Posted on 06/15/2003 4:10:38 AM PDT by NYer
SECTION TWO CHAPTER THREE "No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' except by the Holy Spirit."1 "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!"'2 This knowledge of faith is possible only in the Holy Spirit: to be in touch with Christ, we must first have been touched by the Holy Spirit. He comes to meet us and kindles faith in us. By virtue of our Baptism, the first sacrament of the faith, the Holy Spirit in the Church communicates to us, intimately and personally, the life that originates in the Father and is offered to us in the Son.
Through his grace, the Holy Spirit is the first to awaken faith in us and to communicate to us the new life, which is to "know the Father and the one whom he has sent, Jesus Christ."4 But the Spirit is the last of the persons of the Holy Trinity to be revealed. St. Gregory of Nazianzus, the Theologian, explains this progression in terms of the pedagogy of divine "condescension":
To believe in the Holy Spirit is to profess that the Holy Spirit is one of the persons of the Holy Trinity, consubstantial with the Father and the Son: "with the Father and the Son he is worshipped and glorified."6 For this reason, the divine mystery of the Holy Spirit was already treated in the context of Trinitarian "theology." Here, however, we have to do with the Holy Spirit only in the divine "economy." The Holy Spirit is at work with the Father and the Son from the beginning to the completion of the plan for our salvation. But in these "end times," ushered in by the Son's redeeming Incarnation, the Spirit is revealed and given, recognized and welcomed as a person. Now can this divine plan, accomplished in Christ, the firstborn and head of the new creation, be embodied in mankind by the outpouring of the Spirit: as the Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting.
1 1 Cor 12:3.
SECOND EDITION
THE PROFESSION OF FAITH
THE PROFESSION OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH
I BELIEVE IN THE HOLY SPIRIT
2 Gal 4:6.
3 St. Irenaeus, Dem. ap. 7: SCh 62,41-42.
4 Jn 17:3.
5 St. Gregory of Nazianzus, Oratio theol.,5,26 (= Oratio 31,26):PG 36,161-163.
6 Nicene Creed; see above, par. 465.
Copyright permission for posting of the English translation of the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH on the Saint Charles Borromeo Catholic Church web site was granted by Amministrazione Del Patrimonio Della Sede Apostolica, case number 130389.
Note - Today's posting is the introduction to Chapter 3. The complete section on "I Believe in the Holy Spirit" will be posted next Saturday.
HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to all the men folk who are dads. You know who you are!
Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity!
Father
Son
Holy Spirit
PRAYER TO THE HOLY SPIRIT
Saint Augustine of Hippo
Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy.
Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy.
Draw my heart, O Holy Spirit, that I love but what is holy.
Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy.
Guard me, then, O Holy Spirit, that I always may be holy.
Amen.
In his homily at Mass today, the priest spoke about St. Patrick who, around the year 400AD, tried to explain the Trinity to the pagans. He chose a 3 leaf clover - 3 leaves into 1 stem.
Around the same time, St. Augustine was also wrestling with the Trinity. He went for a walk, asking God to give him inspiration. Along the way, he came across a young boy who had dug a hole in the sand on a beach. Using a conch shell, he ran back and forth between the ocean and the hole. St. Augustine asked the boy what he was doing. The child explained that he was trying to put the ocean into the hole. Recognizing the futility of such a task, St. Augustine thanked God for this moment. For in it he understood that it is impossible to explain the "infinite" to the "finite".
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