Welcome, everyone, as we continue with our Easter celebration. I especially want to welcome any visitors we have with us today, and anyone who is using this holy season as an opportunity to more fully engage in their faith. I am happy to share with you all that I have received a number of messages these past few weeks from people who have been stirred by the Holy Spirit to recommit to the practice of their faith, and they have said that the welcome they received here at St. Gabriel’s played a big part in that, which is very gratifying to hear. God is here, and He is working with the offerings that you make and is helping them bear fruit, so please know that the witness that you give is making a difference. We should not be shocked by this, of course, that the Holy Spirit is at work. All of history is leading up to the moment when Jesus Christ returns, and the Holy Spirit is preparing the world for that moment. We can get easily distracted by our busy lives or by the news that we hear, but God does not get distracted. He is at work, preparing for the fulfillment of His promise. How is He doing that? And what role do we play in this preparation. That is going to be the topic that we begin today for the season of Easter: the mission of the Holy Spirit. Who is the Holy Spirit? If someone were to ask you about your belief in the Holy Spirit, what would you say? It can be a difficult subject. We know best God the Son, Jesus Christ, although even he is still a mystery. Jesus Christ is God made visible, he became one of us and spoke to us, we have his teachings recorded for us 1
in Scripture, that is something we can hold onto. And what Jesus Christ came to do was reveal to us God the Father. He tells us again and again, “the Father and I are one; I have come to do the works of my Father; my Father is the one who sent me; conform your will to that of the heavenly Father.” So we can speak more readily about God the Father and God the Son because of Jesus’ teaching and his mission to reveal the Father to us. But then there’s God the Spirit. What about Him? When speaking of the Holy Spirit, we might recite what we state in the creed: We believe in the Holy Spirit; it was by the Holy Spirit that Jesus Christ was conceived, born of the virgin Mary, and became man; He is the Lord, the giver of life; He proceeds from the Father and the Son; with the Father and the Son, He is adored and glorified; He has spoken through the prophets. That’s a lot, but is that all we can say? The problem with the Holy Spirit, you could say, is that He is so humble. He never talks about Himself. In fact, He never even speaks with His own voice. He has spoken “through the prophets,” He speaks through the Church, He speaks directly to our hearts. And even then, He always speaks to us of God’s Word, Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit does not say, “the Father and the Son have had their time, now it’s my turn, I am the Holy Spirit, focus on me.” No, the Holy Spirit forever points us to Christ, who forever reveals to us the Father. If we were to say to the Holy Spirit, “So tell me about yourself,” He would respond, “Jesus Christ is 2
the Risen Lord.” So it is no wonder that we might be at a loss when we try to speak about the Holy Spirit. One place we might start is today’s gospel. Jesus appears to the Eleven in the upper room after his resurrection. We read, “Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, ‘Peace be with you.’ When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. Jesus said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” Two important things happen in this brief account. Jesus gives the Holy Spirit to the apostles, and he sends them out. He gives them a mission. “Go and forgive sins. Go and preach the gospel. This is the mission of the Holy Spirit, whom you have received. Now go and accomplish that mission.” Our mission, the mission of the Church, is the mission of the Holy Spirit; if someone were to ask you, “tell me about the Church,” it would be right for us to respond, “Jesus Christ is the Risen Lord.” The Church does not exist for its own sake, it does not exist just to perpetuate itself from generation to generation; the Church exists to continue the mission of the Holy Spirit, to make Jesus Christ known and loved. So it might be helpful to remind ourselves if we get stuck trying to speak about the Holy Spirit, that we can speak about the Church, because it is through the Church 3
that the Holy Spirit carries out His mission. It is here that we know the Holy Spirit in the Bible that He inspired and that is transmitted by the Church; in the Sacred Tradition to which the Church bears witness; in our teachings which He guards against error; in the sacraments that we celebrate; in the gifts that He has given to each one of you to build up the Body of Christ. All of these are works of the Holy Spirit, it is through the Church that the Holy Spirit communicates to us that “Jesus Christ is the Risen Lord.” Which is why I am always saddened when I hear someone say, “I’m spiritual, but not religious.” That is a clever turn of phrase that was invented by the devil, designed to separate us from the Church, from the mission of the Holy Spirit. Now, if you’ve ever used that phrase or proclaimed that about yourself, I’m not disparaging you or casting judgment. Not at all. Members of the Church may have given you ample reason to not what to be a part of it, whether a grumpy aunt or a poor catechist or an abusive priest. We are all sinners, and we can make the Church look very unattractive. All that being said, the mission of the Church is and remains the mission of the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit does not leave the Church. So you cannot be of the Spirit if you are not of the Church. It is through the Church that the Spirit accomplishes His mission. Could it have been otherwise? Who knows? Maybe Jesus could have breathed on the crowds, or on the Sanhedrin, or on the children, or on the stones, and given 4
them the Holy Spirit. But He didn’t. He breathed on the apostles and gave the Holy Spirit to them, who then passed through them onto anyone whom they laid their hands, confirming for all to see that the Spirit resided in the Church. St. Paul uses this as his evidence for the gospel in his letter to the Galatians when they begin to doubt: “Did you or did you not receive the Holy Spirit when I baptized you and laid my hands upon you? Did you not prophesy, did you not heal, did you not do mighty works you had never done before? If that is not God the Spirit being transmitted to you in the sacraments, confirming what I told you about Jesus Christ, then what is it?” So the answer to an unattractive Church is not to leave the Church, but to cooperate with the Holy Spirit and make it attractive. And that starts with ourselves. What am I doing to make Jesus Christ known and loved, what am I doing to grow in my discipleship, what am I doing that helps spread the gospel? No one person can do it all; that’s not the way God wants it. He wants to work through all of us, so it is only through all of us working together that we can accomplish our mission. How we cooperate with the Holy Spirit in this will be what we explore this Easter season. Today, let us resolve that we will not be an obstacle for others, that we will not make the Church unattractive; let us commit ourselves to allowing the Holy Spirit to work through us to prepare for the coming of Christ.
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