Sunday, May 31, 2026
The Most Holy Trinity - Solemnity
John 3:16-18
Listen to the whole reading — MP3
First reading
Exodus 34:4-6,8-9
He chiseled two tablets of stone like the first; and Moses rose up early in the morning, and went up to Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand two stone tablets. The Lord descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the Lord’s name. The Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, “the Lord! The Lord, a merciful and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness and truth, Moses hurried and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshiped. He said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, Lord, please let the Lord go among us; although this is a stiff-necked people; pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”
Gospel
John 3:16-18
For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God didn’t send his Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through him. He who believes in him is not judged. He who doesn’t believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the one and only Son of God.
Lectio
On this feast of the Most Holy Trinity, both readings invite us to gaze upon the inner life of God, and what we find there is not cold majesty but tenderness. When the Lord descends on Sinai, He does not announce His power first, but His character: "merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abundant in loving kindness and truth." Centuries later, the Gospel completes the revelation begun in that cloud—the God who proclaimed His own mercy now gives His only Son, not to condemn but to save. The same heart beats through both moments. The Trinity is, at its core, a communion of self-giving love, and that love bends toward us long before we have earned it.
What strikes me is Moses' honesty. He does not pretend his people are worthy. "Although this is a stiff-necked people," he says, and then in the same breath asks God to dwell among them anyway. He knows the truth about himself and his community, and he brings that truth straight into the presence of mercy. This is the posture the Gospel asks of us too. We are not invited to believe in our own goodness, but to believe in the One who was given for us. The only judgment that finally falls is the one we pronounce upon ourselves by refusing to trust that we are loved.
Where in your life are you, like Moses, carrying a stiff-necked truth about yourself or someone you love—and have you dared to bring that exact truth into God's presence and ask Him to dwell there anyway?
When you imagine God looking at you today, do you see a Judge weighing your failures, or the Father who "so loved the world" that He held nothing back—and how is that image quietly shaping the way you live?
Saint of the day
St. Petronilla, Virgin (1st century)
Ora reads this aloud, every morning, free. Ora