Day 3

Scripture (John 3:3-8)

Jesus answered Nicodemus, “Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born anew, he can’t see God’s Kingdom.” ⁴ Nicodemus said to him, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” ⁵ Jesus answered, “Most certainly I tell you, unless one is born of water and Spirit, he can’t enter into God’s Kingdom. ⁶ That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ⁷ Don’t marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born anew.’ ⁸ The wind blows where it wants to, and you hear its sound, but don’t know where it comes from and where it is going. So is everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

Meditation

The first thing we know of a person is the name. It is by his name that we address him, that we distinguish him, and remember him. The third Person of the Trinity also has a name: He is called the Holy Spirit. But “Spirit” is the Latinised version. The name of the Spirit, the one by which the first recipients of revelation knew Him, by which the prophets, the psalmists, Mary, Jesus, and the Apostles invoked Him, is Ruach, which means breath, wind, a puff of air. It was by observing the wind and its manifestations that the biblical writers were led by God to discover a “wind” of a different nature. It is not by accident that at Pentecost the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles accompanied by the ‘roar of a rushing wind’ (cf. Acts 2:2). It was as if the Holy Spirit wanted to put his signature on what was happening. What, then, does His name, Ruach, tell us about the Holy Spirit? The image of the wind serves first of all to express the power of the Holy Spirit. “Spirit and power” or “power of the Spirit” is a recurring combination throughout the Bible. For the wind is an overwhelming force, an indomitable force, capable even of moving oceans. Again, however, to discover the full meaning of the realities of the Bible, one must not stop at the Old Testament, but come to Jesus. Alongside power, Jesus will highlight another characteristic of the wind: its freedom. To Nicodemus, who visits Him at night, Jesus say solemnly: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (Jn 3:8). The wind is the only thing that absolutely cannot be bridled, cannot be “bottled up” or put in a box. We seek to “bottle up” the wind or put it in a box: it’s not possible. It is free. To pretend to enclose the Holy Spirit in concepts, definitions, theses or treatises, as modern rationalism has sometimes attempted to do, is to lose it, nullify it, or reduce it to the purely human spirit, to a simple spirit. There is, however, a similar temptation in the ecclesiastical field, and it is that of wanting to enclose the Holy Spirit in canons, institutions, definitions. The Spirit creates and animates institutions, but He himself cannot be “institutionalised,” “objectified”. The wind blows “where it wills,” so the Spirit distributes its gifts “as it wills” (1 Cor 12:11).  (June 5, 2024)

Musical Selection 

As the wind song through the trees,
as the stirring of the breeze,
so it is with the Spirit of God,
as the heart made strangely warm,
as the voice within the storm,
so it is with the Spirit of God.
Never seen, ever known
where this wind has blown
bringing life, bringing power to the world.

As the rainbow after rain,
as the hope that’s born again,
so it is with the Spirit of God,
as the green in the spring,
as a kite on a string,
so it is with the Spirit of God,
making worlds that are new,
making peace come true,
bringing gifts, bringing love to the world.

Collect

Day 4

Scripture (Revelation 2:18,25-29)

Immediately after His baptism in the Jordan, Jesus “was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil” (Mt 4:1) – this is what the Gospel of Matthew says. The initiative is not Satan’s, but God’s. Going into the wilderness, Jesus obeys an inspiration of the Holy Spirit; He does not fall into an enemy snare, no, no! Once He has withstood the test, it is written, He returns to Galilee “in the power of the Spirit” (Lk 4:14). In the wilderness, Jesus freed Himself of Satan, and now He can deliver from Satan. He freed Himself, He frees from Satan. It is what the Evangelists highlight with the numerous studies of deliverance from possession. Jesus says to His opponents: “If it is by the Spirit of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you” (Mt 12:28). And Jesus casts out the demons, with the aspiration of the kingdom of God. Nowadays we are witnessing a strange phenomenon regarding the devil. At a certain cultural level, it is held that he simply does not exist. He would be a symbol of the collective subconscious, or alienation; in short, a metaphor. But “the cleverest ruse of the devil is to persuade you he does not exist!”, as someone wrote (Charles Baudelaire). He is astute: he makes us believe that he does not exist, and in this way he dominates everything. He is cunning. And yet our technological and secularized world is teeming with magicians, occultism, spiritualism, astrologers, sellers of spells and amulets, and unfortunately with real satanic sects. Driven out the door, the devil has re-entered, one might say, through the window. Driven out of faith, he re-enters with superstition. And if you are superstitious, you are unconsciously conversing with the devil. One does not converse with the devil. The strongest proof of the existence of Satan is found not in sinners or the possessed, but in the saints! “And how can this be, Father?”. Yes, it is true that the devil is present and working in certain extreme and “inhuman” forms of evil and wickedness that we see around us. But by this route, though, it is practically impossible to reach, in individual cases, the certainty that it is truly him, given that we cannot know with precision where his action ends and our own evil begins. This is why the Church is so prudent and so rigorous in performing exorcism, unlike what happens, unfortunately, in certain films! It is in the life of the saints, precisely there, that the devil is forced to come out into the open, to place himself “against the light”. All the saints, all the great believers, some more, some less, testify to their struggle with this obscure reality, and one cannot honestly assume that they were all deluded or mere victims of the prejudices of their time. The battle against the spirit of evil is won as Jesus won it in the wilderness: by striking with the word of God. You see that Jesus does not converse with the devil, He never conversed with the devil. Either he casts him out, or condemns him, but He never converses. And in the wilderness, he replies not with His word, but with the Word of God. Brothers, sisters, never converse with the devil; when temptations present themselves: “But, this would be nice, that would be nice” – stop. Raise your heart to the Lord, pray to Our Lady and banish him, just as Jesus taught us how to banish him. Saint Peter also suggests another means, that Jesus did not need, but we do – vigilance. “Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Pt 5:8). And Saint Paul says to us: “Give no opportunity to the devil” (Eph 4:27). Awareness of the action of the devil in history should not discourage us. The final thought must be, also in this case, of trust and security: “I am with the Lord, be gone”. Christ overcame the devil and gave us the Holy Spirit to make His victory our own. The very action of the enemy can turn to our advantage, if with God's help we make it serve our purification. Let us therefore ask the Holy Spirit, in the words of the hymn Veni Creator: Drive far away our wily Foe, And Thine abiding peace bestow; If Thou be our protecting Guide, No evil can our steps betide”.  (September 25, 2024)

Musical Selection

Collect