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From: Acts 4:23-31

The Church’s Thanksgiving Prayer

[23] When they (Peter and John) were released they went to their friends and
reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them. [24] And when
they heard it, they lifted their voices together to God and said, “Sovereign Lord,
who didst make the Heaven and the earth and the sea and everything in them,
[25] who by the mouth of our father David, Thy servant, didst say by the Holy
Spirit, ‘Why did the Gentiles rage, and the peoples imagine vain things? [26]
The kings of the earth set themselves in array, and the rulers were gathered to-
gether, against the Lord and against His Anointed’ [27] for truly in this city there
were gathered together against Thy Holy Servant Jesus, whom Thou didst anoint,
both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the peoples of Israel, [28]
to do whatever Thy hand and Thy plan had predestined to take place. [29] And
now, Lord, look upon their threats, and grant to Thy servants to speak Thy word
with all boldness, [30] while Thou stretchest out Thy hand to heal, and signs and
wonders are performed through the name of Thy Holy Servant Jesus.” [31] And
when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was sha-
ken; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God with
boldness.

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Commentary:

24-30. This prayer of the Apostles and the community provides Christians with
a model of reliance on God’s help. They ask God to give them the strength they
need to continue to proclaim the Word boldly and not be intimidated by perse-
cution, and they also entreat Him to accredit their preaching by enabling them
to work signs and wonders.

The prayer includes some prophetic verses of Psalm 2 which find their fulfillment
in Jesus Christ. The psalm begins by referring to earthly rulers plotting against
God and His Anointed. Jesus Himself experienced this opposition, as the Apos-
tles do now and as the Church does throughout history. When we hear the cla-
mor of the forces of evil, still striving to “burst their bonds asunder, and cast their
cords from us” (verse 3), we should put our trust in the Lord, who “holds them in
derision. [...] He will speak to them in His wrath, and terrify them in His fury” (ver-
ses 4-5); in this way we make it possible for God’s message to be heard by eve-
ryone: “Now, therefore, O kings, be wise; be warned, O rulers of the earth. Serve
the Lord with fear, with trembling kiss His feet. [...] Blessed are all who take re-
fuge in Him” (verses 10-12).

Meditation on this psalm has comforted Christians in all ages, filling them with
confidence in the Lord’s help: “Ask of Me, and I will make the nations your heri-
tage, and the ends of the earth your possession” (verse 8).

31. The Holy Spirit chose to demonstrate His presence visibly in order to encou-
rage the nascent Church. The shaking that happens here was, St. John Chrysos-
tom comments, “a sign of approval. It is an action of God to instill a holy fear in
the souls of the Apostles, to strengthen them against the threats of senators and
priests, and to inspire them with boldness to preach the Gospel. The Church was
just beginning and it was necessary to support preaching with wonders, in order
the better to win men over. It was needed at this time but not later on. [...] When
the earth is shaken, this sometimes is a sign of Heaven’s wrath, sometimes of fa-
vor and providence. At the death of our Savior the earth shook in protest against
the death of its Author.... But the shaking where the Apostles were gathered to-
gether was a sign of God’s goodness, for the result was that they were filled with
the Holy Spirit” (”Hom. on Acts”, 11).

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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 3:1-8

The Visit of Nicodemus

[1] Now there was a man of the Pharisees, named Nicodemus, a ruler of the
Jews. [2] This man came to Jesus by night and said to Him, “Rabbi, we know
that You are a teacher come from God; for no one can do these things that You
do, unless God is with Him.” [3] Jesus answered him, “Truly, truly, I say to you,
unless one is born anew, he cannot see the Kingdom of God.” [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, “Truly, truly, I
say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the King-
dom of God. [6] That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born
of the Spirit is spirit. [7] Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘You must be born
anew.’ [8] The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you
do not know whence it comes and whether it goes; so it is with every one who
is born of the Spirit.”

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Commentary:

1-21. Nicodemus was a member of the Sanhedrin of Jerusalem (cf. John 7:50).
He must also have been an educated man, probably a scribe or teacher of the
Law: Jesus addresses him as a “teacher of Israel”. He would have been what
is called an intellectual—a person who reasons things out, for whom the search
for truth is a basic part of life. He was, naturally, much influenced by the Jewish
intellectual climate of his time. However, if divine things are to be understood,
reason is not enough: a person must be humble. The first thing Christ is going
to do in His conversation with Nicodemus is to highlight the need for this virtue;
that is why He does not immediately answer his questions: instead, He shows
him how far he is from true wisdom: “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do
not understand this?” Nicodemus needs to recognize that, despite all his stu-
dies, he is still ignorant of the things of God. As St. Thomas Aquinas comments:
“The Lord does not reprove him to offend him but rather because Nicodemus still
relies on his own learning; therefore He desired, by having him experience this
humiliation, to make him a fit dwelling-place for the Holy Spirit” (”Commentary on
St. John, in loc.”). From the way the conversation develops Nicodemus obviously
takes this step of humility and sits before Jesus as disciple before master. Then
our Lord reveals to him the mysteries of faith. From this moment onwards Nico-
demus will be much wiser than all those colleagues of his who have not taken
this step.

Human knowledge, on whatever scale, is something minute compared with the
truths—simple to state but extremely profound—of the articles of faith (cf. Ephe-
sians 3:15-19; 1 Corinthians 2:9). Divine truths need to be received with the sim-
plicity of a child (without which we cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven); then,
they can be meditated on right through one’s life and studied with a sense of
awe, aware that divine things are always far above our heads.

1-2. Throughout this intimate dialogue, Nicodemus behaves with great refinement:
he addresses Jesus with respect and calls Him Rabbi, Master. He had probably
been impressed by Christ’s miracles and preaching and wanted to know more.
The way he reacts to our Lord’s teaching is not yet very supernatural, but he is
noble and upright. His visiting Jesus by night, for fear of the Jews (cf. John 19:39)
is very understandable, given his position as a member of the Sanhedrin: but he
takes the risk and goes to see Jesus.

When the Pharisees tried to arrest Jesus (John 7:32), failing to do so because he
had such support among the people, Nicodemus energetically opposed the injus-
tice of condemning a man without giving him a hearing; he also showed no fear,
at the most difficult time of all, by honoring the dead body of the Lord (John 19:39).

3-8. Nicodemus’ first question shows that he still has doubts about Jesus (is He
a prophet, is He the Messiah?); and our Lord replies to him in a completely unex-
pected way: Nicodemus presumed He would say something about His mission
and, instead, He reveals to him an astonishing truth: one must be born again, in
a spiritual birth, by water and the Spirit; a whole new world opens up before Nico-
demus.

Our Lord’s words also paint a limitless horizon for the spiritual advancement of
any Christian who willingly lets himself or herself be led by divine grace and the
gifts of the Holy Spirit, which are infused at Baptism and enhanced by the Sacra-
ments. As well as opening his soul to God, the Christian also needs to keep at
bay his selfish appetites and the inclinations of pride, if he is to understand what
God is teaching him in his soul: “therefore must the soul be stripped of all things
created, and of its own actions and abilities—namely, of its understanding, per-
ception and feelings—so that, when all that is unlike God and unconformed to
Him is cast out, the soul may receive the likeness of God; and nothing will then
remain in it that is not the will of God and it will thus be transformed in God.
Wherefore, although it is true that, as we have said, God is ever in the soul, gi-
ving it, and through His presence conserving within it, its natural being, yet He
does not always communicate supernatural being to it. For this is communica-
ted only by love and grace, which not all souls possess; and all those that pos-
ses it have it not in the same degree; for some have attained more degrees of
love and others fewer. Wherefore God communicates Himself most to that soul
that has progressed farthest in love; namely, that has its will in closest conformi-
ty with the will of God. And the soul that has attained complete conformity and
likeness of will is totally united and transformed in God supernaturally” (St.
John of the Cross, “Ascent of Mount Carmel”, Book II, Chapter 5).

Jesus speaks very forcefully about man’s new condition: it is no longer a ques-
tion of being born of the flesh, of the line of Abraham (cf. John 1:13), but of being
reborn through the action of the Holy Spirit, by means of water. This is our Lord’s
first reference to Christian Baptism, confirming John the Baptist’s prophecy (cf.
Matthew 3:11; John 1:33) that He had come to institute a baptism with the Holy
Spirit.

“Nicodemus had not yet savored this Spirit and this life. [...] He knew but one
birth, which is from Adam and Eve; that which is from God and the Church, he
did not know; he knew only the paternity which engenders to death; he did not
yet know the paternity which engenders to life. [...] Whereas there are two births,
he knew only of one. One is of earth, the other is of Heaven; one is of the flesh,
the other of the Spirit; one of mortality, the other of eternity; one of male and fe-
male, the other of God and the Church. But the two are each unique; neither one
nor the other can be repeated” (St. Augustine, “In Ioann. Evang.”, 11, 6).

Our Lord speaks of the wonderful effects the Holy Spirit produces in the soul of
the baptized. Just as with the wind—when it blows we realize its presence, we
hear it whistling, but we do not know where it came from, or where it will end up
— so with the Holy Spirit, the Divine “Breath” (”pneuma”) given us in Baptism: we
do not know how He comes to penetrate our heart but He makes His presence
felt by the change in the conduct of whoever receives Him.

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