Vatican City, Jun 5, 2022 / 04:30 am (CNA).
On the Solemnity of Pentecost, Pope Francis offered advice on how to distinguish the voice of the Holy Spirit from “the voice of the spirit of evil.”
Speaking from a wheelchair in front of the main altar of St. Peter’s Basilica, the pope provided several examples of how to recognize the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, who “at every crossroads in our lives suggests to us the best path to follow.”
“The Holy Spirit will never tell you that on your journey everything is going just fine. … No, he corrects you; he makes you weep for your sins; he pushes you to change, to fight against your lies and deceptions, even when that calls for hard work, interior struggle and sacrifice,” Pope Francis said in his homily on June 5.
“Whereas the evil spirit, on the contrary, pushes you to always do what you think and you find pleasing. He makes you think that you have the right to use your freedom any way you want. Then, once you are left feeling empty inside – it is bad, this feeling of emptiness inside, many of us have felt it – and when you are left feeling empty inside, he blames you, becomes the accuser, and throws you down, destroys you.”
“The Holy Spirit, correcting you along the way, never leaves you lying on the ground, never. He takes you by the hand, comforts you and constantly encourages you,” he added.
The pope, who has suffered from knee pain in recent months, did not preside over the Pentecost Mass. He sat in a white chair in front of the congregation to the right of the altar. Francis was assisted to the front of the altar in a wheelchair to offer the homily.
Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, the 88-year-old dean of the College of Cardinals, served as the main celebrant for the Mass, as he did on Easter Vigil earlier this year.
In his homily, Pope Francis underlined that feelings of “bitterness, pessimism and negativity” never come from the Holy Spirit, but come from evil, which “stokes impatience and self-pity … complaints and criticism, the tendency to blame others for all our problems.”
“The Holy Spirit on the other hand urges us never to lose heart and always to start over again. … Get up! How? By jumping right in, without waiting for someone else. And by spreading hope and joy, not complaints; never envying others, never – envy is the door through which the evil spirit enters — but the Holy Spirit leads you to rejoice in the successes of others,” he said.
The pope added that the Holy Spirit is “practical” and “wants us to concentrate on the here and now, because the time and place in which we find ourselves are themselves grace-filled.”
“The spirit of evil, however, would pull us away from the here and now, and put us somewhere else. Often he anchors us to the past: to our regrets, our nostalgia, our disappointments. Or else he points us to the future, fueling our fears, illusions and false hopes. But not the Holy Spirit. The Spirit leads us to love, here and now,” he said.
The Solemnity of Pentecost, which is celebrated 50 days after Easter, marks the descent of the Holy Spirit. Thousands were gathered inside of St. Peter’s Basilica for the Mass.
The twelve fruits of the Holy Spirit are charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, faithfulness, modesty, self-control, and chastity.
Pope Francis said that the Holy Spirit “rejuvenates the Church” and teaches the Church “to be an open house without walls of division.”
“Brothers and sisters, let us sit at the school of the Holy Spirit, so that he can teach us all things. Let us invoke him each day, so that he can remind us to make God’s gaze upon us our starting point, to make decisions by listening to his voice, and to journey together as Church, docile to him and open to the world,” he said.
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Implicit in the above insights are the “signs of the Holy Spirit” also explored by Thomas Dubay, S.M., in “Authenticity: A Biblical Theology of Discernment” (Ignatius, 1997).
In Part III (“Signs of the Holy Spirit”), Dubay identifies moral behavior, doctrinal criteria, communal criteria, and conversion with Attainment of Truth. Later, in Part IV (“Verification and Implications”) Dubay addresses the discernment of Healthy Pluralism:
“A complementary pluralism rooted in a shared vision furthers ecclesial unity (Eph 4:11-13). Between contradictions there is no middle ground; one is right and one is wrong. For this reason routine dissent is destructive. Pope Paul VI referred to individual interpretation torn away from apostolic teaching as ‘indefinitely centrifugal’ and as pulverizing the unity of faith.”
Included in the pulverizing and double-speak “middle ground” of today, of course, is the synodal and media-darling chorus of Marx, Batzing, Hollerich & Co, and their fraudulent enablers.
[In his homily, Pope Francis underlined that feelings of “bitterness, pessimism and negativity” never come from the Holy Spirit, but come from evil, which “stokes impatience and self-pity … complaints and criticism, the tendency to blame others for all our problems.”]
No, sometimes these feelings arise in people because they are being oppressed or are victims of injustice. Some pastor.
As often a beautiful, insightful homily [the Holy Spirit always suggests the best path at crossroads] then, “the Holy Spirit is practical and wants us to concentrate on the here and now, because the time and place in which we find ourselves are themselves grace-filled. The spirit of evil, however, would pull us away from the here and now. Often he anchors us to the past”.
Taken in context of Amoris Laetitia, and the form of proportional situation ethics he proposes, which may explain appointments of clerics with moral baggage we find an appeal, even appealing call to inclusion, accepting the realities of life as they are, offering the imperfect on the peripheries opportunity for salvation, extending access to the Eucharist as a remedy rather than reward.
It’s compelling and powerful.
On this very issue of inflexibility on moral issues he seemingly argues in agreement with Aquinas ST 1a2ae 94, 4 that the natural law is not the same for everyone here alluding to adultery. Aquinas however does not refer here to singular cases rather whether all the law is the same for all universally. Aquinas says it’s not [the further we proceed in details] although the universal principles of natural law remain, they do not change, rather the difference is found accidentally, as sin is accidental to the universal rule [for example the Maasai believe, at least did, that it’s their right to raid and steal cattle from neighboring tribes. Certain peoples practiced polygamy as did the ancient fathers Abraham, David although their fault was not sin due to ignorance of the first principle of natural law concerning marriage].
Conscience on natural law issues is not the arbiter of right or wrong as proposed in Amoris. That’s because the natural law is inscribed on the hearts of men, as prescient knowledge actualized in experience. If the opposite were the rule as suggested in Amoris universal principles would not exist, and morality would be subjective in accord with sentiment rather than reason. This is the “here and now” His Holiness refers to in his homily. It’s a strong, compelling argument then for inclusiveness and mercy although lacking in the primacy dynamic of conversion to the truth to which Christ exhorts the Apostles to teach [the world] all that I have commanded you.
Personally I would like to be kind and assume the pontiff’s good intent. That, however, is not our primary prerogative. Rather it’s the judgment of whether the outcome of such a policy is consistent with Christ’s revelation.
We read: “The spirit of evil, however, would pull us away from the here and now. Often he anchors us to the past”.
“Anchors us to the past?” Pope Francis claims to not be a theologian, nor am I (equality!), but surely discerning spirits can still tell the difference between “the past” and what is IN the past? The baby from the bathwater? Dubay (cited above) has a few words:
“Current argumentation from polls [Germany’s “synodal way”?] …loses sight of the fact that Jesus had plainly said that few would enter the narrow gate [!] and tread the hard road of his [!] moral code (Mt 7:13-14) [….] “Those who reject what they had been taught and seek out another gospel [“paradigm shift”?] are to be condemned (Gal 1:6-9). The leaders [we have leaders?] have the power to exclude from the community those who refuse to be corrected [i.e., self-exclude] and to mend their ways (Mt 18:15-18). We are told that ‘as there were false prophets in the past history of our people, so you too will have your false teachers, who will insinuate their own disruptive views and disown the Master who purchased their freedom (2 Pet 2:1). If the Church had no borders, she would be [is?] a dull, formless society with nothing to say to the world.”
Walking a bit with Pope Francis, we do have this from T.S. Eliot: We are always faced both with the question “what must be destroyed?” and with the question “what must be preserved?” and neither Liberalism nor Conservatism, which are not philosophies and may be merely habits, is enough to guide us.” (T.S. Eliot, The Idea of a Christian Society, 1940).
True enough, BUT, from the perennial Catholic Church the flock rightfully expects more than broad-brush ambiguity or even disdain toward the “the past”—a Church of both faith and morals, which from the beginning is “anchored” [!] in Jesus Christ, “the same yesterday, today and forever” (Heb 13:8).
Spreading hope and joy is the way forward. Come O Holy Spirit and renew the face of the Earth.