The Easter Story: Where the "Trinity" Becomes an Absurdity

Someone at work awhile ago told me that her Sunday School, or maybe her fundy college, taught that the Trinity is like the three forms of Water.  Each has its own "identity" but they're all H20.  So I asked why Jesus referred to God in the third person.  Her answer:  "good question."

 

She didn't have a good answer.

 

Tonight I had the opportunity to go to a Good Friday concert at a Methodist church.  They requested no applause, and there was a prayer/mini-sermon at the beginning, but otherwise it was just a concert with a peculiar theme.

During the brief speechifying, I sensed some awkwardness, as if they were embarrassed to tell such a ridiculous story.  Or maybe I was projecting.  *shrug*  Anyway, during the more boring parts of the concert instead of thinking about Christ's suffering and his love for "each of us," (except many groups he slams in the gospels), I found myself thinking of how the concept of the Trinity makes no sense in light of the Easter story.

The basic story is that we are stained by original sin, or sins we've committed, or by being sinful beings by design, and only animal sacrifices could save us from God's wrath until Christ allowed himself to be betrayed, marched through the streets of Jerusalem in shame, and then killed by crucifiction.  .... then he gets put into a tomb (typical of the time) and then disappears from it, and then appears to people, Elvis-style, for a time... and then goes to live with God.

...except that he is God.  And in the story, he cries out to God, "Why hast thou forsaken me?"  Now, if he was so powerful that he could have liberated himself if he'd wanted to, why would he say that?  And why refer to God in the second and third persons?  And if he could decide to forgive us via his "sacrifice" of being dead for part of a weekend, why not just decide to forgive us just cuz?  They're his rules.  He can change them... unless he's not all-powerful.

So... the Trinity is problem for several reasons:

• Jesus refers to himself as "Son of Man"
• Jesus refers to God in the second and third person
• Jesus didn't have the power to jump off the cross
• Jesus was expecting God to intervene for him
• Jesus as half-God and half-human was more in keeping with stories of his time
• Jesus didn't willingly sacrifice himself - he could have turned himself in rather than be betrayed
• In the cannibalistic meal he references himself as a sacrifice, but sacrifice to whom?  Can a god be sacrificed to appease himself?  That's just plain messed up.
• Jesus says the "father" acts through him, not that he is  his own father
• Jesus "sits at the right hand" of God.  How can God sit next to himself?

Well, at least that many reasons.  Even if you accept everything else as historically true in the Bible, the Trinity seems like a big stretch.

Why does it matter?  Well, the reason this came up with my coworker is that when I asked why Baptists don't consider Mormons to be Christians despite the words "Jesus Christ" being right in the title of their denomination, she brought up the Trinity.  She said they can't be "Christian" because they don't believe Jesus is God.  Apparently, even though they say that believing in salvation through Christ's sacrifice is key to being a Christian, there's a whole list of things they will hold other Christians to. 

 The Nicene Creed, which was codified in 325, is still kind of central, but you'd think that you could drop one or two without being ex-communicated by fundies.  But... take a look at this other version, known as the Apostles' Creed, which goes easy on the Trinity crap.  Yet fundy theology doesn't say that the people who say those words aren't Christians.

What a fucked up theology and fucked up bunch of followers.  If there really were an all-powerful deity behind this, couldn't he have fixed it?