3. The Spirituality of The Angels

 
I. Each ascending class of beings begins, in its highest specimens, to assume the characteristics of the class next above it; and so might serve, if need were, to indicate the peculiarities of the next higher group of creatures. Man, the last and most perfect in the line of material beings, is much more than mere matter. There is in him a higher element, not compounded of chemical substances or the subtle forces of matter. This enjoys faculties not belonging to other beings—intellect and will; it has an apprehension of moral goodness, of the true, of the beautiful; it has cravings, sometimes half unconscious, for something higher than this universe and more enduring. Above all there is in mankind an ineradicable tendency towards the supernatural, towards God and religion; and this is for ever asserting itself in various forms as one of the most energetic forces in human nature. All this is an indication of an actual higher state; for no impulsion exists in the universe without its corresponding object or cause. It is further an indication of a higher class of beings, endowed with more perfect spirituality, less encumbered by matter, more free in the exercise of mind and will, standing nearer to the throne of the Almighty Ruler. Progress is the law of being. Everything points upward through a higher class to God. Cultivate, not those appetites which you share with the beasts, but those aspirations which raise you towards the angels.

II. The spirituality of the angels is much more perfect than that of men. We are not pure spirits, but a compound of the spiritual with the material. The soul has a natural and permanent affinity for those atoms of the slime of the earth which constitute the body; just as oxygen tends to enter into combination with all the coarser elements. Further, the soul is too often enslaved by the prepotent influence of the body, and is dragged down by it to the material level, instead of raising it to spiritual heights. Hence the finer element in man is often submerged under the rush of the body’s coarser interests and appetites and pleasures, and falls from its high estate into degradation. The angels are free from all such influences. Being without bodies they have nothing to drag them down from their proper level; they are not drawn two ways at once by opposing forces; there is no veil to obscure their direct vision of God’s face; there is no deception to make error look like truth; there is nothing to tarnish their purity and sanctity. This spiritual life is to be yours one day. All other creatures, even our material frames, having run their course return whence they came—living beings into dead matter, compounds into their primary elements. The soul of man alone remains, and, united to a spiritualized body, it rises to a higher existence. But to fit ourselves for this our life on earth must be spiritualized.

III. The spirituality of the angels is, however, infinitely inferior to that of God, while generally resembling it. So perfect and transcendent is God that, as compared with Him, the substance of the angels is coarse, and, as it were, material. They are still but a dim and imperfect reflection of the unparalleled brightness and purity of the Divine Essence. So does a light, which in the darkness is a brilliant illumination, grow pale and invisible in the full glare of the noon-tide. “Behold among His saints none is unchangeable, and the heavens are not pure in His sight. Behold even the moon doth not shine, and the stars are not pure in His sight. How much less man that is rottenness, and the son of man who is a worm?” (Job xv. 15; xxv. 5, 6). You are the lowest of all spiritual beings, the feeblest of all that possess intellect and heart. If you are so poor as compared with the angels, how inferior you are before the unapproachable spirituality of God. Humble yourself before Him that you may be found worthy to be raised to His kingdom. 

2. The Existence of The Angels

 

I. All creation is arranged in a regular sequence of stages. So much so, that science has on occasion asserted the existence of some species of animal that seemed needed to fill up a gap in the series: and that species has subsequently been discovered. Life is found everywhere, and in every conceivable form. Scientific men have observed that any form of life which is possible, considering the analogy of the rest of creation, is also probable. So we might have inferred the existence of angels if it had not been revealed to us. Tracing creation towards its source we come to more and more simple forms of life. Solid matter may be traced back to liquid and gas, and at last appears under forms of extreme tenuity. It is conjectured that the lightest of known substances, hydrogen, may be the primal form of matter out of which all the chemical elements have been made up. Then we arrive at immaterial, intangible forces, ether, heat, electricity, and the still more mysterious force of gravitation. As beings grow refined we find that they have a greater range, and greater power, and that they are able to pass through the substance of more solid beings. Analogy would lead us to surmise that there must be a still more refined class of existences, spiritual beings in fact, endowed with enormous powers. Adore in silence the marvellous possibilities of the power and wisdom of God.


II. In man we have what is manifestly the last term of material development on this earth. In him matter is raised above its natural level and associated with the nobler forces of mind and will. His further development is of necessity on the higher plane of the intellectual, the moral, the social, the spiritual. This points to boundless possibilities, not only in the way of further human progress, but in regard to the existence of other classes of beings more perfect in mental and spiritual qualities, who begin where man leaves off, and carry on the chain of existence by more degrees than fill the interval between the jelly-fish and man. It is evident that the full height of created being is not attained in man. There is room yet for innumerable grades between him and God. The work of the Almighty would be justly considered as incomplete, as abruptly broken off and frustrate, if it ended in humanity as the summit of all creation. As reasoning compels science to assume certain things which can never be proved, such as the ether, atoms, gravitation, so would it force us, without other evidence, to conjecture the existence of such beings as angels. How wonderfully revelation completes our knowledge! How necessary is faith in addition to science!


III. The extraordinary abundance of life around us argues at least as great a variety and wealth of life in the boundless realm beyond our senses where the Almighty dwells. Comparing small with great, we feel that there must be courtiers and guards innumerable in the halls of the Eternal, and that they must be high beyond conception, in rank, in energies, in duties, in splendour of endowments. There are ministries for such beings as well as for us. God’s works are not limited to the range of our experience or even of our imagination. His attributes require a much greater space for their manifestation than is afforded by the whole of the visible universe. God has therefore, as the Scripture tells us, made a whole universe of noble spirits to stand before Him, and minister to Him in duties far superior to ours. Great as you are in the material creation, you are weak and miserable compared with the higher world. Strive to raise yourself to it; above all do not fall lower than your already lowly position.

1. Creation in General

I. God was under no obligation to create anything. It is only His intrinsic activity in producing the Persons of the Trinity that is necessary; all other action might or might not be, according to His will. God did not require the world or any creatures. He was rich in all good, perfectly happy, powerful, enjoying immovable repose and perfect activity in His own being. That which was, before creation, was not a dead solitude; but the three Divine Persons formed a kind of society in Their unity. There was a manifestation of infinite perfections by each to each, a mutual understanding and appreciation of the attributes of each, and action, proportioned to the greatness of the divine nature, rendering glory to each. No further witnesses were required of the divine glory, no audience for the celestial communications between the Persons. Indeed no created being could give and take, by the action of its intelligence and will, in anything like the same measure as do the Divine Persons. God has no need of you. You can do nothing that is of any use to Him. “I have said to the Lord, Thou art my God, for Thou hast no need of my goods” (Ps. xv, 2). When you have exerted all your talents and done all that you can, you may say with most perfect truth, “I am an unprofitable servant.”

II. We, on the other hand, cannot do without God. So many million centuries ago, man, and the earth, and the whole universe were not. They were in an abyss of nothingness whence only the command of God was able to bring them forth. No creature could have drawn out a developed being from non-being, even if any creature had been pre-existent. The mode in which something is created from nothing is absolutely inconceivable to us. Only a being of infinite intelligence and omnipotent power could do such a thing. A creature could not have acted before it existed so as to produce itself, or develop itself by its own energies. And the whole universe of things was as powerless to evolve itself as a single atom or a degree of force. What a vast difference between God and creatures! They were once in nothingness, He was always existent; they began a definite time ago, He had no beginning; they are dependent and imperfect, He is absolute uncontrolled Master, all powerful and all perfect. What an enormity it is, and how ridiculous, when any of God’s creatures dare to deny His authority, and disobey His commands, and raise their heads in pride, and say “I will not serve!” This you do when you commit sin.

III. The number of the possible worlds and beings is absolutely without limit, which God might have made after the model of His ideas, and as reflections of His perfections. God determined on certain series of forces and substances, both in spirit and matter; and, by some incomprehensible projection of His infinite activity beyond Himself, He produced the commencements of force and motion and matter, endowed with enormous energies and latent powers of transformation and development. God thus inaugurated a new order. Outside of, or anterior to creation, God was the ocean of the supernatural only; at creation things were produced which had a thitherto unexampled relation to God. He became then the source and author of the natural order as well as of the supernatural, acting freely on two different planes, carrying out two different series of laws. Those two orders were separate and independent, till God united them in man as raised to the life of grace and participation with God. Admire God’s wonderful dispositions. He unites the natural and supernatural orders as being the source of both; here below the two are united again in you.

 

20. The Glory of The Blessed Trinity

 

I. “There are three who give testimony in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost” (1 John v. 7). The Divine Persons give testimony to one another eternally. It is Their essential glory that each is thoroughly comprehended in all His infinite perfections by the other two Divine Persons, and is appreciated and valued accordingly, and is praised and glorified, therefore, to an adequate and infinite extent. Compared with this, all the appreciation and praise of creatures and glory from them is but as a grain in the balance. As God has wrought all His mighty operations in Himself, anteriorly to creation, and without the assistance of creatures; so the Divine Trinity glorifies Itself infinitely, within Itself, and has no need of us. Jesus Christ speaks to His heavenly Father of “the glory which I had, before the world was, with Thee” (John xvii. 5). And again: “I have glorified Thee on earth: I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do. And now glorify Thou Me, O Father, with Thyself” (John xvii. 4, 5). The glory given by the Divine Persons to one another in Their revelations and works on earth is but a faint presentation of the glory which They render to one another within the Divine Essence. Rejoice and praise God for the fact that He receives the full glory which is His due, that He does not depend upon man for it, and that our offences and blasphemies do not impair that infinite glory which is of His essence.

II. There is another praise and appreciation and glory rendered to the Blessed Trinity. This comes from the enormous hosts of the angelic spirits. It is a secondary, inferior and finite glorification, but it surpasses immeasurably all the glory of the service and praise that the whole of mankind could render. We read frequently of this in Holy Scripture: “The morning stars praised Me together, and all the sons of God made a joyful melody” (Job xxxviii. 7). The prophet describes to us the Seraphim standing with veiled faces before the throne of the Most High: “and they cried out one to another and said, Holy, holy, holy, the Lord God of hosts, all the earth is full of His glory” (Isa. vi. 3). Again, at the birth of Our Lord there was “a multitude of the heavenly army, praising God, and saying: Glory to God in the highest” (Luke ii. 13, 14). St. John shows us how the hosts of heaven for ever give praise and honour and benediction to their Lord, prostrate before His throne, and never resting day or night (Apoc. iv. 8-11). When you see this world so full of iniquity, and refusing to accord to God the belief, the worship, the obedience, the love that He deserves, think of the still greater universe of spirits with all its rich endowments giving glory to God, without exception, without any alloy of infidelity, and without cessation.

III. Even this world renders much glory to the Holy Trinity. Apart from the manifestation of God in the natural order and the praise given to Him on that account, there is the supernatural glory rendered by the great sacrifice which, from age to age, is offered unceasingly from the rising to the setting of the sun, in the presence of millions of devout worshippers. There is the perpetual worship before the tabernacle of Jesus, going on in every Church throughout the world; and the recitation of the Divine Office day and night with its hymns, and psalms, and special versicles of praise at the end of each of them. And further, in this unfaithful and apostate world, there are many times over in every land the seven thousand who have not bowed their knee to Baal, but who have dedicated their whole being to glorifying God by copying His attributes in their lives. Your life must be one of two things; either you will join yourself with those named, in glorifying God, or you are necessarily on the side of Satan, engaged in dishonouring God and blaspheming His name.

19. The Divine Persons as Given to Us

   

 

I. The greatest wonder in the Divine temporal missions is that, not merely the grace and aid of God, but the Blessed Persons Themselves are given to us for our elevation and our comfort. Thus, in the Incarnation, the actual Person of God the Son, the Word of God, was bestowed on humanity, and became man and the Son of the Blessed Virgin. Further, our individual souls receive not only light in the intellect and ardour of love in the heart, but the Holy Spirit Himself personally. “The charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, who is given to us” (Rom. v. 5). “He that abideth in charity abideth in God and God in him” (1 John iv. 16). The supernatural likeness of God in us and our aspirations of love towards Him exercise such an attraction on the Divine Persons, that They become united with our souls, and cannot be separated from them except by mortal sin. They are present with souls that are in the state of grace, not simply by the immensity or ubiquity which causes Them to be in every place, but by a special personal indwelling, so that the human body becomes really the temple of the Holy Ghost, and of Christ and the Father too. Thus there dwell in you the Eternal Word produced by the infinite thought of God, and the Spirit produced by infinite love. How this surpasses all the gifts of the natural order, all bodily delights, all pleasures, dignities, sciences!

II. The Divine Persons are bestowed on us in different ways.

1. They come to us as the principle of the supernatural works done by us, works of virtue and of energy which are beyond our natural abilities. Without the divine presence we should be feeble, unspiritual, ungenerous, imprudent, unstable; with it we can believe all, do all, and suffer all things. 

2. They are given to us as the object of our knowledge and our love, for the exercise of our intelligence and will. So we possess God as the object which occupies our thoughts and our affections. 

3. They are given also as the treasure and chief possession of the soul; so that in the midst of the tribulations and bitterness of life we find God within us, and there enjoy, within natural limits, the possession of the supreme good. This is what Our Lord promises us: “If any one love Me he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him” (John xiv. 23). In so many ways you are dependent on God; in so many ways He is useful to you, necessary to you. Without Him you can do nothing. Be careful never to lose that divine presence.

III. It follows that when we commit mortal sin we lose, not only the favour of God, His love, and our title of children of God, but we actually lose God Himself. The personal presence of God is extinguished in our soul; God is driven forth. Our finite action has inflicted an infinite loss. God is present with us still by His immensity, as He is present in physical space and with the lower animals; He is also present by the grace which calls us to repentance; but He is no longer with us as the source of supernatural life, virtue, and merit, nor as the treasure of the soul and the object of its love. Further God is not with the sinner as the source of future glory. If then the sinner passes out of this life unrepentant, he begins his new stage of existence without God, and will never recover the possession of Him. It is a terrible punishment of crime to be deprived absolutely of one of the smaller gifts of God, light, or companionship, or freedom, or the minor comforts of life. How much worse it would be to lose all the sum of material gifts. The loss of supernatural gifts is much more terrible; and worse still is the loss of God, who is the totality of all that is good, desirable, beautiful. This is what mortal sin deprives us of. It is impossible to realize the full greatness of this calamity even with the help of faith; but your faith will suffice to save you from it.

18. The Mission of The Divine Persons

 

I. Our Lord several times spoke of His being sent by the Father, and of His sending the Holy Ghost into the world.This is called the external mission of the Divine Persons. It corresponds externally to the internal production of the Persons within the Godhead. It is the divine processions of the Trinity continued on the lower plane of the world of human souls, making the Divine Persons present in a new way with us, and producing in us an infusion of divine charity and various operations of grace. The Mission, then, consists of two elements, the eternal procession of a Divine Person and the temporal production of grace. As in the eternal processions there is a person producing and a person produced, so in the temporal mission there is a person sending and a person sent. The Father proceeds from none, He therefore is sent by none. The Son proceeds from the Father, and so is sent by the Father. The Holy Ghost, who proceeds from Father and Son, is consequently sent by Father and Son jointly. As in the Trinity, so in the mission of the Divine Persons there is no separation of Person from Person, but They abide in one another, and all are bestowed when one is sent. Thus there is an unbroken chain of action binding all being together from God down to the smallest atom. There is a supreme infinite action in God which produces the Divine Persons. The reverberations of that action pass on into creation, and produce the Divine Persons in the souls of men. Their presence and Their grace lead to the production of virtuous acts in us; and we in turn act upon the lower creation.

II. There are two forms of the temporal mission of the Divine Persons; one is visible and one invisible. The sending of God the Son as man into the world to preach, to labour, and to suffer visibly, was the first form of divine mission. Such also was the coming of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles in flames of fire. Generally, however, the grace of God works in secret; for “the kingdom of God cometh not with observation” (Luke xvii. 20). The Divine Persons come invisibly and softly into the soul to work in it Their powerful effects; according to the word of Job: “If He come to me I shall not see Him; if He depart I shall not understand” (Job ix. 11). This exercises our faith and humility. We possess God, and yet we cannot be puffed up by the certainty of possessing Him; we still have to work in fear and trembling; we walk by faith in God’s word, and not with the assurance of sight. But while we fear, we have no reason for discouragement, but rather for trusting blind confidence in God.

III. Wonderful must be the effects produced in the soul by such messengers as the Eternal Son and the Holy Ghost. These effects are not the effects of nature. When we speak of the divine missions we do not mean the operations carried on by the Divinity as head and source of the natural order of the world. The mission spoken of is that which is supernatural, and which makes God to be present with us in special and more than natural ways. The Divine Mission has as its object to produce sanctifying grace in our souls and increase it, to withdraw us from sin and eternal loss, to enable us to produce acts of virtue or render special services to God and His Church. You really receive at times a special influx and presence of the Divine Persons in your soul; you are aided by Them and act with Them and by Them. How splendid this is! But you need always to watch with anxiety lest the human spirit, or the spirit of the world, or even the spirit of Satan, should intrude itself into your mind and become the motive power of your actions. Humility, obedience, and the love of God will be your preservatives.

17. The Mutual Indwelling of The Divine Persons

I. The three Divine Persons of the Holy Trinity, although differing as to personality, are inseparable as to the Essence or Substance of the Divinity, which is absolutely one in Them. So They are said to dwell with one another and in one another. St. John says: “The Word was with God,” and “The only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father” (John i. 1, 18). In the same Gospel Our Lord says: “The Father who abideth in Me, He doth the works. Believe you not that I am in the Father and the Father in Me?” (John xiv. 10, 11). Therefore wherever the Father is, the Son, or the Holy Ghost, there are also the other two Persons. The Divine Essence which is in the Father is fully in the Son and the Holy Ghost; for the Divinity, or the Divine Essence, is Father, Son and Holy Ghost. No one of the Persons can exist apart from the whole of the Divine Essence; nor apart, consequently, from the other Persons, who are fully in the Divine Essence. The personal relations and productions are not external but are immanent. The Father generates the Son, not as a separate entity, but by an intrinsic intellectual action within Himself; the Father and Son also produce the Holy Ghost by an interior action of mutual love, which is entirely within Themselves. This indwelling is called the circumincession. You are also substantially in God and God is substantially in you when you are in the state of grace; and the three Divine Persons are with you, as Our Lord promised: “If any one love Me . . . My Father will love him, and We will come to him and will make Our abode with him” (John xiv. 23).

II. The Persons of the Blessed Trinity also dwell in one another intellectually, by the fact that each has the fullest perception, knowledge and consciousness of the others; or, as we may express it, they are inseparable in their thoughts. This mutual consciousness of one another may be called a communication of minds, or a divine conversation between the three Blessed Persons. There is nothing else like to this. Intellectual communication is imperfect, at its best, between different men. As between God and man, God bears us always and most completely in His mind, but our feeble, wandering, frivolous, sensual minds can only with great difficulty fix themselves for a short time on God. In the next life we shall have a much closer union of intelligence with God; we shall contemplate Him without distraction; we shall see all things in Him and in His knowledge of them; but yet we shall never see and understand Him as Father, Son and Holy Ghost do, in Their mutual indwelling. Aspire to this union now; it is necessary for the perfecting of man’s intellectual life on earth.

III. There is also an inseparable indwelling of the Divine Persons on account of Their mutual love. Love is an attracting and uniting force. The soul is wrapped up, as we say, in that which it loves, and dwells in it by the delight felt in it. “Where thy treasure is, there is thy heart” (Matt. vi. 21). Each Divine Person perceives the infinite goodness, beauty and delight of the Godhead that exists in the others; and They are drawn together by a unifying attraction and love each for the other, such as would tend to make Them a unity if They were not already in the strictest sense such. Let nothing separate you from the love of God. This completes your union with Him in this life and in the next. The love of God is also the uniting force required by mankind for social harmony and progress. Other combining influences are not strong enough to resist the forces of isolation and disintegration. Even human love itself is transient though violent; it is little more than sensual and animal, unless refined, directed, and made permanent by resting on divine love.

16. The Equality of The Divine Persons

 

I. The three Divine Persons are perfectly equal in all things inasmuch as They are perfectly one. The Divine Essence is not divided amongst Them, but They are of identically the same nature and the same substance. No one, and no two of Them, can be greater than another nor can the three together possess more or do more than any one of Them. Even considering Them separately in Their personalities, with the differences of Their mutual relationships, there is still perfect equality between Them. The Sonship and the procession of the Third Person are as perfect and as necessary in the Divinity as the Paternity. Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are eternally simultaneous constituents of the activity of the One Godhead within Itself. The reception of the Divine Essence is as infinite and noble as the communication of it. It is an equal dignity and glory to the Father to be without first principle or source, to the Son to be produced by the infinite Father, and to the Holy Ghost to be the termination and completeness of the divine action without producing another person. Take a comparison. A ray of bright sunlight was long supposed to be a unity only: now it is proved to be a trinity of three rays, each having a different colour and a different effect on vegetation. These act as one principle. They occur in a certain order, but one does not exist before the other nor apart from another. Each is equally sunlight, and is equally necessary to constitute the glowing unity of the sunbeam and to maintain life on earth. Attach great importance to right thinking about doctrines. But this requires right living and right worship. Each of this trinity is essential to make up the unity of full religiousness.

II. The three Persons are also equal in their attributes and powers: for these, though spoken of as separate qualities, are but the one immovable, unchangeable, Divine Essence. The three Divine Persons have the same sovereign supremacy over all things, the same eternity, the same goodness and love and justice, the same knowledge and wisdom. Their actions, too, are inseparable. They have not made different worlds or originated different religions; all combined equally in creating all the universe, and in establishing the two dispensations of the Old and New Testament. What Our Lord said of Himself applies equally to the other Persons: “The Son cannot do anything of Himself but what He seeth the Father do: for what things soever He doth, these the Son also doth in like manner” (John v. 19). So do you strive in all things to think and act with God. Do nothing without Him, still less in opposition to Him. So His likeness will be perfected in you until it grows into an intimate union.

III. The three Divine Persons are equal in Their right to the adoration, service and love of all creatures, on account of the equality in Their greatness and holiness, in Their love and Their operations towards us. What we worship in one we worship in all; what we see in one we see in all. It is true that the Second Person has brought Himself into closer relations with us by becoming man; and that His human life and virtues and His presence in the Blessed Sacrament appear rather to reveal the Second Person to us than the Father and the Holy Ghost, and rather to draw out our tenderness towards Him. But yet we must remember that the mystery of the Incarnation and Redemption is the joint work of the whole Trinity, only manifested differently on account of the relative differences of the Persons; and that the revelation of the one Person of Our Lord is the revelation of all, according to His words, “Philip, he that seeth Me seeth the Father also” (John xiv. 9). So when Our Lord comes to you He brings with Him the Father and the Holy Ghost. Love and worship each Person separately and all three in Their supreme unity.

15. Jesus Christ and The Holy Ghost

I. Jesus Christ, as man, was abundantly glorified by the Holy Ghost, who was poured out upon Him in infinite measure. Of old the Holy Spirit had inspired the prophets who foretold Our Lord’s coming: He effected the mystery of the Incarnation in His chaste Spouse, the Blessed Virgin Mary; He guided the Sacred Humanity, as when He led Our Lord into the desert and descended on Him in the form of a dove. Jesus Christ declares part of the function of the Holy Ghost where He says, “He shall glorify Me” (John xvi. 14). And this the Holy Spirit does, demonstrating by miracles that Jesus is indeed the Son of God, and moving men by inspirations of grace to believe in Him. In return Our Lord glorified the Holy Ghost, revealing Him to mankind in the august mystery of the Holy Trinity, communicating Him to the Apostles and the Church, speaking of Him with profound respect, teaching men their duties towards the Spirit of God and the enormity of sinning against Him. You should imitate Our Lord in this. Contemplate the qualities of the Holy Ghost, the modes of His manifestations to us, the functions appropriated to Him in the external operations of the Trinity both in the natural and in the supernatural orders; and from all this conceive a special veneration and love for Him.

II. Proceeding to particulars, we find Our Lord applying terms of respect and titles of honour to the Holy Ghost. In the Old Testament He says: “Come over to Me, all ye that desire Me, and be filled with My fruits; for My spirit is sweet above honey” (Eccli. xxiv. 26, 27). To the woman of Samaria He speaks of the Holy Ghost as the “Gift of God,” and says that this will be “a fountain of water springing up unto life everlasting” (John iv. 10, 14). Again He tells the Apostles of the great effects which will be wrought by the Holy Spirit. “When the Paraclete cometh, whom I will send you from My Father, the Spirit of Truth who proceedeth from the Father, He will give testimony of Me” (John xv. 26). And instructing them as to their speech before their persecutors He says: “It is not you that speak, but the Spirit of your Father that speaketh in you” (Matt. x. 20). Our Lord further magnifies the Holy Ghost above Himself, and values His honour even more than His own. “Whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him either in this world or in the world to come” (Matt. xii. 32). Be careful not to commit the dangerous sin of resisting the Holy Ghost, and His inspirations to action or suggestions of truth. Beware of self-will and obstinacy in sin, lest they lead you to final impenitence.

III. Our Lord further magnifies the Holy Ghost by sending Him on the Apostles and the Church to complete His own work of Redemption. He says that the Holy Ghost was necessary for their work, and they were not to venture to begin it until He endued them with His power from on high (Luke xxiv. 49). The Holy Ghost is the great treasure of the Church, His presence will confer upon it an indestructible life, and that presence will never be withdrawn. Our Lord seems to imply that the presence of the Holy Ghost is more to the Apostles than His own. “It is expedient for you that I go: for if I go not the Paraclete will not come to you; but if I go I will send Him to you” (John xvi. 7). That which the Holy Ghost is to the Church, the same He is to you. In the words of the sacred liturgy He will be to you rest in labour, coolness in the heat, consoler in anguish, strength in conflict, sweetest refreshment, and most blessed light.

14.Three Specialities of the Holy Ghost

 

I. It is a special peculiarity of the Holy Ghost that He is the bond of union between the Father and the Son, Their harmony, Their peace, and Their love. This is the case inasmuch as the Father and Son become one principle in the production of the Holy Ghost; They have one and the same relation towards Him; and He has one single relation towards Them. This peculiarity does not belong, for instance, to the Father. He is not the bond of union between the Son and the Holy Ghost, because He stands in different relations towards Them; viz., in the relation of generation towards the Son, and of spiration towards the Holy Ghost. In another way also the Holy Spirit is the bond of union, as being the personified propension, or inclination of the Father towards the Son, and of the Son towards the Father. He is the love of each for the other, and so binds the Blessed Trinity into a special union of Persons over and above the unity of their essence and nature. It is the peculiarity of love to unite different objects; and the Holy Ghost, as being eternal, uncreated, infinite Love, is the accomplishment of the most wonderful of unions. Beseech this Spirit of love to be the bond of union between you and the Godhead, and between you and all your brethren.

II. A second speciality of the Holy Ghost is that He is the final term of the internal processions of the Divine Persons. The Father is the First Person in the Godhead, the Holy Spirit is the last; the cycle is complete; and after that, no further procession is possible or conceivable. The Holy Ghost possesses in full, infinite measure the intelligence and will that belong to the Divine Essence; but these do not produce another Person in the Godhead, for they have already exercised their infinite fecundity with infinite result in the production of the Son and Holy Ghost. The procession of the Third Person is the completion of the divine activity, its last term, its eternal repose and Sabbath. The ending of the productive action does not imply any deficiency or infirmity in the Holy Ghost. His perfection as a Person consists in the fact that He responds adequately to the infinite activity of the divine will and love. Thenceforth nothing more remains but the external operation of the Trinity in the production of creatures outside of Itself. Love, then, is the accomplishment of the law, even of the uncreated law of God’s own being. This great faculty has been given to you for your perfection and happiness. Take care that it does not become corrupted into self-love, the parody and destruction of divine love.

III. The Divine Spirit of love is also a spirit of perfect sanctity. He is the sanctity of Father and Son; His presence is the sanctification of sinners. So effectual is divine love in us, that even in its lowest degree, and in our weak and frigid souls, it instantaneously destroys sin, and communicates to us the supernatural life of God and His actual presence. Therefore Our Lord said concerning St. Mary Magdalene, “Many sins are forgiven her because she hath loved much” (Luke vii. 14). How intense then must be the infinite sanctity resulting from the love of the three Divine Persons in the most Holy Trinity. This is the secret of holiness for you. Endeavour to cultivate a vivid and intense love for God, for the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Without this you cannot have constancy to keep those commandments of God which lead to life. Without this you cannot cast out the engrossing love of self and of creatures, or submit yourself to constant self-restraint, or find pleasure in spiritual things. Give your whole undivided love to God, and He will pour forth the abundance of sanctity and joy into your heart.

13. The Procession of the Holy Ghost

 

  

 

I. The Divine Father, in begetting the Son—equal to Himself and the very Image of His glory—moves by an act of His intellect to love that reflection of His own perfections. The Son, in return, necessarily loves the Father with equal and infinite love. This shared love within the Godhead is itself divine, and is the Person of the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost proceeds from both the Father and the Son as from one source, since they are united in will and in love. The Father eternally begets the Son, equal in divinity and power, and included in this is the power to be the principle of the Holy Ghost. It is in this mutual love that the Holy Ghost is produced, forming the relation between Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Without this procession there would be no distinction of Persons. The production of the Holy Ghost is the great glory of the Son with the Father, just as the generation of the Son is the great glory of the Father. Love is the fulfillment of the law, the aim of our souls toward God, and the healing of many sins.


II. This love is infinitely great, because it springs from a Being of infinite capacity, and its object is infinitely worthy of love. Such is the love shared among the Divine Persons. Though it is one simple and eternal act, we may think of it in the ways we know love ourselves:


The love of appreciation, by which the Divine Persons esteem and value each other as the Supreme Good above all else.


The love of good-will, by which They wish to each other the praise, joy, and glory that each deserves.


The love of delight, which is the highest kind of love, expressed by the Father when He said of Our Lord, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matt. iii. 17).


We too should exercise ourselves in these three acts of love toward each Divine Person. The love of delight is the source of spiritual joy, one of the fruits of the Holy Ghost. True religion is always joyful. Make sure that this is true for you, for it is a sure test of virtue.


III. The love in God that produces the Holy Ghost is also the love of all that is good, which includes His love for His creatures. All creatures, present in the eternal mind of God, are seen by Him in that divine act of knowledge which produces the Son, and loved by Him in the act of will which produces the Holy Ghost. From this comes the infinite and unexpected love God shows for mankind even in their weakness. Though men fall, they still bear a trace of their divine origin. God not only loves all that He has made, but He loves them in the Holy Ghost.

So we too should love the Holy Ghost, the source of every grace and good gift in creation. He is the fountain of spiritual blessings described in the hymn Veni Sancte Spiritus. He brings us charity, joy, peace, patience, faith, modesty, and more. He is truly our Paraclete and Comforter. Too late have you known Him; too late have you loved Him!

12. The Third Person

I. In a spiritual being the fundamental fact is its existence, and from this proceeds a double activity, inseparable from the being but different from it. The first activity is the intellect, which exercises itself on objects as being true, and its exercise is knowledge, reason, wisdom. The next is the will, which exercises itself in love, or a propension towards objects as being good. These are two distinct operations, and are essential to completeness and to one another. The intelligence is the basis; the propension of the will proceeds from this, and constitutes its efficacy. The intelligence brings the object, in a manner, into itself by conceiving its image: love is a going forth and bestowal of self upon the object. Here we have plurality of operations in the unity of one being; they cannot be separated from it or from one another; and they embrace the whole activity of a spiritual being. These faculties represent two great classes of duties in man, the knowledge and love of God, the service of mind and heart. Exercise them both on the only object that can elicit and satisfy all their activity, i.e., on God.

II. These spiritual faculties and actions exist in God and correspond to ours, but they are infinite. The action of the divine will is in several respects similar to the action of the intellect which produces the Second Person, or the Word.

It is not transient or arbitrary, but is a necessity of the divine nature and is eternal; it never begins, it never took place, it is always in progress.

As it is an action in God, and as there is nothing in God that is not God, so this action or love is God. Otherwise, it is God acting in that way, for God is pure activity.

As the Divine Essence with the relations engendered in it by the action of the intellect is Father and Son, so the Divine Essence with the relations engendered in it by the action of the will is the Holy Ghost.

As it is with the action of the intellect producing the Son, so with the action of the will there must be two terms, that from which it proceeds and that towards which it moves. The Father and Son jointly are the term producing, the Holy Ghost is the term produced.

Like the intellect, the will of God has an infinite activity; it communicates the totality of the Divine Essence; and this so perfectly as to produce a conscious personality which is God.

As the Son is the fulness of the divine intelligence and the object produced by its action, so the Holy Ghost is the fulness of the divine love of Father and Son, produced by the action of Their reciprocal love. This completes the interior action of the Godhead; nothing more remains to be done, no other Person to be produced. There can be no more than the personified thought equal to the Godhead, and the personified love equal to the Godhead. Take care that the action of your will corresponds with your intelligence. You know God well. Do you love Him as well? Is your life as divine as your faith?

III. This mysterious productive action has no exact counterpart in creation. While the procession of the Second Person bears the specific name of Generation and its terms are Father and Son, we have to use the generic term Procession for the production of the Third Person, and the general term Holy Spirit for Him. The word Spiration is also used. There is an analogy between the eternal and temporal processions of the Divine Persons. The Son of God was born on earth and became the Son of the Holy Virgin; and He communicated the Holy Ghost by spiration or breathing on the Apostles, and sent Him on the day of Pentecost in the form of a mighty wind (spiritus) as well as of fiery tongues. The Apostle assures you that you are the temple of the Holy Ghost. How great are the privileges and honours heaped upon those who have submitted to the obedience of faith, who strive to live the life of God, and make use of the Holy Sacraments!