Holy Trinity

Profitentes Unitatem
Veneremur Trinitatem
Pari reverentia,
Tres Personas asserentes
Personali differentes
A se differentia.

Haec dicutur relative,
Quum sint unum substantive,
Non tria principia.
Sive dicas tres vel tria,
Simplex tamen est usia,
Non triplex essentia.

Simplex esse, simplex posse,
Simplex velle, simplex nosse,
Cuncta simplicia.
Non unius quam duarum
Sive trium Personarum
Minor efficacia.

Pater, Proles, Sacrum Flamen,
Deus unus: sed hi tamen
Habent quaedam propria.
Una virtus, unum numen,
Unus splendor, unum lumen,
Hoc una quod alia.

Patri Proles est aequalis,
Nec hoc tollit personalis
Amborum distinctio.
Patri compar Filioque,
Spiritalis ab utroque
Procedit connexio.

No humana ratione
Capi possunt hae Personae,
Nec harum discretio.
Non hic ordo temporalis,
Non hic situs, aut localis
Rerum circumscriptio.

Nil in Deo praeter Deum,
Nulla causa praeter eum
Qui causat causalia.
Effectiva vel formalis
Causa Deus, et finalis,
Sed numquam materia

Digne loqui de Personis
Vim transcendit rationis,
Excedit ingenia.
Quid sit gigni, quid processus,
Me nescire sum professus:
Sed fide non dubia.

Qui sic credit, ne festinet,
Et a via non declinet
Insolerter regia.
Servet fidem, formet mores,
Non declinet ad errores
Quos damnat Ecclesia.

Nos in fide gloriemur,
Nos in una modulemur
Fidei constantia:
Trinae sit laus Unitati,
Sit et simplae Trinitati
Coaeterna gloria! Amen.

Happy Trinity Sunday! The above is by Adam of St. Victor. I thought I had translated it, but it turns out only little bits, and it's no good to chop it up, and my translation wouldn't have done justice to its awesomeness anyway. So if you know Latin, enjoy.

With Trinity Sunday's page above, I really tried to avoid some theological pitfalls--not errors as long as you interpret right, but images that could be misinterpreted to support error--that pictures of the Trinity are often susceptible to. Of course I couldn't get everything, because it's not possible to express the Trinity anywhere near fully. If you did, the expression would be It, because that's kinda what the Word is... anyway.

One thing was I definitely wanted the manhood of the Son to stand out and be different from the Others. So I didn't want the Father to look human. A basically human-like face, but strange eyes and a body that, rather than being a human body, spreads out as the ordering principle of being. (expressed in a curved grid) The Holy Spirit... I'm not a huge fan of the plain dove image, (I know He used that appearance yes, but only once and I dunno, the way its used especially in commercial religious art really seems to reduce Him to me,) but since I wanted to emphasize His and the Father's non-humaness, yeah. I did stylize, so its not a picture of a realistic naturalistic dove anyway. And the positioning is to emphasize unity, because whenever you draw the Trinity you have to draw three entities, and that can't help but lean towards Tritheism. And the Holy Ghost's place as link; He "proceeds connectingly." (There, you get a little bit of translation!)

Tomorrow I'm leaving for Minnesota, as said below. I'll try still to update here; that's inspiration city! (Partly because it's not a city.)