The Trinity: A model of holiness

In today's first reading, 1 Peter 1: 10-16, we are admonished to "be holy because I am holy." We are women and men in the process of being made holy by our Lord and Savior. To grow in holiness, Jesus sent us the Spirit, the bond of love and unity that characterizes the Trinity. The Father and the Son give of themselves totally to one another. "The Father and I are one," Jesus tells us in John 10:30. "I do nothing but what the Father tells me to do" (John 8:12). The Father and the Son function in complete harmony with each other, are equal to each other and respect this equality of beingness. Without equality of persons, there is no unity. When anyone of us functions from a position of superiority to another, from a position of "I'm smarter than, better than, more powerful than, more educated than the other, more capable than, more whatever", unity is thwarted. "...only in the life of communion is unity sustained and human identity fulfilled" (Pope Benedict XVI, "Three Insights about the Holy Spirit," Magnificat, Vol. 14, No. 3/May 2012, p. 372)--a challenge for all adults, no matter in what vocation or in what career one is called to "be holy as I am holy," to live the life of communion modeled by the Trinity.