in space and time.


The Rev'd Dr. Peter Toon