The Christian Trinity: Aspects of “I Am”
How does the “I am” of pure awareness reconcile with the distinct persons of the Christian Godhead? One perspective is to view the Trinity not as three separate consciousnesses akin to individual minds, but as fundamental manifestations within one ground of being.
The primordial affirmation of existence itself, the pure awareness of “I am,” is analogous to the ultimate, unmanifest Godhead in Christian thought. The Father in his ultimate transcendence is the source and ground of all creation. “I am” and the Father are one.
From this unmanifest source arises the Son, the Logos, the Word, the Christ. This can be understood as the manifestation or expression of pure awareness into the realm of form, of subject-object relationship. The biblical declaration, “Through him all things were made,” in this sense, describes awareness, in which all things appear, by which all things are known, and out of which all things are made. The Word is the intelligence and energy of awareness creating the multiplicity and diversity of life, the vast array of localized body-mind perspectives. Furthermore, the Incarnation of Christ, the divine becoming fully embodied in human form, can be seen as the revelation of this manifesting awareness.
The third aspect is the Holy Spirit, the divine essence indwelling and permeating the entirety of creation. The Holy Spirit can be understood as the living breath of life, immanent presence itself.
In this view the Trinity are not compartmentalized entities but a fluid and seamless expression within awareness. The Father, the “I am,” is the underlying reality, the infinite potential, the ground of Being. The Son and Holy Spirit are the ways awareness expresses and relates to itself—in its transcendent source, its creative manifestation, and its immanent presence.
This perspective allows for a deeper appreciation of both the fundamental unity emphasized in the nondual understanding and the rich relationality inherent in the Christian understanding of the divine.