Maxim Monday: Trinitarian Spirituality of the Maxims

This is the third blog entry for Maxim Mondays. If you want to see the previous posts about the Maxims of the Little Institute look back at the last two Mondays. The spirituality underlying the Maxims of the Little Institute focuses on what Médaille calls the Two Trinities:

            the Uncreated

           … and Created Trinities

The Uncreated Trinity, being Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Trinity

• God the Father is seen as inclusive love
• the Son, poured out love,
• and the Spirit as unconditional love.

For Médaille, that is who God is: inclusive, poured out, unconditional...

Elizabeth Johnson, CSJ, says, "How we think of God influences how we relate to God and to one another."

These first three points present the model of God.

It answers the question: Who is God?

The Next three poinst answer the question:Who am I?

The created Trinity - Jesus, Mary, Joseph - to these three, Médaille attributes the following virtues:
Jesus personifies Zeal for the mission; a zeal that is two-pronged –

- magnanimous -- generous, courageous
- and humble -- a realization that we are all the same; all one; we are in this together.

Mary personifies fidelity to grace:

...fidelity being the centerpiece to both zeal and service.

This fidelity speaks of an awareness and openness to God's will; it has to do with the pursuit of integrity.

Joseph personifies cordial charity;

It's service to the neighbor without distinction. To say charity is "cordial" is to suggest that it stirs up love wherever it is.

During an Associate meeting I attended a few years ago, part of the prayer expressed the desire

• to be Joseph to the homeless; 
•  to be Mary faithful to the lonely and despairing; 
•  to be Jesus in his zeal, to reach out to the hopeless and apathetic... 

Father Jean-Pierre Médaille was trying to make this spirituality very concrete for these women who, for the most part, did not read.