Illustration: El Greco’s depiction of Pentecost, (c. 1600)
Pope Francis’s profound morning meditation
in the chapel of the Domus Sanctae Marthae
Tuesday, 2 September 2014
First Reading: 1 Corinthians 2:10-16
The Spirit reaches the depths of everything, even the depths of God.
After all, a man can only be truly known by his own spirit, not by anyone else, and in the same way, only the Spirit of God can truly know the depths of God.
Instead of the spirit of the world, we have received God’s Spirit to teach us to understand the gifts he has given us.
Therefore, we do not teach in the way philosophy is taught, but in the way the Spirit teaches us: we teach spiritual things spiritually.
An unspiritual person does not accept anything of the Spirit of God; he sees it all as nonsense because it is beyond his understanding — it can only be understood by means of the Spirit.
A spiritual person, on the other hand, can judge the value of everything, and their own value is not to be judged by others.
As scripture says: ‘Who can know the mind of the Lord? Who can teach him?’
But we have the mind of Christ.
Gospel Reading: Luke 4:31-37
Jesus went down to Capernaum, a town in Galilee, and taught them on the sabbath.
And his teaching made a deep impression on them because he spoke with authority.
In the synagogue there was a man who was possessed by the spirit of an unclean devil,
and it shouted at the top of its voice, ‘Ha! What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are: the Holy One of God.’
But Jesus said sharply, ‘Be quiet! Come out of him!’
And the devil, throwing the man down in front of everyone, went out of him without hurting him at all. Astonishment seized them and they were all saying to one another,
‘What teaching!
He gives orders to unclean spirits with authority and power and they come out.’
And reports of him went all through the surrounding countryside.
Pope Francis’ meditation
It is the Holy Spirit who gives “identity” to the Christian.
This is why “you can have five degrees in theology but not have the Spirit of God”.
And “you might be a great theologian but you are not a Christian”, precisely “because you do not have the Spirit of God”.
Many times we find, among our faithful, simple old women who perhaps didn’t finish elementary school, but who speak to you about things better than a theologian, because they have the Spirit of Christ”.
And the Pope offered the example of St Paul, who despite his effective preaching had no particular academic qualifications.
He did not take courses in “human wisdom” at the Lateran or Gregorian” Pontifical Universities/
However he spoke to satisfy the Spirit of God.
In the Gospel of Luke passage proposed for today’s liturgy, the word “authority” appears twice.
The people “were astonished by Jesus’ teaching, because his word were authoritative”.
Then, at the end of the passage, the Gospel states that “they were all amazed and said to one another: ‘What is this word? For with authority and power he commands…’”.
Pope Francis continued, “the people were astonished because, when Jesus spoke or preached, he had an authority that the other preachers and legal experts didn’t have.
The question to ask yourself is: “What is this authority of Jesus, this new thing that astounded the people?
How is it different from the manner of speaking and teaching of the legal experts?”
And the answer is definitive.
“This authority” is the unique and special identity of Jesus”.
Indeed, “Jesus was not a common preacher.
He did not teach the law like all the others.
He taught in a different way, in a new way, because he had the strength of the Holy Spirit.”
In the liturgy on the previous day, we read that passage in which Jesus presents himself, visits his synagogue and he speaks of himself in the words of the Prophet Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me” and “he has sent me to proclaim”.
This, too, confirms that “the authority which Jesus has comes precisely from this special anointing of the Holy Spirit: Jesus is anointed, the first Anointed One, the true Anointed One”.
And “this anointing gives authority to Jesus”.
“The very identity of Jesus is the Anointed Being”.
He is “the Son of God, anointed and sent, sent to bring salvation and freedom”.
Thus “this anointing and sending is the identity of Jesus, and because of it the people said:
‘This man has special authority, which the legal experts who teach us do not have’.
But some are scandalized by this manner of Jesus, this style of Jesus”.
The liberty, the freedom of Jesus is the very anointing of the Holy Spirit”.
So we can ask ourselves what is our identity as Christians!
In the First Letter to the Corinthians (2:10-16),
St Paul explains that “we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom”.
In this regard, Paul’s preaching does not emanate from “human wisdom”,
because the Holy Spirit taught him his words.
Paul preached with the anointing of the Spirit, expressing spiritual matters of the Spirit in spiritual terms”.
Using the very expressions of St Paul in the first reading:
“The unspiritual man does not receive the gifts of the Spirit of God, …
and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned”.
In other words, if we, Christians, do not understand the gifts of the Spirit, then we do not bear witness or offer testimony. We will not have an identity.”After all, “these gifts of the spirit” seem like “folly”, to those who lack identity, who are not able to understand them”.
Referring again to St Paul’s letter “the spiritual man judges all things but is himself to be judged by no one”.
Indeed, who has known the mind of the Lord?
But now we have the mind of Christ, that is, the Spirit of Christ”.
And “this is the Christian identity.
Ultimately, “what gives authority, what gives identity is the Holy Spirit, the anointing of the Holy Spirit”. This is why people don’t love those preachers, those legal experts.
Because they spoke truthfully about theology, but they didn’t reach the heart.
They didn’t give freedom.
They weren’t capable of doing so in a manner the people identified with, because they were not anointed by the Holy Spirit”.
However, “the authority of Jesus — and the authority of the Christian — comes from this very capacity to understand the gifts of the Spirit, to speak the language of the Spirit; it comes from this anointing of the Holy Spirit”.
We must pray to the Lord to give us “the Christian identity which You have:
“give us your Spirit; give us your way of thinking, of feeling, of speaking: that is, Lord grant us the anointing of the Holy Spirit”.