What is the Catholic Trinity?
Answered from the commentary of A. J. Pollock, W. W. Fereday, William J. Hocking and 1 other
The catholic Trinity is one God in three distinct Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; each is God, coequal and coeternal with the others, and the three are one in divine nature, substance, will, and purpose. They are not three Gods, nor three forms or aspects of one Person, but one God in a unity that is beyond human understanding.
The passages agree on this central teaching, while differing over whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son as well as from the Father: one passage says the Greek church rejects this and the Latin church affirms it, and disputes that it was always the catholic church’s teaching.
Verses: Matthew 28:19, 2 Corinthians 13:13, John 1:1, John 1:14, John 10:30, John 14:16, John 14:17, John 14:26, John 15:26, John 17:21, Acts 5:3, Acts 5:4, Romans 8:9, Romans 8:10, Romans 8:11, 1 Corinthians 8:6, Ephesians 4:4, Ephesians 4:5, Ephesians 4:6, Colossians 2:9
The above is AI generated summary based on the writers below.
What the commentators say
The passages the answer is drawn from, the most direct first, with the words that bear on the question marked.
So we must be careful in using the terms, first, second and third Persons in the Trinity, not to think there is any difference in importance. The Father is God; the Son is God; the Spirit is God—the Spirit equal in nature and substance to the Father and the Son. If the three Persons of the Godhead are each of them God, it does not follow that there are three Gods. That were impossible. There can be only one God, supreme and unique. Orthodox Christendom believes in three Persons in the Godhead, yet one God, indivisible and unique—the three Persons in the Godhead with one will, one purpose, each sharing to the full every thought and desire and purpose in the minds of the others. We may not, nay cannot, comprehend this. It is a mystery hidden in the Godhead, yet the Godhead is pleased to reveal Itself as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Thus we see that there could be no full revelation of God, but through the Son by the Spirit, and thereby of the Father. The full revelation of the one God is only thus - Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. This, this only, is what the one God is, one identity of will and being, so that they are essentially one and one only, yet distinct in willing and acting (and we can distinguish them in willing and acting: hence we commonly speak of persons), yet never willing or acting but in the common will and unity of nature.
There are three divine persons: the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Each of them is ‘God’.
Essentially, what we have just said (question 4): there are three persons in the Godhead, and yet God is one. This is not for human reason to question but for faith to worship.
Divine revelation tells us of a triune God, that is three Divine Persons yet One God. The Bible presents three in One and One in Three—Father, Son and Spirit, the Triune God, completely One in power, will, and knowledge.
This clearly shows that whilst Scripture affirms that there are three distinct Persons in the Godhead, yet there are not three Gods, but one; not a trinity of Gods, but a triune God.
The truth as to the Deity is not that there are Gods—three supreme and omnipotent Beings, each having His own life and acting from Himself—but three in one—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—One God; and though for the sake of accommodation we use the word Person, and speak of three Persons in the Godhead, yet there are not three Persons as we understand persons. Such as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were three persons; each having his own separate life.
Here in this very majestic declaration of the Oneness of the Godhead, care is taken to state it consistently with the truth afterwards revealed concerning the Three Persons of the Godhead—Father, Son and Spirit. These Three Persons, of one Substance, completely united in thought, will, purpose, counsel, are not three Gods, but One God, not a tritheism, but a Holy Trinity. We cannot understand the mystery of all this, but this truth lies at the very foundation of the Christian faith.
Scripture is most plain, whatever unbelief may say, that there are three distinct persons in the Godhead, equal in power, majesty, and glory, each taking His own part in all that is done, whether in creation or redemption, yet ever acting in perfect unity and communion.
Our title at the head of this paper is one such. Yet there is abundance of teaching in the Holy Scriptures that God reveals Himself as Father, Son and Holy Spirit, not three Gods, but a Triune God, though Scripture teaches that the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, yet one God indivisible.
Verses
- Matthew 28:19Go [therefore] and make disciples of all the nations, baptising them to the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit;
- 2 Corinthians 13:13All the saints salute you.
- John 1:1In [the] beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
- John 1:14And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us (and we have contemplated his glory, a glory as of an only-begotten with a father), full of grace and truth;
- John 10:30I and the Father are one.
- John 14:16–1716And I will beg the Father, and he will give you another Comforter, that he may be with you for ever, 17the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see him nor know him; but ye know him, for he abides with you, and shall be in you.
- John 14:26but the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things, and will bring to your remembrance all the things which I have said to you.