Shnorhali’s Trinity

Translators for Today: Unity, Liberty and Charity

Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who dedicated her life in service to the poor and marginalized, is said to have reflected on her own personal plight by with the words, “I know God will not give me anything I can’t handle. I just wish He didn’t trust me so much.”  The statement is a reflection of her own strength and frailties, blending a belief in God’s providence with a candid admission of human limitations.

Following the Feast of the Holy Translators, I have shared with you some “Translators for Today.” In the same spirit of the Holy Translators, these are people who have taken the complexities that are often a product of elaborate theological dissertations and simplified them into meaningful metaphors and explanations. Mother Teresa of Calcutta is one such Translator for today. She translated the Message of Christ, that is, the Gospel, with expressions of her love and compassion for others. In 2016 she was officially recognized as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church.

Each of the Traditional Churches have their own canon of saints. While Mother Teresa of Calcutta may not be a saint of the Armenian Church, she brings a unique set of life-experiences and definitions to the Christian experience that would escape us if we raised walls to separate us for other Christian expressions.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta & Archbishop Vatche Hovsespian on board an airplane bringing relief to earthquake stricken Armenia. Circa 1989

In appreciating Translators for Today, we are guided by the 12^th century Catholicos of Armenian and ecumenist, St. Nersess Shnorhali, who sets a standard by which we understand ourselves as Christians. His formula for approaching one another is simple enough: Unity in Essentials, Liberty in Secondary issues, Charity in all things. With this trinity of understanding, Shnorhali teaches that we are united with all Christians in the essentials by accepting Jesus Christ, yesterday, today and tomorrow, eternally the same. His sacrificial life, Crucifixion and Resurrection, his mission and message are what unite us. Secondary issues, such as how we fast, what vestments we use, fall into a liberty that we extend to others as they do to us, and in all matters, we look through the charitable glasses of love.

We have much to learn from the various Traditions of Christianity, because each has the potential to be Translators for Today, in bringing the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world.

St. Nersess Shnorhali is one of the several translators remembered by the Armenian Church. We pray the prayer of the 16^th hour from Havodov Khosdovanim

O my God, who opens Your hand and fills all things living with Your bounty, to You I commit my soul; do care for me and provide for the needs of my body and soul forever. Have mercy upon Your Creatures. Amen.