My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, how fitting it is that my last day as assistant to the parish priest of the Cathedral of the Archdiocese of Goa and Daman is a Sunday – the beginning, and end, of a new week. How even more fitting that this closure of a cycle is on the Sunday when we celebrate the solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. Fitting, because the theme that I will develop, animated by the teachings of the lectionary for this great feast, has been the theme that has animated my first year in pastoral life.
In the first reading we hear the words that Moses addresses to God
If I find favor with you, O Lord,
do come along in our company.
This is indeed a stiff-necked people; yet pardon our wickedness and sins,
and receive us as your own.
We are as stiff-necked and wicked and sinful as the people of Israel, our fathers in faith, and yet, the Triune God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – chose to come into our company and pitch tent among us. This tent is present in every Catholic Church in the world, and in this Cathedral our forefathers built a particularly beautiful tent for Him in the form of the Chapel of the Most Blessed Sacrament.
This chapel of the Blessed Sacrament is precious not only because God – the Most Holy Trinity – dwells there, but also for the instruction we receive on our faith and the importance of the Blessed Sacrament through the paintings on the walls. One of these paintings is a representation of the vision of Jacob, where he saw a stairway leading to heaven, and angels ascending and descending between heaven and earth. This place was where Jacob set up a shrine to honour God.
As I have preached so many times before, every tabernacle of the Blessed Sacrament is the site of the ladder that allows us to reach heaven, and there are countless angels ascending and descending at this spot praising the Triune God in His glory.
My dear brothers and sisters, when Our Lord Jesus Christ is present in the Blessed Sacrament, He is not present alone. Recall His words to the disciples in the Gospel according to John (14:10):
I am in the Father and the Father is in me
And further in the same chapter (14:21):
Those who love me will keep my word, and my Father will love them,
and we will come to them and make our home with them.
Where the Son is, there is the Father; where the Father and Son are, the Holy Spirit who is born of their love also is. In other words, in every tabernacle where the Son – the ladder that bridges heaven and earth – is, the Father and the Holy Spirit are also present.
It should not, therefore, surprise us, that two of the prayers of Fatima, mention the Holy Trinity and the Blessed Sacrament in the same breath.
Most Holy Trinity, I adore Thee! My God, my God, I love Thee in the Most Blessed Sacrament.
And
Most Holy Trinity—Father, Son and Holy Spirit—I adore Thee profoundly. I offer Thee the most precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the world, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges, and indifferences whereby He is offended. And through the infinite merits of His Most Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of Thee the conversion of poor sinners.
If this is the case, if God, the Holy Trinity dwells with us, should we not be more careful in our behaviour before the Blessed Sacrament? As we read in the first reading, the moment Moses realized he was in the presence of God, he:
at once bowed down to the ground in worship
This is the place where angels ascend and descend, and we should genuflect at the very least before the tabernacle, yet we are so stiff-necked, wicked and sinful that most people simply walk past the tabernacle without recognizing the God who dwells there, for no other reason, than for us! As I have said before, dear brothers and sisters, a mere bow is not sufficient, what makes us Catholic is the fact that we genuflect to demonstrate that we recognize the true and real presence of God among us.
In a recent catechism offered at the Wednesday public audience, Pope Leo appealed to us:
let us allow ourselves to be shaped inwardly by the rites, symbols, gestures and above all the living presence of Christ.
My dear brothers and sisters, the living presence of Christ is the presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament. With Him are the Father and the Holy Spirit. Let us allow, therefore, the traditions of our fathers, that showed profound respect to the Blessed Sacrament, to shape our lives and our souls as well.
And so, let us make the words of the Gospel acclamation today our own and promise to give:
Glory to the Father, the Son, and
the Holy Spirit;
to God who is, who was, and who is to come.
May the Triune God bless you all. Keep me in your prayers.
(A version of this homily was preached in Concanim to the faithful at the Cathedral parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, Old Goa on 31 May 31, 2026.)
(Image reference: The Holy Trinity, Sebastiano Conca, Chiesa di San Francesco Saverio, Rome.)
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