The Trinity arrived under a blossoming almond tree in Rebecca Sandia's backyard in the early hours of Easter morning. She watched it appear as she sipped tea on her back porch. Because of the peace radiating from the three images—a lion, a lamb, and a dove—she did not feel alarm or even much concern. She was not an overtly religious person, but she experienced considerable relief at having a major question—the existence of a God—answered in the affirmative. The Trinity approached her table on hooves, paws, and wings; and this, she knew, expressed the ultimate assurance and humility of God—that He should not require her to approach Him.
"Good morning," she said. The lamb nuzzled her leg affectionately. "An especially significant morning for you, is it not?" The lamb bleated and spun its tail. "I am so pleased you have chosen me, though I wonder why."
The lion spoke with a voice like a typhoon confined in a barrel:
"Once each year on this date we reveal the Craft of Godhead to a selected human. Seldom are the humans chosen from My formal houses of worship, for I have found them almost universally unable to comprehend the Mystery. They have preconceived ideas and cannot remove the blinds from their eyes."
Rebecca Sandia felt a brief frisson then, but the dove rubbed its breast feathers against her hand where it lay on the table. "I have never been a strong believer," she said, "though I have always had hopes."
"That is why you were chosen," the dove sang, its voice as dulcet as a summer's evening breeze. The lamb cavorted about the grass; and Rebecca's heart was filled with gladness watching it, for she remembered it had gone through hard times not long ago.
"I have asked only one thing of My creations," the lion said, "that once a year I find some individual capable of understanding the Mystery. Each year I have chosen the most likely individual and appeared to speak and enthuse. And each year I have chosen correctly and found understanding and allowed the world to continue. And so it will be until My creation is fulfilled."
"But I am a scientist," Rebecca said, concerned by the lion's words. "I am enchanted by the creation more than the God. I am buried in the world and not the spirit."
"I have spun the world out of My spirit," the dove sang. "Each particle is as one of my feathers; each event, a note in my song."
"Then I am joyful," Rebecca said, "for that I understand. I have often thought of you as a scientist, performing experiments."
"Then you do not understand," the lion said. "For I seek not to comprehend My creation but to know MySelf."
"Then is it wrong for me to be a scientist?" Rebecca asked. "Should I be a priest or a theologian, to help You understand YourSelf?"
"No, for I have made your kind as so many mirrors, that you may see each other; and there are no finer mirrors than scientists, who are so hard and bright. Priests and theologians, as I have said, shroud their brightness with mists for their own comfort and sense of well-being."
"Then I am still concerned," Rebecca said, "for I would like the world to be ultimately kind and nurturing. Though as a scientist I see that it is not, that it is cruel and harsh and demanding."
"What is pain?" the lion asked, lifting one paw to show a triangle marked by thorns. "It is transitory, and suffering is the moisture of My breath."
"I don't understand," Rebecca said, shivering .
"Among My names are disease and disaster, and My hand lies on every pockmark and blotch and boil, and My limbs move beneath every hurricane and earthquake. Yet you still seek to love Me. Do you not comprehend?"
"No," Rebecca said, her face pale, for the world's particles seemed to lose some of their stability at that moment. "How can it be that You love us?"
"If I had made all things comfortable and sweet, then you would not be driven to examine Me and know My motives. You would dance and sing and withdraw into your pleasures. "
"Then I understand," Rebecca said "For it is the work of a scientist to know the world and control it, and we are often driven by the urge to prevent misery. Through our knowledge we see You more clearly."
"I see MySelves more clearly through you."
"Then I can love You and cherish You, knowing that ultimately You are concerned for us."
The world swayed; and Rebecca was sore afraid, for the peace of the lamb had faded, and the lion glowed red as coals. "Whom are you closest to," the lion asked, its voice deeper than thunder, "your enemies or your lovers? Whom do you scrutinize more thoroughly?"
Rebecca thought of her enemies and her lovers, and she was not sure.
"In front of your enemies you are always watchful, and with your lovers you may relax and close your eyes."
"Then I understand," Rebecca said. "For this might be a kind of war; and after the war is over, we may come together, former enemies, and celebrate the peace
The sky became black as ink. The blossoms of the almond tree fell, and she saw, within the branches, that the almonds would be bitter this year
"In peace the former enemies would close their eyes," the lion said, "and sleep together peacefully."
"Then we must be enemies forever?"
"For I am a zealous God. I am zealous of your eyes and your ears, which I gave you that you might avoid the agonies I visit upon you. I am zealous of your mind, which I made wary and facile, that you might always be thinking and planning ways to improve upon this world."
"Then I understand," Rebecca said fearfully, her voice breaking, "that all our lives we must fight against you . . . but when we die?"
The lamb scampered about the yard, but the lion reached out with a paw and laid the lamb out on the grass with its back broken. "This is the Mystery," the lion roared, consuming the lamb, leaving only a splash of blood steaming on the ground.
Rebecca leaped from her chair, horrified, and held out her hands to fend off the prowling beast. "I understand!" she screamed "You are a selfish God, and Your creation is a toy You can mangle at will! You do not love; you do not care; you are cold and cruel."
The lion sat to lick its chops. 'And?" it asked menacingly.
Rebecca's face flushed. She felt a sudden anger. "I am better than You," she said quietly, "for I can love and feel compassion. How wrong we have been to send our prayers to You!"
"And?" the lion asked with a growl.
"There is much we can teach You!" she said. "For You do not know how to love or respect Your creation, or YourSelf! You are a wild beast, and it is our job to tame You and train You."
"Such dangerous knowledge," the lion said. The dove landed among the hairs of its mane. "Catch Me if you can," the dove sang. For an instant the Trinity shed its symbolic forms and revealed Its true Self, a thing beyond ugliness or beauty, a vast cyclic thing of no humanity whatsoever, dark and horribly young—and that truth reduced Rebecca to hysterics.
Then the Trinity vanished, and the world continued for another year.
But Rebecca was never the same again, for she had understood, and by her grace we have lived this added time.