The Trinity and the Nature of Christ

Do a word search on the Bible and you won’t find a single occurrence of the word “trinity.” And yet, a few years ago a Christian woman who wrote a diet book was debunked as a heretic by male church leaders, all because she didn’t embrace the doctrine of the Trinity.

I suspect there’s some historical reason for this doctrine, some heresy church fathers were trying to combat. Perhaps at some point in church history the doctrine was useful enough that it still exists in church creeds.

Nowadays, I’m not so sure. Though I’ve never found the concept of Father, Son and Holy Ghost confusing, I suspect most such dogma consists of straining gnats and swallowing camels. A Jewish apologetic I read a while back used the doctrine of the Trinity to argue Christianity is a polytheistic religion. Muslims also believe this.

My own concept of the Trinity comes from my father.

Dad’s father died of testicular cancer when Dad was two. Afterwards, his mother moved in with her Mormon bishop father-in-law. My uncle claimed the relationship was polygamous.

Dad had little use for his religion as an adult. In fact, he was downright irreverent. He used to make the sign of the cross over the front of his pants, a gesture he found amusing, but which struck me as inscrutable when I was a girl. To this day when I hear the term Trinity, I envision the male genitals. To me, the Trinity isn’t so much a symbol of the triune nature of God as the patriarchal nature of religion.

Dad used to tell this joke: “What do you say when you’ve had meat loaf for dinner three nights in a row? Jesus Christ! The same yesterday, today and forever.”

Nowadays ministers talk about what a tough guy Jesus was, not that “milquetoast” you read about in the Bible. As a novelist I tend to notice character traits and transformations. If, as Dad and Hebrews 13:8 proclaimed, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever,” why are churches preaching a different Christ than they did 30 years ago?