“When I behold the heavens, the work of your hands, the moon and the stars which you set in place, who are we [humans] that you should be mindful of us?” [!]  Who indeed? My friends, the gospel verse for today from Psalm 8 really says it all as we ponder who our God is on this Sunday when we celebrate a “trinity” of persons in one God – a concept we can only really accept through the eyes of faith.  Most of us long-time Catholic Christians grew up believing and speaking of our God as “Father, Son and Holy Spirit” – some of the oldest among us probably even remember the Spirit as, “the Holy Ghost.” 

   Today, here, when speaking of the Trinity, we say, “Creator, Savior/Revealer, and Spirit of the Living God.  We have made that change so as to be more true to the fullness of who our God is – because as theologian, Sister Sandra Schneiders has said so well, “God is more than two men and a bird.” 

   The first reading today from Exodus is the familiar story of God giving Moses the Ten Commandments – in fact, this is the 2^nd try as Moses broke the 1^st set of stone tablets on the golden calf the people had constructed while he was up the mountain the first time. 

   During this second time of God reaching out to Moses, we learn some wonderful things about who God in fact is.  Our Scripture translation comes from The Priests for Equality and says of God, “I Am, I Am, a God of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger and rich in kindness and faithfulness.”  What else would any of us need to know about God?  God is basically promising to “walk with us,”  treat us with compassion, tenderness, and kindness – and when we fail in our part of the relationship, our God won’t become angry with us. 

   At this time of year, many young people are graduating from high school, college, as well as with advanced degrees, ready to begin their lives and hopefully make a difference in our world, for themselves, but also for others.  Those who rank highest in their classes are usually given the honor of speaking some “words of wisdom” to their peers.  It is always interesting, I think, to hear what these young people have to share – their bits of wisdom. 

   Many times, we hear the encouragement to “work hard,” and when you don’t quite accomplish what you had hoped to, “pick yourself up, and try again.”  Along with the above bits of wisdom, I read a comment that really stood out for me. It was shared by a guest speaker at a commencement exercise, and she was sharing, I believe, a life lesson that she had learned in living: “…in making your way in the world, she said – be kind.”  I believe this one stood out for me because it is something so needed in our world today. 

   If we are daily watchers and listeners of the news, we find much I think that is not only “unkind,” but down right, mean, and one has to ask, what is accomplished in being that way?  The past anchor for NBC Nightly News, Lester Holt, ended the nightly report with the tag line, “Please take care of yourself and each other.”  I seem to remember that he started doing that during COVID, and afterward, I think he continued doing it because people liked hearing it.  The present anchor, Tom Llamas, ends with, “Tonight, and always, we’re here for you!”  Perhaps a gimmick, but I don’t think so, and both always did, and do, give me a smile. 

   This past week, Cathy Wurser, host of MPR Morning Edition had a segment asking people to call in “with something good “ happening in  their life – the show was really appreciated, and even, “loved” by some. 

   Going back to the Scriptures then, I would like to lift up God’s words to Moses again:  “I am a God of kindness” … and so forth.  We are thus in good “footsteps” when we too choose to be kind.  Over the years, and through other translations of this Exodus reading, we have heard the above words translated, “I Am Who I Am.”  I have heard homilists try to make sense of these words to no avail, when really all that is necessary, is that we “go deeper” as I always recommend, and hear again, that our God is tender, compassionate, slow to anger, and rich in kindness and faithfulness.

   Paul, in his letter to the Corinthians agrees that the “God of love and peace will be with” [us] – “the grace of the Savior, the love of God, and the friendship of the Spirit.”  I wonder how many of us think about our God wanting to be “friends” with us – wanting to be in a relationship with us. 

    And we conclude today with John’s gospel where he speaks of our brother Jesus as, “the Christ – a form of God who is “big enough” as Franciscans, Father Richard Rohr and Sister Ilia Delio proclaim, “for all of us believers.”  Some in our Christian world, unfortunately, have come to believe that Jesus is the only one that all people must confess to believe in to be “saved.”  For us Christians, yes – but that is not what this reading says.  “God did not send [Jesus] into the world to condemn [it] but through [the] Christ, the world would be [shown] the way. 

   Now common sense tells us that through time, there have been many manifestations of God – Jesus, Allah, Buddha, the Great Spirit, and more – our banner here speaks to this mystery – there are many roads … The only way that all people, each of us, and all of us, can one day be one, is that we realize that the loving, tender, compassionate, kind, and faithful God wants to be in relationship with each of us and all of us, thus different ways will be needed – none of them wrong ways, as long as we get there!

   We all, in our world, were given assistance this past week in living our “best selves through Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical letter, “Magnifica Humanitas.”  I have not read it in its entirety, but through a fine article in America magazine, by Jesuit, James Martin, I learned that Leo has taken on capitalism and addresses it through the message of Jesus, highlighting the dignity of the human person, and when looking at “economics,” “the human person is not expendable.” More on this in weeks to come, but for now, let’s all be kind… Amen? Amen!