Feast of Pentecost, May 27, 2012
The Birthday of Christ’s Catholic Church
John 14: 23-31
Today’s Gospel gives us a good opportunity to meditate on the peace our Lord gave us and on the Three Persons in One God and I hope you will do that during Pentecost week.
Our Lord said, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.” Here is a definition of our Lord’s peace variously credited to Sts. Augustine, Peter Chrysologus or Ambrose: “Peace is serenity of mind, tranquility of soul, simplicity of heart, the bond of love, the fellowship of charity.” Peace “takes away enmities, restrains wars, holds back anger, treads down pride, loves the humble, calms those who quarrel, reconciles those who are enemies, and is pleasing and acceptable to all. It seeks nothing that belongs to another; regards nothing as its own. It teaches a love that has never learned to hate. It knows not how to be lifted above itself. It knows not how to be puffed up” in pride. (Patrologia Latina, 39, Sermo 97) This is the Law of Peace that is given to us by the Son of God. It is both a law and a great gift, and it’s the will of God that we follow this Law.
We can have peace or hostility, but why would we want to promote hostilities between people? This has consequences that we cannot escape. The devil promoted hostility between the First Man and God when he appeared as a serpent in the Garden. Satan already knew the consequences of his disobedience to God. For us today, either we accept the charity of Christ and follow the Law of Peace, or we must know that in imitating the devil we become like him. If we embrace Christ’s peace, we find that we live in freedom – no matter what form of government we live under.
Job wrote that “[God’s] Spirit hath adorned the heavens.” (Job 26: 13) These adornments of heaven are the virtues that St. Paul lists in (1 Cor. 12: 8) as wisdom, knowledge, faith, healing, miracles, prophecy and tongues, what we call the Gifts of the Holy Ghost. We know the Apostles were lacking in these gifts before the coming of the Holy Ghost, but look at what these men did after His coming. Before the year 100 A. D. they and their disciples had spread the True Faith through the known world. +
Now let’s talk about the Trinity. When we confess God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost, the Three Persons in One God, let us put out of our minds the measurable things of the universe – length, width, height and time. Let us understand that God is at all times and in all places complete and perfect and One. We cannot prefer the Father to the Son and Holy Ghost. If we insult the Son we also insult to the Father and the Holy Ghost because they are One. Further, we cannot believe that God is Omnipotent and Unchanging if He has begotten a Son Who is inferior or less than Himself. Some say that Jesus was created at some point in eternity, long before the universe was created, that He is indeed the Son of God, but not God. But they do not understand the term “eternity.” Eternity in the religious or theological sense is the condition of timeless existence. Eternity then is the absence of time. That is why the Church teaches that Jesus was eternally begotten of the Father. In other words, Jesus has existed eternally. As to Jesus being God, there are ample proofs of this in Scriptures. One such proof is: “All things whatsoever the Father hath are mine.” (John 16: 15) God the Father has Divinity, therefore, so does the Son. And so does the Holy Ghost as we see at John 16: 13: “when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will teach you all truth: for he shall not speak of himself . . .” The word “himself” shows us that the Holy Ghost is, Himself, a separate person. St. Augustine says that he does not speak of Himself because He is not from Himself, but proceedeth from the Father and the Son. Fr. Robert Witham (d. 1738) wrote: “If he [Holy Ghost] shall teach all truth, and that forever, how is it possible, that the Church can err, or hath erred in matters of faith, at any time, or in any point of doctrine? [If this were true], would not the Holy Ghost have forfeited his title of Spirit of Truth?”
We have a prayer to the Holy Ghost: “Come, Holy Ghost, fill the hearts of Thy faithful, enkindle in them the fire of Thy love. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created and Thou shalt renew the face of the Earth.” This prayer comes from Psalm 104, v. 30. This same Holy Spirit inspired a youthful harpist and created the psalmist, who was King David (1 Kings 16: 18). He moved the soul of a “herdsman plucking wild figs: and made him a prophet,” (Amos 7: 14). He entered a young boy who was disciplined in the spirit, and made him a judge (Daniel 13: 45). He entered into a fisherman and made him a preacher of the Gospel and head of His Church, St. Peter (Mt. 4: 19). He filled a persecutor of the Church and made him the Doctor of the Gentiles, St. Paul (Acts 9). He filled a publican and made him an Evangelist (Luke 5: 27,28). The Holy Ghost renews the face of the Earth by inflaming people with the love of God, and these people in turn do God's work in the community. The Apostles, who before were afraid of their enemies, now under the influence of the Holy Ghost, dominate them with their authority. I suspect that a refusal to accept the authority of the Church is why many people refuse to join Her or drop away and abandon Christ’s Mass and His Sacraments, all of which are His gifts to help us reach Heaven.
Many ask how can I love the Holy Spirit whom I cannot see? A mind taken up with visible things only cannot see the invisible. However, we can see God by looking at a metaphor from nature. We cannot watch the sun directly as it rises, but if we look to the west at sunrise, we can see the beauty of the sun unfolding on the face of the earth. Looking at God is somewhat like that. We can see His beauty in His saints; we can see His beauty in good works, because His beauty is like sunlight shining upon the earth.
Jesus tells us today, “The word which you have heard is not mine; but the Father’s who sent me.” Pope St. Gregory the Great helps us understand this when he writes, “that He Who speaks is the Word, the Only-Begotten Son of the Father, and because of this the words the Son speaks are not the Son’s but the Father’s: for the Son is Himself the Word of the Father.” Now go from Pope St. Gregory to John Chap. 1: “and the Word was God . . . and the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.” We know Who Jesus is and we believe the Word of God. +++
We Celebrate the Traditional Tridentine Latin Mass: The Mass of All Ages
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