Daily Mass Gospel Reflection- Spirited Life/Death

Word on Fire Ministry ^ | 7-9-2021 | Aux. Bishop R. Barron

[MurphsLaw]

Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Matthew 10:16-23

Friends, in our Gospel today, Jesus assures us that the Holy Spirit will help us when we face persecution. Speaking to his disciples the night before he dies, Jesus says that he and his Father will send another Parakletos (Advocate). That word, stemming from kaleo (to call) and para (for, or on behalf of), designates something like a lawyer, someone who would plead on behalf of another, who would support, advocate, encourage.

Jesus is saying that while he will depart physically from the scene, he and his Father will send the Spirit as a friend. This is the advocate who will inspire Christians up and down the ages.

When the martyrs went to their deaths, it was with the help of the Holy Spirit; when the missionaries went to proclaim the faith in hostile lands, it was the Holy Spirit who pleaded on their behalf; when Edith Stein went with her Gestapo captors to Auschwitz, she too went with the Holy Spirit. And that same Spirit is with you today, right now.

[MurphsLaw]

+++Jesus said to his Apostles:
“Behold, I am sending you like sheep in
the midst of wolves;
so be shrewd as serpents
and simple as doves. But beware of men,
for they will hand you over to courts
and scourge you in their synagogues,
and you will be led before governors and
kings for my sake
as a witness before them and the pagans.
When they hand you over,
do not worry about how you are to speak
or what you are to say.
You will be given at that moment what you
are to say."+++

[Marchmain]

Veni, Sancte Spiritus.

[MurphsLaw]

Veni, Sancte Spiritus

To be sure... no doubt...
Though... why is it so easy to lose Faith in the Advocate, like we are seeing now?