The Holy Spirit: Light, Might, and Delight!

Fr. Manuel Flores, SJ

A famous wandering preacher had a favorite gimmick when preaching about the Holy Spirit. He would ask a boy to go up and hide in the ceiling and rafters bringing a white dove. The preacher instructed the boy to release the dove when he reached the peak of his sermon, where he shouts “come down Holy Spirit!!!” And people would always be cheering and clapping in amazement as the dove descended!
And so again in one town he found a boy willing to go up and hide in the rafters with the dove. When he reached the peak of his sermon he shouted “come down Holy Spirit!”, but no dove flew down. A second, and a third time he shouted “come down Holy Spirit!” still with no dove coming down. Then a boy’s tiny voice was heard from the ceiling and rafters “Sir, sir, the cat ate the Holy Spirit! Do you want me to throw down the cat?”

The Holy Spirit as “HELPER.

“Life is hard.” Jesus knows that the demands of ordinary living: emotional, financial, physical can at times be difficult even crushing! Today, many experience depression, anxieties with some even being led to suicide. If that were not enough, the path of Jesus: of sharing, service, sacrifice, compassion and forgiveness is a mountain quite impossible to climb on our own. That is why Jesus promised us “I will ask the Father and he will give you another helper (paraklitos) to be with you for ever.” (Jn 14:16)
Briefly, the Holy Spirit helps us by giving us “LIGHT, MIGHT and DELIGHT” (In Tagalog: liwanag, lakas, ligaya! In Visayan: kahayag, kusog, kalipay!)

The Holy Spirit as LIGHT!

It is the Holy Spirit who helps us understand the truths of God and find God’s will for our lives leading us to become the best, most alive and happiest we can be, as God desires us to be! It is also the light of Holy Spirit who reveals sin to us “And when he comes, he will convince the world of sin and of righteousness and of judgment.” (Jn 16:8) Without the Holy Spirit we don’t have a clue about how even now sin is destroying us and others.

The Holy Spirit as MIGHT!

“Gusto kong bumait pero di ko magawa!” It is the Holy Spirit who gives us the courage and strength to fight temptation, to overcome our various addictions and enslavements to various pleasures. It is also the Holy Spirit who give us the capacity to accomplish heroic good: for sharing, service, sacrifice, compassion and forgiveness, enabling us to become like God Himself!

The Holy Spirit as DELIGHT!

The Holy Spirit gives us joy, peace and delight that the world cannot give (Jn 14:27). The world tells us to find peace by ESCAPING from problems and painful reality though social media, drink, drugs, casinos, and other addictions which ultimately leave us even more enlaved and stuck. Because the Holy Spirit gives us the courage and strength to face our problems we ultimately come out as victors, not victims.
Our peace, joy and delight comes from knowing that we loved and never alone, that God’s power and wisdom ensure that ultimately everything will work out for our good (Rom 8:28).

The Spirit blows where it will! (Jn 3:8)

One of my most memorable experiences as Jesuit seminarian was selling balut. I did this at night for a whole week in 1979 while I was living in the slums of Balic-Balic. Our balut supplier was a kindly middle aged woman who belonged to another religious sect. She and her family lived in a modest apartment where I picked up my balut basket at 5pm. I had a very negative view of their sect as it had a weird set of beliefs, a charlatan founder who made their own corrupted and altered translation of the bible. I was very carefully warned about the dangers of selling balut at night. I was to avoid dark unlighted alleys, groups of drinking men or you could get robbed and stabbed. Be careful also of buyers riding cars who could run off without paying you.

When I returned my basket one night later that week I heard that a 15 year old balut vendor whom I knew was stabbed and was fighting for his life in a hospital.I learned that our balut supplier had deposited money in the hospital so he could be admitted. The balut supplier would later pay for the hospital bills of more 10,000 pesos because no one would. In today’s pesos that would amount to 230,000 pesos. How could that lady belonging to another sect do that? That boy will never be able to pay her back? The lady was not rich at all. How could she give up her hard earned money just like that?

Then I saw the important truth that a person may have the wrong religion but the right heart! The lady can only do that extraordinary act of love by the Holy Spirit acting in her. I may have the right religion but the wrong heart! Would I have done what that lady did? Truly, the Spirit blows where it wills!

On this day of Pentecost we beg God not so much for the right religion, but the right heart. Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and enkindle in us the fire of your love!