Feast of the Holy Trinity

TODAY we celebrate the greatest mystery of our faith – the mystery of the Most Holy Trinity. But what actually is the Trinity?  

The Dogma of the Trinity – the truth that there are three distinct persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy, united in one God – is the central doctrine of the Christian faith. In the words of the Athanasian Creed (c.500Ad), “the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three Gods but one God.” The three persons of the Trinity are all co-equal and co-eternal, uncreated and omnipotent.

The Catholic Encyclopedia explains that, as defined by the first Vatican Council, the meaning of the Trinity is a mystery in theology, “a truth which we are not merely incapable of discovering apart from Divine Revelation, but which, even when revealed, remains hidden by the veil of faith and enveloped, so to speak, by a kind of darkness… Our understanding of it remains only partial, even after we have accepted it as part of the Divine message. Through analogies and types we can form a representative concept expressive of what is revealed, but we cannot attain that fuller knowledge which supposes that the various elements of the concept are clearly grasped and their reciprocal compatibility manifest.”

Though the term “trinity” is not used in Scripture, the Doctrine of the Trinity is based in Scripture. The nature of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three persons, yet one God, is apparent throughout the New Testament. For example, when after his resurrection, Jesus instructs the disciples to “go and teach all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit (Mt 28:18).” The phrase “in the name” (eis to onoma) affirms the Godhead of the three Persons and their unity of nature. Additionally, because there is only one God, any Scripture passages revealing the divine nature of Christ and of the Holy Spirit are an affirmation on the unity of God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

The earliest writing using the term Trinity (trias) was in a document by Thepphilus of Antioch about 180AD: afterwards it was used by Tertullian, and over the next century became a popularly used term. It appears frequently in the writings of Origen, and the first creed in which it was used was that of Gregory Thaumaturgas, a pupil of Origen:

“There is therefore nothing created, nothing subject to another in the Trinity; nor is there anything that has been added as though it once had not existed, but had entered afterwards: therefore the Father has never been without the Son, nor the Son without the Spirit: and this same Trinity is immutable and unalterable forever.”

- Adapted from the Catholic Encyclopaedia

Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ


This Feast will be celebrated next Sunday, 14^th June.  Following on from the success of last year’s vigil of Eucharistic Adoration to mark the feast, we plan to have exposition of the Blessed Sacrament on Saturday 13^th June from the end of the 5.30pm Mass until 11.30pm. The success of this venture will depend on watchers offering to spend a short period of time of prayer before the altar throughout the evening. If you would like to take part then please add your name to the list at the back of the Church. There will be Evening Prayer and Benediction at 8.30pm and Night Prayers and Benediction at 11pm. Please use this time as an opportunity to re-affirm your faith in Our Lord’s Real Presence by paying a short visit to the Church

Gentleman's Sporting Evening

Bertie Auld

John Quinn

Malcolm McKay

Tommy Boyd


For tickets (£10) please call Felix on 0141 573 4686

 A new Archbishop at Westminster

I hope that some of our parishioners had the chance to see some or all of the great Mass in Westminster Cathedral on Thursday at which Archbishop Vincent Nichols, for some years now Archbishop of Birmingham, took over from Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor the role of Archbishop of Westmnster and therefore head of the Catholic church in England and Wales. It was a particularly magnificent and moving liturgy and we can be proud that the great piece for choir and orchestra (a setting of the ancient text Summa Trinitatis) which accompanied the entrance procession was a specially-commissioned work by our own Scottish composer James Macmillan, who besides many great works has provided parishes like our own with more than one simple Mass setting.

The Archbishop himself took the opportunity in his homily to make a plea for respectfulness and wisdom between the churches and society at large, and drew a parallel between the task of today’s Church and what St Paul faced up to when he tried to explain the Christian message to the non-Christian intellectuals of Athens.  Archbishop Nichols was speaking from experience in addressing this issue, since he has been for years a strong and competent spokesman for the Church with the media. From a Midlands background which shows through in his accent, he was educated by the Christian Brothers and at the English College in Rome.  Before his appointment to Birmingham he was an auxiliary Bishop at Westminster and close adviser to the late Cardinal Hume, so his appointment is a sort of homecoming for him. It was during the period when he was an assistant bishop that he spent a week in company with Motherwell diocesan priests, giving them a retreat in which he spoke with great candour about his own priestly experiences and providing wise and significant counsel about the special challenges of the priesthood in the twenty-first century. Although Scotland is not part of his pastoral responsibility, what he says and does as Archbishop has importance for us all. We pray that he may have all the graces he needs in caring for his flock and in speaking for the Church to the world of British society

John McIntyre

On Receiving the Sacrament

It is a matter of personal choice for the Latin rite faithful whether they receive the host at Holy Communion in the hand or on the tongue, and whether they receive the sacrament in ‘the more perfect form’, the Precious Blood as well as the Body of Christ. It can be an aid to their devotion to read what the great St Cyril of Jerusalem had to say about it in his 4^th –century instructions to the newly-baptised:

When you approach, do not go stretching out your open hands or havinyour fingers spread out, but make the left hand into a throne for the right which shall receive the King, and then cup your open hand and take the body of Christ, reciting the Amen.then sanctify with all care your eyes by touching the Sacred Body, and receive it. But be careful that no particles fall for what you lose would be to you as if you had lost some of your limbs.

Tell me, if anyone had given you gold dust, would you not hold fast to it with all care… [Ordinary leavened bread would have been used in St Cyril’s time]  Then, after you have partaken of the Body of Christ, approach the chalice with the Blood without stretching out your hands, but bowed, in a position of worship and reverence, and repeat the Amen and sanctify your self by receiving the Blood of Christ.  Should your lips be still moist then touch them with your hands and sanctify your eyes and your forehead and the other senses.

This passage probably had some influence on the liturgists who reformed the Latin-rite Mass in the 60s, and on the bishops who gradually approved of the custom of receiving Communion in the hand. Fear of irreverence was probably
responsible for the change to receiving in the mouth (about 9^th century) and the later gradual withdrawal from the people of the chalice of the Precious Blood. We can be glad that all now have the choice of receiving the Host in the more ancient way, and the chalice if they wish. But all the more we should care for reverence towards the Blessed Sacrament. For instance, those not receiving from the chalice should nevertheless not walk past but pause in reverence and perhaps bow - the Precious Blood in the chalice is Christ Present just as much as the hosts in the Tabernacle, and should be recognized in the same kind of way.  J McI