The Holy Spirit

EWTN Global Catholic Radio and St. Joseph Communications proudly present Life is Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Shin. This 50-part series was recorded on photograph records in the 1960s and the sound quality is sometimes limited. But the word of God spoken by Archbishop Shin is timeless and now here is Archbishop Fulton Shin. Peace be to you. In this lesson we come to that detail of the creed which states, I believe in the Holy Ghost, that which stated before, Holy Ghost and Holy Spirit may be used indifferently. It might be well to introduce this particular subject by pangering on a question which you have probably asked yourself many times. We did not have been better for you to have lived in the days of our Blessed Lord than to live now. Have you not missed much? By not being a contemporary or being incarnate life of God that walk is earth. It will lose something. In the 20th century at a disadvantage being so far removed from him. In answer to those questions it must be admitted that there would have been some advantages living at the time of our Blessed Lord. We could have heard his voice and been tremendously impressed by the ring of its authority. Heurus could have brought their children to him to have been blessed. Senors would have been charmed to with the majesty of his bearing. All of us would have been stirred by the eloquence of his words. As word of police you will remember, when they set out to arrest our Blessed Lord, they were arrested by his eloquence. When they went back to the temple authorities they said to the police, why did you not arrest him and they said, no man ever spoke as that man spoke. These would have been some advantages. But we must go on the words of our Blessed Lord himself who said it was better for him that he go. This is what he said the night of the last supper when the apostles were rather sad. There were only a few hours before his agony in the garden and just the night before his death on the cross. He said to his apostles, now I am going back to him who said please. I can say truly it is better for you that I should go away. He was to be friends you will not come to you unless I do go. But if only I make my way there I will send him to you. I always say it is expedient that he go. If he goes not the Holy Spirit would not come to us. If I were to remain the honor we could have gotten no closer and were seen in without eyes and were hurting without ears or possibly even and embrace. It would have been a sense of our love. But if he left then he could send us a spirit. Then he would not do and example to be copied then it would be a valuable life to be lived. Certainly we have lost his corporal presence but the spiritual presence has taken its place. Now the Christ has no longer localized external but is in his body, vilifying not in one place but in his church and in his souls with the longer with. Are we there for it a disadvantage? No, we are rather a great advantage. Do not think that if you had lived in the time of our blessed Lord that it would have been any easier to have believed in his divinity then that it would be to believe in the divinity of his church now. Those who missed him missed the church now. Look at the apostles. They did not understand the meaning of his death until the Holy Spirit came with fondament, petty cost. It is vanity for us to say that we would have understood our Lord better than the apostles. Now that brings us to some of the lessons of the Holy Spirit and we're going to enumerate about four of them. The Holy Spirit, first of all, reveals the Son, I just to say the Son of God Christ. The Holy Spirit reveals the Son as the Son reveals the Father. When our blessed Lord was on this earth, He revealed the Heavenly Father. It was only thanks to him that we knew how much love the Father had for us. The Father so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son into this world. The night of the last supper, Philip said to him, show us the Father and our Lord said to him, Philip, have I been with you all this time and till you do not understand the Father and I are one. The Father's love that sent the Son so that our blessed Lord was acclaimed of a prison just as when the earthly Son, the Son of the Heaven shines through a prison. It splits up into the seven rays of the spectrum. In so too, it was thanks to our blessed Lord that we understood the full love and goodness of the Heavenly Father. Now just as the Son revealed the Father, so the Holy Spirit that our Lord said He would send would reveal Him, these are the words of our Lord, and He will bring honor to me because it is from me that He will derive what He makes plain to because all that belongs to the Father belongs to me. In these words our blessed Lord is saying that once He ascends to the Father, then all of the spiritual blessings one by Him on Calibri would be conveyed to us by the Holy Spirit. Our blessed Lord is said during his earthly life that we would not understand his life, we would not receive all of the merits of his life until the Spirit came to the Church. The great business of the Holy Spirit therefore is to stand behind the scenes, to make Christ normal. That is why the apostles did not understand the crucifixion until after Petticoast. St. Paul, for so far as to say that no one can call Jesus Lord except by the Spirit. Oh yes you can pronounce the word Jesus, but you do not know that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, the Savior of the world, the Lord of the universe, except by the Holy Spirit. If you believe in the divinity of Christ for this time, it is through the Holy Spirit that you believe, not through any ways of mine. I am giving through only certain motives of credibility. But the full assurance of it comes from the Spirit. If the telescope reveals not itself, but the stars beyond. So the Holy Spirit reveals not Himself, but Christ. Just think how we are able in this age of ours to communicate with distant parts of the earth thanks to electric or light waves and why cannot therefore our Lord who dwells in heaven, be within whispering distance of us through this Holy Spirit. So our vested Lord, as He said, was not going to leave us orphans. He said, he was a Palsos. Give us only for a short time that I am with you, my children. I will not leave you orphans. Many promised His Spirit that would abide with Him forever. And that Spirit He said was to be another comforter. He was their comforter on earth. And now His Spirit would be their comforter, their parakeet, their advocate. Listen to the words of our Lord. I will ask the Father and He will give you another comforter, one who would dwell with you forever. It is the truth giving Spirit, for whom the world can find no room, because it cannot see Him, cannot recognize Him. Our Lord is here saying that the world cannot understand the Holy Spirit, because the world goes only by the evidence of the eyes and the ears. Can I see the Holy Spirit? In His words to our Lord, it is manifesting to us that He spoke to us without, but the Holy Spirit would speak to us within. Did that mean that the Holy Spirit is to be a substitute for Christ? No, the Holy Spirit will make Christ more real than ever. Hear the words of our Lord. And that day you shall know that I am in the Father and you in me and I in you. How would He do in us? I will be dealing with given excellence in our hearts. That is what I say Paul said, if we have no one Christ to call into the flesh, we know Him so no longer, because now we know Him in another way, we know Him through the Holy Spirit. Now what the Holy Spirit, as our Lord said, will bear witness to Him, not to Himself. But almost with the impression that the different persons of the Trinity were hiding, it is almost as if the Father hit Himself for the sake of the Son who revealed Him. And it almost seems as if the Holy the Son were now hiding Himself for the sake of the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit seems to hide Himself too, for He does not manifest Himself. The word hiding is not a proper word to use. We can make our idea clear by quoting the words of our Blessed Lord. He will not utter a message of His own. He will utter the message that has been given to Him, and He will make plain to you what is to come. The Holy Spirit, therefore, witnesses not to Himself but to the Son. That is why only those who have this spirit understand Christ. You will often hear people say, oh Jesus was a great teacher. Really He and Lincoln and Plato have done a great deal for the world. If we wanted to solve all of our economic and social problems, all we would have to do is read the attitudes of Jesus. People who talk that way do not understand the geniuses, the Christ, the Son of God, the regime of the world. For them Jesus is just a not a man. Why do they not know him? Because they do not have this spirit, and why do they not have this spirit? Because they have not obeyed the law of God that they knew. However little or however much it was. In our Lord's head, if you love me, keep my commands. Then the Holy Spirit will manifest Himself to us. The purpose of the Holy Spirit then is that of an artist. He draws the picture of our Lord on the canvas. He makes him ready to do us so that we understand him. Just as the artist stays outside of the canvas, so the Holy Spirit is staying outside of the Christ and He reveals to us. To be filled with the Spirit is to be filled therefore with Christ so that we put on the mind of Christ, we put on the will of Christ. And there is nothing in the gospel that gives us the answer to many of the problems of life. And the difficulty is the day. If we were just simply to imitate the life of our Blessed Lord, as found in the gospel, we would all have to be Carpenters. How then do we know what to do through the Spirit of Christ that manifests to us what we are to do in each and every circumstance? The proper words of say, the right action to do, the kind of charity to perform. Now this Spirit of Christ that is in our soul, we say manifest Christ to us. The Saint Paul uses the example of the human mind to make clear the Holy Spirit. Saint Paul asks, how do we know the thoughts of another person? And it's because we have a soul and the spirit just as he has. Engineers understand engineers and brokers understand brokers and students of the same college, understand students of the same college. Why? Because they all have the same spirit. For human to begin with and then they have the spirit of engineers and brokers and so forth. How do we understand Christ? Because we have the spirit of Christ. That is why those who share that spirit understand one another so readily. The natural spirit, the pure human spirit, the spirit that is not yet holy cannot grasp the deep meaning of Christ. It's almost like expecting a canary and a cage to learn Shakespeare. He cannot do so, he would have to put your own brain in fact of the canaries brain. So the brain of a scientist or a dramatist cannot understand the mysteries of redemption because lacks the spirit. Saint Paul puts it, the natural man we see does not the things of the spirit of God. For they are foolishness under him and he can know them because they are spiritually deserved. And try to teach people about Christ and the mysteries of our holy faith. It's almost like trying to teach a blind man color unless those people are ready to receive the spirit of Christ himself. Now converts and take instructions come to know that Jesus is our Lord. Where do they learn it? From the spirit. The very first lessons we gave in this course. He said that one becomes interested in the church simply because he's received a great that illumined his mind and strengthened his will. Now the Holy Spirit does that. The Holy Spirit rules the soul, draws it to a closer fellowship. To more than a union becomes our sanctifier. Just as the Father is our Creator and the Son is our Redeemer. This is one of the fruits of the spirit in our daily lives. Now we come up to another. May we be Holy Spirit in relationship to our understanding of sin. Nine Velas, the parables, the Lord said that the Holy Spirit would convict us of sin. The Spirit will come, our Lord said, and it will be for him to prove the world wrong about sin. They have not found belief in me. When do we come to a real understanding of sin? Our Lord says here through the Holy Spirit. No one really grasps the evil of sin if he thinks that he is just the breaking of a law. When we have the Spirit of Christ we understand that sin is doing harm to one we love. That is why the crucifixion is the manifestation of sin. That as our Lord said is unbelief in its essence. The absolute refusal to have the love and the blessings of God. Now the Holy Spirit reveals to us that sin is the refusal to accept that deliverance purchased by Christ. And nothing but the Spirit can convince us really of sin. How often, for example, our conscience can be smothered by repeated evil actions. We rationalize our evil deeds, public opinions, sometimes even approves of sin. But the Spirit of the Holy Spirit is in us. Reveals to us that all unbelief is sin. That sin in some way is tied up with the crucifixion, with the cross. Then we begin to understand that the cross is a kind of an autobiography. We can see our own lives there. Our pride and the crown of thorns, our abours and the nailing of hand, our flight from race, in the opinion feet, our rebellious loves in the purest side. And our disrespect to the body and the flesh that was hanging from him like purple rags. The blood is the ink and his skin is the parchment. And our sins constitute the writing. Every sinner, therefore, has the spirit of Christ, always thinks of sins in relationship to the crucifixion. And then, our Blessed Lord becomes our hope. So there is nothing like, therefore, the enlightened conscience, in which we are not under a law, actually we are not. Those who really love Christ were beyond it. The Holy Spirit gives us the sense of holiness. And holiness is separation from the world. So St. Paul says that his conscience was enlightened by the Holy Spirit. Whenever, therefore, we do wrong, it is not the law, it's not the commandments, it's the spirit that tells us that we are breaking off a relationship with love. That is why St. Paul tells us that as often as we sin, we crucify Christ and you in our hearts. Therefore, the life of a true Christian is not so much concerned with the avoidance of sin. We have been on that. Rather, it is an attempt to rejuvenate ourselves, the life of Christ. As our Lord said, if it has happened in far, all things that are pleasing to him, that I do. So we say to the twin, all things that are pleasing to God, that we do. That constitutes our attitude towards sin and that is done through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. I propose in this lesson to mention many other effects of the Holy Spirit in our lives, but we may have time in this half hour for just one more. And perhaps we will talk about the Holy Spirit in relationship to the body, because hardly anyone ever thinks of that. St. Paul says, no, you not to your body is the temple of God, the Holy Spirit dwelleth in you. How does our body become the temple of God? Well, because it is made holy by the end of the body of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in our soul, remember that when our Blessed Lord went into the temple in Jerusalem, drove out the buyers and the sellers, the Pharisees asked him for a sign that he had authority to do that. Now, blessed Lord had destroyed this temple and in three days I will rebuild it. He was not referring to that first-leam material temple. It was in the course of the construction under Herod. He was referring to the temple of his body. What is the temple? The temple is the place where God dwells. And since he was the Son of God in the flesh, therefore his body was the Supreme Temple. Now in a anological way, our body, when we are in a state of grace, and possess the life of Christ in our soul, also becomes the temple. It is therefore the Holy Spirit that gives medicine and dignity. The Holy Spirit, you will man, cannot treat. A sick person is a guinea pig. Our Lord has a double glory. One with the Father, where He is glorified at the right hand, but also He is glorified in us. Our Lord said, the Holy Spirit shall glorify me. The Holy Spirit glorifies Him in us by making us witnesses to Christ, to clearing Him in our mind, our actions. Let therefore the practical results of this lesson be to pray to the Holy Spirit that you may know Christ, the fullness of his gospel and the love of the Father. It will understand that He is the source of power, the Holy Spirit. For our Lord said, I will send you power from on high. Every day of my peace, my life, I pray for that power, the Holy Spirit. The power that is not human, the power that is not physical, the power that is not intellectual, the brother of power, that comes solely from living the Christ life, power to influence people, power to impress you now. Did you listen to me? Now the divinity of the Holy Spirit. And if then, in the course of this lesson, I have given to you any deeper comprehension of the beautiful love of the Trinity of the Father who created us and said His Son, of the Son who redeemed us and of the Holy Spirit who sanctified us and mixed up our body at temple of God, I say if I have done anything to give you a closer understanding of the beauty of the Spirit of Christ, then I trust that you will in gratitude, sometimes say a little prayer to the Holy Spirit for me, that I may more and more in mind and heart and body. So forth, the Spirit of Christ. God love you. This has been Life's Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Cheen. For more information about this series, contact St. Joseph Communications at 1-800-526-2151. Outside the US, call 818-3313-3549 and please join us again next time for Life's Worth Living with Archbishop Fulton Cheen on EWTN Global Catholic Radio. The Apostles Creed. I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried. He descended to the dead and on the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven and it seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. Amen.