15th Sunday in Ordinary time (Year A) 2014

15^th. Sunday of Year (A)

(Isaiah 55:10-11; Romans 8:18-23; Matthew 13:1-23)

 

 

You may well have thought that the sower did a pretty careless job: sowing on patches of rock and among thorns ….. indeed one popular translation seems to support that idea by making the sower seem a little more accurate in his work by saying that some seeds ‘fell on the edge of the path’!   That, however, is not accurate enough for most modern translations say quite clearly:

            Some seed fell on the path and birds came and ate it up.         

All this is, however, easily understood if we realize that in Palestine of Jesus’ day sowing preceded ploughing; hence, in the parable, the sower is depicted as striding over the unploughed stubble.  This enables us to understand why he sows ‘along the footpath’ because he sows intentionally over the path which locals have made walking through the stubble, since he intends even that seed to be, perhaps, sown sufficiently well when he has ploughed up the adventitious footpath.  Likewise, he sows intentionally among the thorns standing withered in the fallow, because they too will be ploughed up.  Nor need it even surprise us that some grains fall upon rocky ground, for the underlying limestone -- thinly covered with soil -- hardly shows above the surface and is not noticed until the ploughshare jars against it.  He sows thus because he is a working man who has not the time (even if he had the patience) to keep stopping and starting, avoiding first this and then that …. He needs must work over the whole field in order to get the job done in preparation for the seasonal weather and, as I have said, to have some hope (by the goodness of God!) for what might appear to be the otherwise totally useless sections.

How many circumstances there were to frustrate, even thwart, the sower’s labours!  How much that could quite possibly have disheartened him! But, amazingly, what a wonderful crop resulted:

            Some a hundred fold, some sixty, some thirty!!

Beyond all expectations larger than the normal good harvest, which yielded only tenfold!

Obviously Jesus did not intend to give, prescribe, a method of increasing crop production and developing earthly wealth.  No!  This was parable to show that the rich blessings of God’s Kingdom here on earth will come to fruition despite the insignificant, slow, laborious, beginnings of that Kingdom.

My word that goes forth from My mouth shall not return to Me void, but shall do My will, achieving the end for which I sent it.

In spite of all natural obstructions and human opposition and though it may appear -- humanly speaking – impossible, the Kingdom of God will come for those who have firm faith in Jesus and patient trust in God’s great goodness and mercy; because those wonderfully prophetic words from Isaiah are not only fulfilled in those who hear but do not listen in search of understanding, but most sublimely and over and above all human expectations they are fulfilled in Jesus Himself:

My Word (incarnate) shall not return to Me void, but shall do My will, achieving the end for which I sent (Him).

And so, in Our Lord’s own life on earth among men, He suffered ‘natural obstructions and human opposition’ to such an extent that He died maligned and deserted: an almost transparent failure in the sight of men.  But His trust in His Father was unshaken; He committed Himself without reserve to Him:

            Father, into Your hands I commend My Spirit.

The Kingdom of God in our souls expands to full extent in the same way.  With the sower we must do our best: first to work well and then to trust firmly in God.  We must, however, work at the whole field; not only in the better sections, but in those which are thorny and stony, on the trodden down and hard pathway.  We must try to exercise ourselves not only at that which comes easier to us, but also in those areas of life which we find it more difficult to discipline ourselves.  I suppose that for most of us the rough and stony mediocre ground is more plenteous than the fertile.  The points is, we must work at our whole being-before-God with simply sincerity, and quiet, unflagging, endeavour; and then trust in God with calm peace, and confident, childlike, expectance.  Results are His gift and for His glory.

Then the disciples approached Jesus and said, ‘Why do You speak to the people in parables?’  He said to them in reply, ‘Because they look but do not see and hear but do not listen or understand.’

It was no arbitrary decision of Our Lord which led to Him speak in parables to the people.  No, it was the consequence and punishment of the poor dispositions of those who listened to Him.  That is why we must work at the whole field of our lives.  It is not enough to be good to our own family, if we are deaf and blind to the needs of others; it is not enough to be sober and thrifty if we are also ill-tempered or wrapped up in the things of this world; it is not enough to say, ‘I don’t do anyone any harm’ if we don’t seek to promote what is positively good.  Otherwise, we are, at the best, only half-disposed, and our vision is distorted, our understanding vitiated or, as Our Lord said:

            They look but do not see and hear but do not listen or understand.

A man who is lustful, though he may have many good points – he may be generous hearted and hard working – but he cannot rightly conceive or meditate upon the love of God, because love for him has a twisted meaning; he cannot really imagine or appreciate a disinterested love, a fully personal love because pleasure and passion clouds and distorts his outlook.  And such distortion spreads elsewhere and can come to contaminate all we do unless we react against firmly it and any other such vices which have a place in our character and a part in our life.  If we are slaves in one aspect of our life, we cannot be truly free in any other, because we are not really ourselves, the selves God intended us to be.  As Jesus said in this respect:

To anyone who has, more will be given, and he will grow rich; from anyone who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

And so, People of God, I would recommend you today to aim at being consistent in your effort to let God’s Kingdom take root and come to reign in your lives... not just in one sector but in the whole of your lives, for that alone will bring true, lasting, joy and peace into your hearts:

Blessed are your eyes because they see, and your ears because they hear!  Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, but did not see it; and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.

Yes, you will see God at work in your life, hear Him speaking in your heart, and you will rejoice as they alone can rejoice who have found a love beyond compare which time can never tarnish nor changing circumstances disturb.  That, indeed, is the aim of all our religious practices: to recognize and respond with love to God in all aspects and occurrences of life; nothing being too important, nothing too insignificant; to see God’s beauty and loveableness in all persons and in all things, and to rejoice in Him with all our heart:

             I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly.

May we have that purpose fulfilled both here and in eternity, through Jesus Christ Our Lord.

14th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A 2014

14^th. Sunday Year (A)

(Zechariah 9:9-10; Romans 8:9, 11-13; Matthew 11:25-30)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us recall the picture painted of the King-to-come in our first reading from the prophecy of Zechariah:

Rejoice heartily O daughter Zion, shout for joy O daughter Jerusalem! See, your king shall come to you; a just saviour is he, meek, and riding on an ass, on a colt, the foal of an ass.  He shall banish the chariot from Ephraim, and the horse from Jerusalem; the warrior’s bow shall be banished, and he shall proclaim peace to the nations. His dominion shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth.

The coming King there foreshadowed by the prophet is a figure but dimly espied, yet marked out unmistakeably by his humility and the just salvation he brings which -- coming as it does from God – banishes, in the name of God, the weapons of war from His holy land, while proclaiming and offering peace to the nations.  

With such a background in mind we can easily recognize Jesus and well understand the Good News He proclaimed in our Gospel passage today:

Come to Me, all you who labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls.  For My yoke is easy and My burden light.   (cf. New Vulgate)

We again find Jesus calling out publicly ‘Come to Me’ at one of Israel’s greatest feasts when crowds of pilgrims and visitors were everywhere to be found:

On the last and greatest day of the feast, Jesus stood up and exclaimed, "Let anyone who thirsts come to Me and drink. Whoever believes in Me, as scripture says: 'Rivers of living water will flow from within him.' (John 7:37-38)

Whereupon St. John goes on to explain:

He said this in reference to the Spirit that those who came to believe in him were to receive. There was, of course, no Spirit yet, because Jesus had not yet been glorified. (v.39)

Thus we have a more focussed understanding of the coming King Who – Jesus explains – comes not directly to banish war from the Holy City and Israel’s Land but to invite His people to – Come to Me, Come to Me -- and, through faith in Him, learn to find peace for their souls by the Gift of His Spirit. 

We have yet other words of Jesus reported by St. Matthew (25:31-41) where He speaks of the ultimate denouement of His Kingdom:

"When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the holy angels with Him, then He will sit on the throne of His glory.  All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate them one from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats.  And He will set the sheep on His right hand, but the goats on the left.  Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.”...… Then He will also say to those on the left hand, “Depart from Me you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.”  

Now, the Kingdom thus foretold, and to be ultimately fulfilled when Jesus comes in glory, was set in motion from the very first preaching of the Good News as St. Luke (10:1-2.9) tells us:

The Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go.  Then He said to them, “Whatever city you enter, and they receive you, eat such things as are set before you.  And heal the sick there, and say to them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’”

 

And so, twenty-first century People of God, know yourselves, your situation, and your calling: you have heard the Word of God, the Good News of Jesus, proclaimed to you not just by the ‘seventy others’ but by the Universal Church established by Jesus on the rock of Peter; and having responded to that word, you have been made -- through baptism and the Gift of the Holy Spirit -- a member of the Body of Christ and a prospective citizen in the Kingdom of God after the final distinction between sheep and goats has been made; and as such, the Holy Spirit is both encouraging and enabling you to claim your place at the right hand of God by fighting against the enemies of that Kingdom.  First of all by fighting against sin in your own life; and then, according to the measure given you by the Spirit, against sin active in the world around us, that you may finally become fittingly counted among those chosen and blessed ones at God’s right hand.

Let us now turn back to St. Paul to learn what our Christian struggle against sin, involves:

Consequently, brothers, we are not debtors to the flesh, to live according to the flesh, for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 

‘Life lived according to the flesh’, what does that mean?  Let us first consider it as meant in St. Paul’s letter; that is, living in flaccid accordance with our natural impulses and desires -- especially our bodily inclinations and drives.  Such living -- St. Paul warns us -- will lead us to death, eternal death; not because such inclinations are always and inevitably totally wrong but because they all too easily become uncontrollable desires and drives blinding and enslaving us: taking no account of the needs and well-being  of others, disregarding the integrity and fullness of our own natural being, and contemning the supreme worth and sublime dignity of our divinely-bestowed calling as children of God.  The restraining of our native selfishness, the guiding of such irresponsible impulses, together with the curbing of blind lusts of all sorts, is what St. Paul means when he speaks of ‘putting to death the deeds of the body by the spirit’, for only through the Spirit communing with our spirit, recalling and enabling us to appreciate the teaching of Jesus, can we find strength to walk perseveringly in accordance with the light of life.

However, that is but one aspect of Jesus’ teaching, for He would see an even greater betrayal of that Christian inheritance with which He has endowed us as being a life lived with no aspirations other than worldly ones; a life spent, enjoyed, without reference to God at all … possibly an eminently respectable-in-the-sight-of-men life, yet lived for nothing other than worldly, human, motives, and seeking nothing more than worldly fulfilment and self-satisfaction; a life ending too frequently these days in a culprit-or-victim’s suicide, causing much understandable puzzlement, regret and sorrow, but also, at times, evoking unprincipled and unchristian sympathy from family and friends, onlookers and observers:

These things I have spoken to you, that My joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be full. I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep.  I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.  (John 15:11; 10:10-11)

Life in abundance and the fullness of joy, such is Jesus’ programme for each of us.  Of that programme, life in abundance is the easy part, so to speak: it is Jesus’ sheer gift to us!  But ‘our joy’, our ‘joy in fullness’ … is not generally easy; it is something to be 'sorted out' individually, to be worked on throughout our life, by the Spirit of Jesus communing with our individual spirit, a most intimate communing characteristic of truly Christian prayer.  In such prayer each of us has to open ourselves up and accustom, attune, ourselves to the Spirit of Jesus, peacefully, trustfully, and wholeheartedly; ever watching for, waiting on, and listening to, the Spirit’s gentle breath warming our heart and stirring our mind, before seeking to move our will in His direction.

Now that, dear People of God¸ is the most deeply fulfilling and transcendently joyful of human experiences, wherein the Spirit gradually adapts and attunes the frailty and blindness of our human capacities to His own infinite wisdom, beauty, and goodness; guiding our individual progress ever more surely towards the plenitude of our ultimate sharing in the eternal life and joy promised by Jesus before the presence of His Father:

No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son, and any one to whom the Son wishes to reveal Him.

Saints Peter and Paul Year A 2014

 Saints Peter & Paul                       

(Acts 12:1-11; 2^nd. Timothy 4:6-8, 17-18; Matthew 16:13-19)

My dear People of God, we are invited today to give thanks to God for the gift of faith with which we have been blessed; to thank Our Blessed Lord for establishing His Church on the abiding foundation Rock of His Good News proclaimed by Peter and Paul and the Apostolic College; and finally to express our gratitude for the witness given by both Peter and Paul in Rome.

In the infant Church there were certain people who claimed to have knowledge of some teachings of Jesus hidden from the general body of disciples, teachings which only those could learn who had been specially initiated by rituals of a secret nature.   For such people, the faith of the simple Christian was only the beginning; the first step indeed but not, of itself, enough for deep intimacy with God in Jesus.  

All those who fought the very idea of such secret doctrines did so stating that:

The authentic Christian teaching is addressed to all Christians; and is essentially based on, and to be found in, the New Testament and other public and Holy Scriptures of Mother Church;

The faith taught publicly in the Church is guaranteed by the fact that it is one with, and truly expressive of, the traditional Church presentation of the original Good News of Jesus given to the Apostles and handed down to subsequent ages  through the unbroken line of their successors.  

In that way it was made clear that the fullness of the authentic teaching of Jesus is open and available to all in the Church.

You must remember that in the early centuries of the Church there were no printed books; what books there were had to be copied by hand and were difficult to find and very expensive to buy: there were few roads, and the best of them -- though direct -- could only facilitate slow transport by horses and wheeled carriage, while transport by sea was very slow due to ships having to wait for favourable winds and tides; and, of course, both modes of transport were open to attack by robbers and pirates.   All this meant that the Church in each town generally preached what it had received at the beginning of its foundation from the wandering teachers who first came and proclaimed Christ to them and baptised them in His name.   These teachers were all accepted as true disciples of Jesus risking their lives to proclaim His Gospel, but those with the greatest authority were, of course, the twelve apostles and their closest associates.  Those churches founded personally by an apostle, or where an apostle was known to have been active, were specially respected.  Above all, however, churches whose apostle had not only worked among them but had died and was buried in their midst in a tomb open to veneration, such churches were, indeed, shown the very greatest respect and their tradition of faith was recognized as being most sure.  Such churches could be found, for example, at Antioch in Syria, at Philippi, Ephesus, Corinth, and Thessalonica.  But even among these “super” churches with “surer” faith because of the originating apostolic presence and witness, even among these, there was one which stood head and shoulders above all others, and that was the church at Rome, where both Peter, the Rock on which Jesus had said He would build His Church, and Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles, had both worked and, indeed, suffered martyrdom for their unflinching witness to the truth of Jesus.   If any church could remain free from heresy, if any church could preserve the teaching of Jesus in its purest integrity, it had to be the church at Rome.

All, therefore, who wanted to know the true teaching of Jesus would find it proclaimed most fully and surely in the apostolic churches, above all in the church at Rome.  That true faith in Jesus and His teaching was known as the Catholic faith, because “catholic” means “universal”, and that faith was proclaimed in Christian churches all over the known world because all were teaching the doctrine of the apostolic churches, and, above all, the doctrine proclaimed by the church at Rome.  The Catholic Church, was one and potentially universal because it was present in local churches to be found in cities, towns, and countryside, throughout the known world, proclaiming the one catholic faith received from Paul and the original apostolic college, and sealed, confirmed, by the witness and authority of Peter the Rock.  And even today, we above all, are rightly called Christians because we believe and proclaim the authentic Catholic faith.

Let me just give you the words of two of the earliest fathers and writers in the universal Church concerning the church at Rome.  First of all the words of St. Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons in France, whose memory we celebrated yesterday, and who was writing about the year 185, having been taught himself by St. Polycarp who had heard the Good News from the lips of St. John the Evangelist:

We do put to confusion all those who, in whatever manner, whether by an evil self-pleasing, by vainglory, or by blindness and perverse opinion, assemble in unauthorized meetings; [we do this, I say,] by indicating that tradition derived from the apostles, of the very great, the very ancient, and universally known Church founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul; as also [by pointing out] the faith preached to men, which comes down to our time by means of the successions of the bishops. For it is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church, on account of its pre-eminent authority, that is, the faithful everywhere, inasmuch as the apostolic tradition has been preserved continuously by those [faithful men] who exist everywhere.   (Adv. Haer. III, 3, 2.)

Let us now listen to another very early witness to the Church:

Come now you who would indulge a better curiosity if you would apply it to the business of your salvation, run over the apostolic churches in which the very thrones of the apostles are still pre-eminent in their places, in which their own authentic writings are read, uttering the voice and representing the face of each of them severally. Achaia is very near you, (in which) you find Corinth. Since you are not far from Macedonia, you have Philippi; (and there too) you have the Thessalonians. Since you are able to cross to Asia, you get Ephesus. Since, moreover, you are close upon Italy, you have Rome, from which there comes even into our own hands the very authority (of apostles themselves). How happy is its church, on which apostles poured forth all their doctrine along with their blood!  Where Peter endures a passion like his Lord’s!  Where Paul wins his crown in a death like John the Baptist, and where the Apostle John was first plunged, unhurt, into boiling oil, and thence remitted to his island-exile! …One Lord God does she acknowledge, the Creator of the universe, and Christ Jesus (born) of the Virgin Mary, the Son of God the Creator; and the Resurrection of the flesh; the law and the prophets she unites in one volume with the writings of evangelists and apostles, from which she drinks in her faith. This she seals with the water (of baptism), arrays with the Holy Ghost, feeds with the Eucharist, cheers with martyrdom, and against such a discipline thus (maintained) she admits no gainsayer. 

Those words were written by one called Tertullian, a famous and influential figure in the early Church who lived from 160 onwards.

There are so very many ancient witnesses to the unique position of Rome in the Church!  Were there disputes about the faith?  Rome was asked to decide.  Was anyone being persecuted for upholding Catholic truth?   Such a person would go to Rome seeking sanctuary and support.  Were innovators seducing the faithful?  The example of Rome was invoked and her help sought, because she was known never to have been deceived by innovations detrimental to the tradition she had received from Peter and Paul.

In our present world of change and uncertainty, where faith is often denied and tradition ridiculed, we should be both grateful for, and proud of, the blessing we have received: the supreme blessing and gift of the one, true, faith proclaimed by Paul and guaranteed by Peter; the inviolate faith, preserved and revealed in the one Church of Christ through the power of the Spirit of holiness and truth bequeathed to her by the Lord.  And for so great a blessing each and every one of us should, on this feast above all, give most heartfelt thanks to God our loving Father whilst offering most sincere prayers that mother Church, under the guidance of Peter the Apostle in the figure of the present Pope, might continue to further the fulfillment of the work Jesus originally committed to her charge.  Though the world criticizes and even persecutes Mother Church, we -- her children -- must ever remember and unceasingly call to mind that Jesus is always with her as He promised, and that, just as He committed His mother Mary to John the Apostle's care, so also He commits Mother Church to our active care and loving service, not just to our plaints and cries:

Jesus said to His disciples, "The harvest is abundant but the labourers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out labourers for His harvest

All power in heaven and on earth has been given to Me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age." (Matthew 9:37-38; 28: 18-20)

                                     

Corpus Christi Year A

Corpus Christi (A)

(Deuteronomy 8:2-3, 14-16; 1^st. Corinthians 10:16-17; John 6:51-58)

Anyone who loves Jesus will occasionally think “How wonderful it must have been to actually see Him, hear Him speak, experience His Presence and Personality!”  What a privilege: incomparable and unrepeatable!  Such a person might then go on to wonder: “What difference might it have made to my life if, indeed, I could have known the Jesus Who walked and talked in Palestine; Who taught, smiled on, and blessed His Apostles, disciples, and the thronging crowds; Who looked on the poor and needy with an immediate and personal sympathy, giving evidence of a patient understanding deeper than any possible words of exhortation or explanation.  Oh, to have known Him thus!   Had that been my lot, might I not have turned out immeasurably better than I find myself today?”

Let us, however, recall these words of Jesus to His sorrowing disciples who were distressed at the thought of losing Him (John 16:7):

But I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send Him to you.

 

God’s blessings are now bestowed on us in the name of Jesus by the Advocate, the Spirit of Jesus, through the mediation of Jesus’ Sacramental Body and Blood, and these two aspects we need to look a little closer at in order to appreciate them more.

Had we personally heard and seen Jesus Himself here on earth, we would have been looking upon Him as One other than ourselves, looking outside ourselves to Another.  Moreover, we would have been listening to Him with ears that do not always hear accurately, looking at Him through eyes that often see only what we expect or want to see and are conversely, at times slow to notice or appreciate the unexpected or the unwelcome.  And then, having seen and heard in our own way that which others might have seen and heard somewhat differently, we frequently recall only that which -- for some perhaps unknown reason – particularly stirred our personal sensitivity, and so fixed itself in our memory.  It is a fact that we can rarely, if at all, remember all that actually happened; and police will tell us how difficult it can be at times in the search for objective facts to reconcile different, even mutually contradictory, eye- witness accounts.

If our remembering and reporting of all that might have happened could prove so difficult, what about our understanding of those events?  We can misunderstand what others do, even when we know them intimately …. How would we -- sinners as we know ourselves to be -- have understood aright what Jesus in His infinite wisdom and 'caritas'-as-distinct-from-emotional love chose to do and say to us and in our hearing?

In the days of His public ministry Jesus – though devoutly accompanied and attended to by the company of the disciples and Apostles we have learned to admire so much -- was nevertheless led on several occasions to reproach them for their slowness of understanding and the weakness of their flesh.  Had we been with them, we might have watched and admired Him in His work, but surely we ourselves would frequently -- probably more frequently than the  Apostles -- have been found unable to rightly appreciate the significance of His words and actions, nor would we have been either more committed and courageous than they so as to be able to disregard the fear that originally held them back from confessing His Name, or so as to stay our feet from leaving Jesus’ side and running with them, each and every one of us, on our own way.

Now, however, Jesus has given us His own Spirit, to be with us in Mother Church to the end of time and we know more of Jesus’ words than did His disciples of old because the Spirit has brought, and is constantly bringing, to the Church’s mind all that Jesus said and did, intended for us and wanted of us, as He so gently but yet irresistibly guides her into all truth about Jesus’ saving work.  And in our individual lives, too, through all the changing circumstances of our daily routines, no matter what the joys or sorrows, difficulties or trials, the Spirit of Jesus is in us, with us, and for us: speaking to and communing with our spirit, comforting and supporting us, moving and guiding, inspiring and sustaining us, whereby we are enlightened to appreciate what Jesus does for us, and also empowered to work with and for Jesus, making full use of the blessings He has left us in His Church.

All this is what was shown when Our Lord ascended to heaven.  The disciples were left gazing after Him, whereupon they were admonished by angels saying:

Men of Galilee, why are you standing there looking at the sky? This Jesus who has been taken up from you into heaven will return in the same way as you have seen him going into heaven.  (Acts 1:11)

“Why stand gazing up into the sky?”  Admiring indeed, but not involved.  That was our situation at the beginning when we were thinking about how wonderful it would have been if we had been able to see, hear and follow Jesus on His saving mission.   The present and enduring fact is that now we are not just watching, we are involved; we have been given riches beyond any of our imaginings, riches meant to enable us to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling” as St. Paul said.  We are no longer like children innocent of any responsibility, just watching, waiting, wondering and wishing; but rather we are now called upon by the Spirit of Jesus -- working within the Church and in each one of us -- to actualize, bring about, what Jesus planned, suffered, and died for, by bringing forth acceptable fruit in our lives and growing to full personal  maturity in Christ, having a part with Him in His sufferings for the salvation of mankind, and thereby hoping to attain to a share in the glory of His Resurrection, under the guidance and in the power of His Spirit within us.

In order that we may be able to fulfil this our glorious calling, and to grow continually in union with Jesus, we have been given His own Most Precious Body and Blood in Holy Mother Church, so that, receiving Him from her we might be filled ever anew with, purified and perfected by, His Most Holy Spirit.

The Spirit is indeed given to each of us at our Baptism.  However, the Spirit is a Divine Person to Whom we must learn to respond; He is not a thing we irrevocably possess; and our awareness of a developing presence of the Spirit within us and for us is dependent upon the sensitivity and sincerity of our response to His initiatives in our lives.  And therein lies the difficulty, for it is difficult to respond to One Who is invisible and intangible.  

To help us in that respect the Spirit Himself, our Advocate and Helper, puts the presence of Jesus in Mother Church before our eyes; for, just as Jesus lived for the glory of His Father, so the Spirit too, lives and works in us, not for Himself but for the glory of Jesus.  He knows we can more easily recall, love, and appreciate the human figure of Jesus Who, though Himself no longer with us visibly, is nevertheless indelibly etched on our minds and hearts through His shared humanity with us: in the memories of Him enshrined in the Scriptures and in the traditions and practices of Mother Church.  Above all else, however, the Spirit insists that we never forget that Jesus left us one supreme and sublimely perfect memorial of Himself -- His Self-sacrifice to the Father and Self-communion to us -- in Holy Mass:

Then Jesus took the bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them, saying, "This is my body, which will be given for you; do this in memory of Me."   And likewise the cup after they had eaten, saying, "This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which will be shed for you. (Luke 22:19-20)

In our Holy Communion, Jesus is present to us as He promised: He is present in His glorious body under the appearances of bread and wine because He comes offering us life, eternal life.  Indeed, He even offers us a share, a place, in His glory by the Gift of the Spirit Who raised Him from the dead:

If the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the One who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also, through His Spirit that dwells in you.   (Romans 8:11)

In this way our continued growth in understanding of, love for, and likeness to, Jesus can know no limits until we are, finally, one with Him in all things for the Father.  Jesus, on earth, was necessarily leading His disciples from the outside; now, however, by the Gift of His Spirit – ever renewed and refreshed in us by our communion with Him in His Eucharistic sacrifice and sacrament -- Jesus wills to make us, by His Spirit, perfectly one with Himself in love for and service of His Father, Who Himself comes to us and wills to abide with us, that thus He might make us His own truly and fully adopted children and show Himself to be our most truly sublime and loving Father.