(Unsplash/Intricate Explorer)
by Nameeta Renu
Editor's note: Welcome to Theologians' Corner, where each week a different woman theologian from around the world offers a fresh reflection on the Sunday readings.
The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
May 31, 2026
As a child, I prayed the "Our Father" in school and was told that God is in the sky and everywhere around us. I visualized God as a typical white-haired and bearded old grandfather seated on a throne amid the clouds (Daniel 3:52-56). As I grew up in a multireligious milieu, this God imagery resembled depictions of Brahma in Hinduism.
People have worshipped God in other diverse forms, such as Krishna, Shiva, Sai Baba, Vaishno Devi and Jesus. I thought these were male or female manifestations of the divine to rescue helpless individuals in peril, much like figures in comics and cinema. God could choose to share a "personal relationship" with anyone. How my little heart pined for more of this bond of love!
Spirits existed in my little mind as frightening ghosts or bhoot in Hindi. When someone suggested God was the good and supreme Paramatman, who protected children, it resonated like a fairy tale. I grasped that every living person possesses an atman, and when breath ceases at death, that atman departs the body. Taught that plants also breathe and have life, I deduced that this life-giving spirit permeates all of nature.
Curiously, I felt no difficulty relating with God in these multiple ways, as God was present everywhere. Perhaps I was a born mystic.
My initial musings on God as Trinity were stirred on being introduced to the rosary. Gradually, catechism and formal theology obscured my lived God experience. As a feminist theologian, I find it increasingly difficult to relate to an anthropomorphic "Father God," created by humans in man's image. God remains my best friend, though. Furthermore, scholarly debates over absolutism vs. pluralistic relativism often hurt the reality of living in harmony with people of various religions, triggering communal violence.
My calling as a consecrated virgin involves three aspects: consecration to God, mystical espousal with Christ, and dedication to the service (mission) of the church using my gifts and talents. The Trinity captivates my entire being. To me, God is relationship. I often ponder: Isn't heaven defined by relationships of love, and hell by their absence?
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Our labor for the kin_dom of God is a stride toward heaven on earth. Every effort toward interreligious respect and peace is participation in Trinitarian love. How can this unfold in the era of artificial intelligence? I am struck by a soulful note from Mrinank Sharma on X: "I feel called to writing that addresses and engages fully with the place we find ourselves, and that places poetic truth alongside scientific truth as equally valid ways of knowing."
As a mystic, I too experience a dilemma between dogmatic truth in theology and poetic truth of relationship with God and humanity. As my philosophical and theological understanding of diverse faiths has deepened, I see shimmering vestiges of the Trinity reflected everywhere. Christian faith continues to offer a uniquely "high definition" lens to view the mystery, but the Trinity is not something we can capture with an AI-operated camera. The Trinity is also not a mere doctrine in need of decoding, but a poetic relationship asking for expression through love between followers of diverse religions — indeed between God, humanity and the cosmos.
This Sunday liturgy invites us to believe that God is not a solitary patriarch on a throne but a living, loving and active Trinitarian relationship (2 Corinthians 13:13). God's love disrupts the power games seen in the digital world. In this age of gadgets, social media connections and AI, I feel nostalgic for my childhood wonder, longing for heaven on earth through bonds of love.
The readings reinforce this vision. Moses ascends Sinai to the cloud of "mystery" and receives the surprising revelation of God as merciful, compassionate, slow to anger, and faithful in love despite the people's failings (Exodus 34:4-6). Paul's exhortation to Christians in the cosmopolis of Corinth — to live in love and peace — is a mandate for our own multicultural and multireligious contexts.
Contrastingly, our digital cloud is often a place of polarization over seemingly immutable religious doctrines and dogmatic truth; it is infected with the "block" and "cancel" culture. Have these "certainties" become the golden calf in today's world? If God is relationship, then where dignified relationship is absent — in the vitriol of comments on social media — is God truly present?
The Gospel urges us to remember that God's love was emptied out through Jesus so that no one who believes in him might perish (John 3:16-18). Like Moses, could we carry our tablets and smartphones to God in the digital cloud, asking for wisdom in using them for the praise of God's glory and our own happiness?
