Image: Rachel Welford, ‘Perichoresis – the Dance of the Trinity’, High Dalby House, Dalby Forest, North Yorkshire, 2021.
The glass panels that make up ‘Perichoresis – the Dance of the Trinity’ take their inspiration from the multilayered themes of the Trinity, transformed into an artwork that has depth and meaning as well as beauty and visual interest. Its aim is to encourage contemplation, to be meditative, to foster a sense of wellbeing, to give a sense of our oneness with nature, and to have relevance to both Christians and non-Christians alike.
The artwork seeks to embody aspects of the Trinity: that they are three elements in relationship, yet not individually separate; that they are also not three different modes of the same being; that they are three individual elements, and one element that is all of these, three as one. Each of the elements of the Trinity shares completely in the life of the other two; distinctions of the three are preserved; but the substance is not divided into three; they may not be separated; they are dynamically intermingled.
Research into the importance of nature for early Christians also fed into the designs, how they often prayed whilst immersed in rivers and talked to the animals as a spiritual practice. This radical one-ness with nature and the timeless spirit of place were ideas which fed into the artwork.
‘Love shared in the power of love’
Andrew Collis
Trinity Sunday, Year B
Isaiah 6:1-8; Psalm 29; Romans 8:12-17; John 3:1-17
“Perichoresis”, from the Greek peri, “around” and chorein, “to make room for” or “to dance” (as in choreography), is one of the oldest and most important words in the history of trinitarian theology … Trinity is a way of thinking about God as the Dance of Life. Life in a-barn-dance, as another preacher might say.
Trinity is our way of thinking about God as creative, redemptive and sustaining love. It is a pattern or grammar of speaking and being, a poetics, which includes us, as friends of Jesus, in all manner of divine activity.
Love shared in the power of love. There are many ways to explore this theme.
Trinity names a quality within every relationship.
As givers and receivers of love, we are also inspired (the word is apt) to love more and to keep on loving. When I love my niece, I am also inspired to love the world. In my father’s love for me, my love for others begins again, or is born again.
Trinity connotes a Dance of Life that resists idolatry – in other words, it is a way of saying that love, at the most real or divine level, frees us from all objectifying, labelling, judging; all arrogance and fearful ignorance. Love, at the most real or divine level, draws us into creative, redemptive, sustaining patterns of thought, feeling and action.
When I love the world (of light, trees, rivers or music – this light through these windows, this lemon myrtle, this body of water on Gadigal country, this song of praise and protest), I am also inspired to love my work in this world.
When I love my friend, I am also inspired to care about her world, the particular world of her concerns.
In my cat’s quizzical regard for me (her trust in my care), my regard for good food, fresh water and clean air – my regard for rest and play and creaturely affection – begins again, or is born again.
Real love, real life, bears a trinitarian imprint – never closing in on itself, resolving or totalising the world, but inspiring reverence for all things in their infinite variety … inspiring reverence for the world to come.
Trinity names a quality within every relationship, sometimes acknowledged, sometimes denied (whenever we treat someone asking for help – a neighbour or stranger/foreigner/seeker of asylum, for example – with disrespect or disdain … whenever we fail to include others at the table of thanksgiving and hospitality … or whenever “we sacrifice entire ecosystems to small idols of pleasure” [Elizabeth Farrelly after Leonard Cohen]).
There are reasons to be cynical but there is much more to our life together in the world than foolish self-interest or manipulation.
And as spiritual beings, made in God’s image, Trinity names a quality within everyone.
In my neighbour’s love for me – in the love of my neighbours – my inner capability-dependability-possibility, a sense of myself as love’s work in progress, begins again, or is born again. “Here I am … send me!” (Isaiah 6:8).
Sometimes we express this in terms of a familiar narrative: Abba God so loved the world as to give the Only Begotten One to share in the struggle for freedom, to gather all the beloved of God in a Spirit of joy, justice and peace. Abba God so loves the world, now as always, as to give the Only Begotten One … to show love, to lead from death to life, the Lord of the Dance.
We need stories for this kind of thing. Embodied, cultural, moving, engaging, reorienting/transforming stories.
Sometimes we express this in familiar conceptual terms: the Incarnation, we say, lies at the heart of Christianity.
Or, more philosophically, that “God was seen at a certain moment and in a certain place, and God left behind words and memories which were then passed on. Henceforth humanity’s road toward God was no longer [mere] contemplation but the commentary and interpretation of that ambiguous message whose energy is never exhausted …” (Maurice Merleau-Ponty).
We need statements like this because we are ever at risk of presenting the faith otherwise – implying that some other notion of power or glory lies at the heart of Christianity – some kind of “power over” others, a force without regard for flesh and blood, without reverence for bodies, stories, history, culture or matter.
The Triune God is a God in whom we find salvation, in whom we find ourselves made whole, made for relationship.
Christ is the Only Begotten, the Child of God (because the faithfulness of Jesus is our model), but we are all children of God. The Apostle Paul says: “We are … heirs of God and coheirs with Christ, sharing in Christ’s suffering and sharing in Christ’s glory.”
God is the Dance of Life.
How might you complete the sentence: When I love my friend/neighbour/mother, I am inspired to … When I love the world, I am inspired to … Amen.
