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From: Acts 8:5-8, 14-17

Philip’s Preaching in Samaria

[5] Philip went down to a city of Samaria, and proclaimed to them the Christ. [6]
And the multitudes with one accord gave heed to what was said by Philip, when
they heard him and saw the signs which he did. [7] For unclean spirits came out
of many who were possessed, crying with a loud voice; and many who were para-
lyzed or lame were healed. [8] So there was much joy in that city.

Peter and John in Samaria

[14] Now when the Apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the
Word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, [15] who came down and prayed
for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit; [16] for it had not yet fallen on any
of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. [17] Then
they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.

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Commentary:

5. This is not Philip the Apostle (1:13) but one of the seven deacons appointed
to look after Christians in need (6:5). The Gospel is proclaimed to the Samaritans
— who also were awaiting the Messiah. This means that it now spreads beyond
the borders of Judea once and for all, and our Lord’s promise (Acts 1:8) is fulfilled:
“You shall by My witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria.”

The despised Samaritans became the first to benefit from the Gospel’s determi-
nation to spread all over the world. We can sense St. Luke’s pleasure in reporting
its proclamation to the Samaritans; earlier he had already showed them in a favo-
rable light: he is the only Evangelist to recount the parable of the Good Samaritan
(cf. Luke 10:30-37) and to mention that the leper who came back to thank Jesus
after being cured was a Samaritan (cf. Luke 17:16). On the Samaritans in general,
see the note on John 4:20.

14-17. Here we see the Apostles exercising through Peter and John the authority
they have over the entire Church. The two Apostles proceed to confirm the dis-
ciples recently baptized by Philip: we may presume that in addition to laying their
hands on them to communicate the Holy Spirit, the Apostles made sure that they
had a correct grasp of the central points of the Gospel message. At this time the
Apostles constituted the spiritual center of the Church and took an active interest
in ensuring that the new communities were conscious of the links — doctrinal and
affective — that united them to the mother community in Jerusalem.

This passage bears witness to the existence of Baptism and the gift of the Holy
Spirit (or Confirmation) as two distinct sacramental rites. The most important ef-
fects Christian Baptism has are the infusion of initial grace and the remission of
Original Sin and any personal sin; it is the first sacrament a person receives,
which is why it is called the “door of the Church”.

There is a close connection between Baptism and Confirmation, so much so that
in the early centuries of Christianity, Confirmation was administered immediately
after Baptism. There is a clear distinction between these two sacraments of
Christian initiation, which helps us understand the different effects they have. A
useful comparison is the difference, in natural life, between conception and later
growth (cf. “St. Pius V Catechism”, II, 3, 5). “As nature intends that all her chil-
dren should grow and attain full maturity [...], so the Catholic Church, the com-
mon mother of all, earnestly wishes that, in those whom she has regenerated
by Baptism, the perfection of Christian manhood be completed” (”ibid.”, II, 3, 7).

“The nature of the Sacrament of Confirmation,” John Paul II explains, “grows out
of this endowment of strength which the Holy Spirit communicates to each bap-
tized person, to make him or her—as the well-known language of the Catechism
puts it—a perfect Christian and soldier of Christ, ready to witness boldly to His
resurrection and its redemptive power: ‘You shall be My witnesses’ (Acts 1:8)”

(”Homily”, 25 May 1980). “All Christians, incorporated into Christ and His Church
by Baptism, are consecrated to God. They are called to profess the faith which
they have received. By the Sacrament of Confirmation they are further endowed
by the Holy Spirit with special strength to be witnesses of Christ and sharers in
His mission of salvation” (”Homily in Limerick”, 1 October 1979). “This is a sa-
crament which in a special way associates us with the mission of the Apostles,
in that it inserts each baptized person into the apostolate of the Church” (”Homi-
ly in Cracow”, 10 June 1979). In the Sacrament of Confirmation divine grace anti-
cipates the aggressive and demoralizing temptations a young Christian man or
woman is likely to experience, and reminds them of the fact that they have a vo-
cation to holiness; it makes them feel more identified with the Church, their Mo-
ther, and helps them live in accordance with their Catholic beliefs and convic-
tions. From their formative years Christ makes them defenders of the faith.

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Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.

From: John 14:15-21

The Promise of the Holy Spirit

Jesus said to His disciples: [15] “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.
[16] And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Counsellor, to be with
you for ever, [17] even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because
it neither sees Him nor knows Him; you know Him, for He dwells with you, and will
be in you.

[18] “I will not leave you desolate; I will come to you. [19] Yet a little while, and
the world will see Me no more, but you will see Me; because I live, you will live
also. [20] In that day you will know that I am in My Father, and you in Me, and I in
you. [21] He who has My commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves Me;
and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him, and manifest
Myself to him.”

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Commentary:

15. Genuine love must express itself in deeds. “This indeed is love: obeying and
believing in the loved one” (St. John Chrysostom, “Hom. on St. John”, 74). There-
fore, Jesus wants us to understand that love of God, if it is to be authentic, must
be reflected in a life of generous and faithful self-giving obedient to the Will of God:
he who accepts God’s commandments and obeys them, he it is who loves Him (cf.
John 14:21). St. John himself exhorts us in another passage not to “love in word
or speech but in deed and in truth” (1 John 3:18), and he teaches us that “this is
the love of God, that we keep His commandments” (1 John 5:3).

16-17. On a number of occasions the Lord promises the Apostles that He will send
them the Holy Spirit (cf. 14:26; 15:36; 16:7-14; Matthew 10:20). Here He tells them
that one result of His mediation with the Father will be the coming of the Paraclete.
The Holy Spirit in fact does come down on the disciples after our Lord’s ascension
(cf. Acts 2:1-13), sent by the Father and by the Son. In promising here that through
Him the father will send them the Holy Spirit, Jesus is revealing the mystery of the
Blessed Trinity.

“Consoler”: the Greek word sometimes anglicized as “paraclete” means etymologi-
cally “called to be beside one” to accompany, to console, protect, defend. Hence
the word is translated as Consoler, Advocate, etc. Jesus speaks of the Holy Spirit
as “another Consoler”, because He will be given them in Christ’s place as Advo-
cate or Defender to help them, since Jesus is going to ascend to Heaven. In 1
John 2:1 Jesus Christ is described as a Paraclete: “We have an advocate with the
Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous”. Jesus Christ, then, also is our Advocate and
Mediator in Heaven where He is with the Father (cf. Hebrews 7:25). It is now the
role of the Holy Spirit to guide, protect and vivify the Church, “for there are, as we
know, two factors which Christ has promised and arranged in different ways to
continue His mission [...]: the apostolate and the Spirit. The apostolate is the ex-
ternal and objective factor, it forms the material body, so to speak, of the Church
and is the source of her visible and social structures. The Holy Spirit acts inter-
nally within each person, as well as on the whole community, animating, vivifying,
sanctifying” (Paul VI, “Opening Address at the Third Session of Vatican II”, 14
September 1964).

The Holy Spirit is our Consoler as we make our way in this world amid difficulties
and the temptation to feel depressed. “In spite of our great limitations, we can look
up to Heaven with confidence and joy: God loves us and frees us from our sins.
The presence and the action of the Holy Spirit in the Church are a foretaste of
eternal happiness, of the joy and peace for which we are destined by God” (St.
J. Escriva, “Christ Is Passing By”, 128).

18-20. At various points in the Supper we can see the Apostles growing sad when
the Lord bid them farewell (cf. John 15:16; 16:22). Jesus speaks to them with
great tenderness, calling them “little children” (John 13:33) and “friends” (John 15:
15), and He promises that He will not leave them alone, for He will send the Holy
Spirit, and He Himself will return to be with them again. And in fact He will see
them again after the Resurrection when He appears to them over a period of forty
days to tell them about the Kingdom of God (cf. Acts 1:3). When He ascends into
Heaven they will see Him no longer; yet Jesus still continues to be in the midst of
His disciples as He promised He would (cf. Matthew 28:20), and we will see Him
face to face in Heaven. “Then it shall be that we will be able to see that which we
believe. For even now He is with us, and we in Him [...]; but now we know by be-
lieving, whereas then we shall know by beholding.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.