A Trinitarian Metaphysic

At the heart of Christian theology is the doctrine of the Trinity, which means all theology arises from this understanding of God and all portions of the Christian belief-mosaic point back to the reality of the Triune God.

The doctrine of the Trinity had been an important theological subject for the early church, reached a high point in Thomas Aquinas, but declined during the time of the enlightenment. Hegel and Barth restored the Trinity to its proper place and Karl Rahner became famous for his statement concerning the matter. Walter Kasper writes, "What K. Rahner sets down as a basic principle reflects a broad consensus among the theologians of the various churches."

During the period of the Enlightenment the doctrine of the Trinity was largely ignored by most theologians no matter what what side of the modern-fundamentalist controversy they landed. While the doctrine was cast aside as an embarrassing relic by more liberal theologians, conservative theologians did little more than affirm the classical doctrine of the Trinity handed down through the western tradition. The Trinity was something to affirm as a part of Christian tradition, but not a subject worth developing or reflecting upon, because of its mysteriousness.

It was Hegel and then later Barth, who began to break from the enlightenment treatment of the Trinity. They saw the Trinity as a necessary element of Christian proclomation and placed it at the heart of Christian theology. They paved the way for Karl Rahner and his now famous "rule:" "The economic Trinity is the immanent Trinity and the immanent Trinity is the economic Trinity."

By immanent Trinity he was referring to the speculative Trinitarian theology present in the neo-scholastics that relied little on the biblical narrative, which sought to understand God "in himself" in contrast to the God "experienced in the economy of salvation." Grenz writes, "the experience of God that arises in the economy of salvation remains a genuine experience of the eternal God, for through the process of salvation the eternal God reveals his own true self to humans.

Rahner writes that God is, "actually internally just the way we experience the divine in relation to us, namely, as Father, Son, and Spirit." Catherine LaCugna writes, "The identity of 'immanent' and 'economic' Trinity means that God truly and completely gives God's self to the creature without remainder, and what is given in the economy of salvation is God as such."

The important point that emerges from this discussion is that God has revealed himself as the most perfect and eternal community. He is a social God. God, according to LaCugna is not a "by-itself" or an "in-itself" but a person or a "toward-another."

The most important thing we can say about God is that he is relational and has revealed this to us in history. To quote Scripture, "God is love" (1 John 4:8) and he has revealed this love through his son supremely in the cross. God is the Triune God of self giving love.

This has many implications for theology, for it means that God must be understood in relational terms and ways. It has implications for how mankind is to understand his relationship to God, creation, and to himself. It has implications for the community called the church, and shapes our understanding of the goal God has for his creation.