Veni Sancte Spiritu

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of the faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love.

We are approaching the Feast of the Pentecost, the celebration of the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles (Acts 2:1-11). It was the day the Holy Spirit poured out the splendor of his power upon the apostles, giving them the light of faith, unloosing their timid lips, emboldening their hearts. The apostles broke out of their shells of fear, darkness and weaknesses, and inflamed by the Spirit, spoke in various tongues to proclaim the love of Christ. The prolific spread of Christianity took off from the conversions of that moment.

During these days, we focus our thoughts on the Third Person in the Blessed Trinity. The Holy Spirit is our Lord God, boundless, omnipotent, one with the Father and the Son in substance, divinity and majesty, not made nor created nor generated but proceeds from the Father and the Son (Athanasian Creed). God is Spirit that gives life (Jn 4:24; Jn 6:63). He is Christ’s gift to his followers whom he did not want to leave as orphans (Jn 14:18). In the Holy Spirit the intimate life of the Triune God becomes totally gift, an exchange of mutual love between the divine Persons, and that through the Holy Spirit God exists in the mode of gift (John Paul II, Dominum et Vivicantem), 10).

He has sent the Paraclete (Latin paraclet; Greek παρακλητος ‘call in aid’] to be with us always (Jn 16:17, 14:6). Even Jesus is aware that it is hard to comprehend the Holy Spirit, which “the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows it,” and it is known only to believers because it will remain with them and will be in them (Jn 14:17). No one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit who has baptized us into one body (1 Cor 12:3, 13).

God is love, and whoever remains in love remains in God and God in him (1 Jn 12-13, 16). The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that has been given to us (Rom 5:5). No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us. This is how we know that we remain in him and he in us, that he has given us of his Spirit. We have come to know and to believe in the love God has for us (1 Jn 4:12-13, 16).

The Holy Spirit dwells within man who loves God (St. Thomas Aquinas), infusing him with gifts which are beyond the perceptions of the senses. “It is the Holy Spirit who, with his inspirations, gives a supernatural tone to our thoughts, desires and actions. It is he who leads us to receive Christ's teaching and to assimilate it in a profound way. It is he who gives us the light by which we perceive our personal calling and the strength to carry out all that God expects of us. If we are docile to the Holy Spirit, the image of Christ will be formed more and more fully in us, and we will be brought closer every day to God the Father. For whoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the children of God (St. Josemaria Escriva, Christ is Passing By, 135).

The gifts of wisdom, knowledge, understanding and counsel influence the actions of the mind, while the gifts of fortitude, piety and holy fear work on the actions of the heart. The graces are imperceptible in their operation but they produce fruits seen in man’s dispositions, attitudes and behavior. The person acts with charity, has patience, at peace with his self and with others, brings joy around him, is gentle, kind and generous, remains faithful, is modest, chaste and pure in heart. All of these are the fruits of the Holy Spirit (Gal 5:22-23).

The Holy Spirit testifies to Christ, teaches everything and reminds all about what Christ has said (Jn 14:26) and declares the things that are coming (Jn 16:13). The Holy Spirit cleanses us from sins, enlightens our mind, helps and compels us to keep the commandments, strengthens our hope of eternal life, counsels us when we are in doubt and teaches us what is God’s will (St. Thomas Aquinas). He intercedes in our prayers (Rom 8:26). “Holiness is attained with the help of the Holy Spirit, who comes to dwell in our souls, through grace given us by the sacraments and as a result of a constant ascetical struggle” (St. Josemaria Escriva, The Forge, 429). He is our constant protector and defendaer in the small and great battles of our daily life (Christ is Passing By, 130, 131).

It is time to take our Christian life seriously, putting our lives on the line, and to live and act as a Christian should, and carry on the work of holiness which is Christ’s command and which he merited for us through his incarnation and death (cf Christ is Passing By, 129, 130).

“To live according to the Holy Spirit means to live by faith and hope and charity — to allow God to take possession of our lives and to change our hearts, to make us resemble him more and more” (Christ is Passing By, 134).