LOOKING AT CRITICISM OF THE HOLY TRINITY

The Christian doctrine of the Holy Trinity says that there is one God and that God is three persons. The persons are not three Gods but one God. God is not three persons in one person but three persons in one being. The persons are God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. God the Son became a man. Jesus Christ was God the Son.
  
FROM A CATHOLIC TRUTH SOCIETY BOOKLET
  
From pages 50, 51,
CTS EXPLANATIONS, Jehovah’s Witnesses, by John Wijngaards, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1998
 
Three “Persons” in the Blessed Trinity
 
Watchtower Argument
 
Christians say that there are three Persons in God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. They profess at the same time that there is only one God. But these two statements are completely contradictory.
 
To be a true “person”, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit must be able to act independently. Each person has his own mind and takes his own decisions. But this means that there are really three Gods. The old Trinitarian gods of the pagan world have been reintroduced into Christianity in a new guise.
 
Response
 
The objection would be valid if the word “Person” used in the Trinitarian formula were to have the same meaning as the word “person” in modern English. But such is not the case.1
 
The use of the term “Person” in the Trinity was introduced by the Greek Fathers of the Church as an equivalent to hypostasis subsistence. What they were trying to express is that somehow, though God is One, God is not solitary. Within the One God there are mutual relationships, as it were different faces that reflect one another. 2  
 
In human language this is sometimes expressed as the Father reflecting on himself and thus giving birth to the Son, and the Father and Son reflecting on their mutual love which becomes the Holy Spirit. Since we are talking about God’s deepest essence, we are dealing with first –class mystery, and human terms will always remain inadequate.
 
Using the term “Person” is not a fortunate turn of phrase when we speak of the Trinity today. For in present-day usage, a “person” refers to an individual who can independently think, decide and act. This is not how it is in the Trinity. The early Church Councils clearly expressed that Father, Son and Holy Spirit are One God. They have one intelligence, one will, and one combined external action, 3 if we may use such human terms about God.
 
Father, Son and Spirit possess one divine nature are not distinct in anything else except their mutual relationship to each other.
 
If we may sum up the meaning of our Christian belief in the Trinity in non-theological terms, it comes to this. God, cosmic Mind and uncreated Love, is so intensely personal that we experience God as caring Parent, intimate Brother and inner Spark in us, all at the same time. The personal dimensions in God are inexhaustible.

1 The Church admits that there would be a contradiction between saying there were three persons in God and that there was only one God so it denies that persons is the right word. This contradicts Jesus in John 8:17, 18. There he says that the law of Moses declares that the testimony of two people is true. He says that he testifies for himself and the Father testifies for him making up the two. This certainly implies that Jesus and the Father are two completely separate persons or centres of consciousness. If it was not two persons in one being but two "persons" in one being, the fact that they are the one being would mean that Jesus has not two witnesses but one.
 
2 We see that the Church denies that there are three literal persons for this is absurd. But then it says that there are mutual relationships in God. Why is it absurd to say there are three persons and then not absurd to say that though God is one he has relationships in himself? It makes no sense. First we are told that God is one and then that there are three distinctions in him, Father, Son and Spirit, so he’s not one after all. For a relationship to exist there has to be more than one person. A God who has a relationship with himself like he is three different people
 
The Church says that when it speaks of the three persons of the Trinity it doesn’t mean there are three individuals in God for that would be contradictory. God can’t be one God and also be three individuals. But he can be three whatevers and the Church is clear that the Father is not the Son or Holy Spirit and the Son is not the Holy Spirit or the Father and the Holy Spirit is not the Father or the Son. The Church tries to avoid the charge of contradiction by saying that God is not made up of literal persons but this is a trick to obscure the obvious contradiction between God being one individual and undivided being and his having separation in him. The Church likes to distract from the real issue.  The Trinity is really three Gods pretending to be one God or the Church believing in three Gods and denying it. God couldn’t reveal the Trinity to us even if it were. We think in terms of either one or three not both. To honour the Holy Trinity then is to unavoidably honour three gods. It is the way we are made, we have no choice. God then has forced us into apostasy and polytheism by revealing the doctrine. Christianity is a polytheistic religion, it has more than one God.
 
The book by Brian Davies, a Dominican, The Reality of God and the Problem of Evil, states that the doctrine of the Trinity does not say that there are three distinct centres of consciousness in God (page 60). What it is saying that though God is undivided and one there are distinctions in him meaning that the Father is not the Son or the Holy Spirit and the Son is not the Holy Spirit. One wonders how God can be undivided and be one consciousness not three have these differences in himself when one person cannot be three persons or three persons one person.
 
3 If God is a personal relationship between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit then if the three always act together and have one intelligence and one will then there is no relationship. How could there be when relationships take place only between separate beings who have separate wills and intelligences. They can will and know the same things but nevertheless though the content of the will and the intelligence may be the same they are separate. If John and Jack intend to steal a pound sitting on a table they will the same things but the wills are separate faculties or powers.
 
The Church says that God became man in Jesus Christ. However Jesus is not the Father or the Holy Spirit but he is the Son. He is the second person of the Trinity. But if the Trinity is so close that we can deny the three are literal persons then how come Jesus is God the Son only? Surely he would have to be the Father and the Holy Spirit as well? The Church has never accepted the doctrine of treble incarnation that the three persons became the one man. It regards it as a heresy for it says the title Son of God indicates that Jesus was God the Son. Also Jesus when he prayed to God prayed to the Father so he couldn’t be the Father for you can’t pray to yourself. The Church says the three persons pray to each other for pray means have relationship with. Jesus said that nobody knows the Father but the Son indicating they are not the same person or being and that the Holy Spirit is certainly either the Father or not God at all. To say Jesus is God the Son only, implies that he is indeed a separate person and so the Trinity does consist of three individuals or Gods.
 
The Church admits that it doesn’t clearly know what the Trinity means and has no understanding of it. Words don’t help much and are only employed as an alternative to silence. The Church however claims that God revealed the doctrine to give us intimate knowledge of him and to tell his most intimate secret to us. All this sweet talk is sheer nonsense. It doesn’t really reveal anything. A God who gives us an unintelligible secret is giving us nothing at all. He is a cheat.

The doctrine of the Trinity was and still is just an invention of the Church.
 
CONCLUSION
 
The doctrine of the Trinity has no rational or biblical support. There is no evidence in its favour. It is just another Catholic concession to pagan trends and fashion to get members.
 
BOOKS CONSULTED

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CHRIST IS GOD, Rev JP Arendzen DD, Augustine Publishing Company, Devon, 1987
CHRIST OUR LIGHT, J Buys SJ Geoffrey Chapman and Gill & Son, London-Melbourne, Dublin 1966
CHRISTIANITY FOR THE TOUGH-MINDED Ed John Warwick Montgomery, Bethany Fellowship Inc, Minneapolis, 1973
CTS EXPLANATIONS, Jehovah’s Witnesses, by John Wijngaards, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1998
DID JESUS CHRIST REALLY COME DOWN FROM HEAVEN? Alan Hayward, Christadelphian ALS, Birmingham
DO CHRISTIANS BELIEVE IN THREE GODS? Radio Bible Class, Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1992
EVIDENCE THAT DEMANDS A VERDICT, Vol 1, Josh McDowell, Alpha, Scripture Press Foundation, Bucks, 1995
FOUR GREAT HERESIES, John R Rice, Sword of the Lord, Murfreesboro, Tennessee, 1975
GOD A GUIDE FOR THE PERPLEXED Keith Ward, OneWorld, Oxford, 2003
GOD AND THE HUMAN CONDITION, F J Sheed, Sheed & Ward, London 1967
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HERESIES AND HOW TO AVOID THEM, Editors Ben Quash and Michael Ward, SPCK, London, 2007
HONEST TO GOD, John AT Robinson, SCM Press, London, 1963
JEHOVAH’S WITNESSES John Wijngaards, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1998
JESUS AND EARLY CHRISTIANITY IN THE GOSPELS, Daniel J Grolin, George Ronald, Oxford, 2002
JESUS GOD THE SON OR SON OF GOD? Fred Pearce Christadelphian Publishing Office, Birmingham
MERE CHRISTIANITY, CS Lewis, Fontana, Glasgow, 1975
MIRACLES, CS Lewis, Fontana, London, 1960
PATRIARCHAL AND MOSAIC RELIGION, Studies in Comparative Religion, Rt Rev Mgr John M T Barton, DD, FSA, Catholic Truth Society, London, 1962
PRIESTLAND’S PROGRESS, Gerald Priestland, BBC, London, 1981
SCIENCE AND THE BIBLE, Henry Morris, Moody Press, Bucks, 1988
SET MY EXILES FREE, John Power, Logos Books, MH Gill & Son Ltd, Dublin, 1967
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THE METAPHOR OF GOD INCARNATE, John Hick, SCM Press, London, 1993
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UNDERSTANDING THE CULTS, Josh McDowell and Don Stewart, Campus Crusade for Christ, San Bernardino, 1983
UNITARIAN CHRISTIANITY AND OTHER ESSAYS, William Ellery Channing, The Bobs-Merrill Company Inc, Kansas, 1957
WHEN CRITICS ASK, Norman Geisler and Thomas Howe, Victor Books, Illinois ,1992
YOU CAN LIVE FOREVER IN PARADISE ON EARTH, Watchtower Bible and Tract Society, New York, 1982