John Henry Newman: The Holy Spirit is a Spring of Health and Salvation Sunday, May 19 2013

The Holy Ghost…dwells in body and soul, as in a temple.

[...]  He is able to search into all our thoughts, and penetrate into every motive of the heart.

Therefore, He pervades us…as light pervades a building, or as a sweet perfume the folds of some honourable robe; so that, in Scripture language, we are said to be in Him, and He in us.

It is plain that such an inhabitation brings the Christian into a state altogether new and marvellous, far above the possession of mere gifts, exalts him inconceivably in the scale of beings, and gives him a place and an office which he had not before.

In St. Peter’s forcible language, he becomes “partaker of the Divine Nature,” and has “power” or authority, as St. John says, “to become the son of God.”

Or, to use the words of St. Paul, “he is a new creation; old things are passed away, behold all things are become new.”

[...]  This wonderful change from darkness to light, through the entrance of the Spirit into the soul, is called Regeneration, or the New Birth; a blessing which, before Christ’s coming, not even Prophets and righteous men possessed, but which is now conveyed to all men freely through the Sacrament of Baptism.

By…the coming of the Holy Ghost, all guilt and pollution are burned away as by fire, the devil is driven forth, sin…is forgiven, and the whole man is consecrated to God.

And this is the reason why He is called “the earnest” of that Saviour who died for us, and will one day give us the fulness of His own presence in heaven.

Hence, too, He is our “seal unto the day of redemption;” for as the potter moulds the clay, so He impresses the Divine image on us members of the household of God.

And His work may truly be called Regeneration; for though the original nature of the soul is not destroyed, yet its past transgressions are pardoned once and for ever, and its source of evil staunched and gradually dried up by the pervading health and purity which has set up its abode in it.

Instead of its own bitter waters, a spring of health and salvation is brought within it; not the mere streams of that fountain, “clear as crystal,” which is before the Throne of God , but, as our Lord says, “a well of water in him,” in a man’s heart, “springing up into everlasting life.”

Hence He elsewhere describes the heart as giving forth, not receiving, the streams of grace: “Out of his belly shall flow rivers of Living Water.” St. John adds, “this spake He of the Spirit” (John 4:14; 7:38, 39).

John Henry Cardinal Newman (1801-1890): Parochial and Plain Sermons, vol. 2, Sermon 19, The Indwelling Spirit.

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Leo the Great: The Holy Spirit Came to Enkindle to a Greater Heat and Fill with Larger Abundance the Hearts Dedicated to Him Friday, May 17 2013

The Lord Jesus had promised that the Holy Spirit should come, not then for the first time to be the Indweller of the saints, but to kindle to a greater heat, and to fill with larger abundance the hearts that were dedicated to Him, increasing, not commencing His gifts, not fresh in operation because richer in bounty.

For the Majesty of the Holy Ghost is never separate from the Omnipotence of the Father and the Son, and whatever the Divine government accomplishes in the ordering of all things, proceeds from the Providence of the whole Trinity.

Therein exists unity of mercy and loving-kindness, unity of judgment and justice:  nor is there any division in action where there is no divergence of will.  What, therefore, the Father enlightens, the Son enlightens, and the Holy Ghost enlightens, and…both the Unity and the Trinity are at the same time revealed to us….

The fact, therefore, that, with the co-operation of the inseparable Godhead still perfect, certain things are performed by the Father, certain by the Son, and certain by the Holy Spirit, in particular belongs to the ordering of our Redemption and the method of our salvation.

For if man, made after the image and likeness of God, had retained the dignity of his own nature, and had not been deceived by the devil’s wiles into transgressing through lust the law laid down for him, the Creator of the world would not have become a Creature, the Eternal would not have entered the sphere of time, nor God the Son, Who is equal with God the Father, have assumed the form of a slave and the likeness of sinful flesh.

But because “by the devil’s malice death entered into the world,” and captive humanity could not otherwise be set free without His undertaking our cause, Who without loss of His majesty should both become true Man, and alone have no taint of sin, the mercy of the Trinity divided for Itself the work of our restoration in such a way that the Father should be reconciled, the Son should reconcile, and the Holy Ghost enkindle.

For it was necessary that those who are to be saved should also do something on their part, and by the turning of their hearts to the Redeemer should quit the dominion of the enemy, even as the Apostle says, “God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying Abba, Father,” “And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty,” and “no one can call Jesus Lord except in the Holy Spirit.”

Leo the Great (c.400-461): Sermon 77, 1-2.

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Dorotheus of Gaza: “He Led Captivity Captive” Sunday, May 5 2013

The power of the mystery of the death of Christ is this…: we through sin have lost in ourselves the image of God and therefore through the fall and sin have become mortal, as the Apostle has said (Eph. 2:1).

Therefore God Who created us in His Image, having had mercy on us, on His own creation and His own image, for our sake became man, and suffered death for all so as to raise us who have been killed into the life which we lost on account of our disobedience.

For He ascended on the Holy Cross and crucified sin – the sin for which we were banished from Paradise – and led captivity captive as it says in the Scripture (Ps. 67:18; Eph. 4:8).

What does this mean: “led captivity captive?” This means that after the transgression of Adam the enemy took us captive and held us in his power so that human souls which departed from the body went to hell, for Paradise was closed.

But when Christ ascended on the heights of the Holy and Life-giving Cross, then by His own Blood He delivered us from the captivity by which the enemy had taken us for our transgression.

That is, He snatched us from the hands of the enemy, and so to speak, recaptured us, conquering and overthrowing the one who had taken us captive. Wherefore it says in the Scripture that He “led captivity captive.”

Such is the power of the mystery; Christ died for us so that, as the Saint said, He might raise us up into life who have been killed.

And thus we have been delivered from hell by Christ’s love of mankind, and it is up to us whether we go to Paradise, for the enemy no longer compels us as he did before and does not keep us in slavery.

Only let us take care for ourselves O brethren, and preserve ourselves from sin in very deed. For many times before I have said to you that every sin which is fulfilled in deed again enslaves us to the enemy, inasmuch as we voluntarily throw ourselves down and enslave ourselves to him.

Is this not a shame and is this not a great misfortune if, after Christ has delivered us from hell by His own Blood and after we have heard all this, we should again go and throw ourselves into hell? Are we not in this case deserving of yet greater and more powerful torture?

May the Lover of mankind, God, have mercy on us and grant us heedfulness, so that we might understand all this and profit by it, that we might obtain at least a small portion of God’s mercy.

Dorotheos of Gaza (505-565 or 620: Conference 21 – An Explanation of Certain Expressions of St Gregory the Theologian which are Sung together with the Troparia on Holy Pascha @ Pravoslavie.

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Cyril of Alexandria: “I Am in My Father, and You in Me, and I in You” Wednesday, May 1 2013

In that day ye shall know that I am in My Father, and ye in Me, and I in you (John 14:20).

After the creature [man]…had attained unto the propriety of its perfect nature by means of both soul and body…, then like a stamp of His own Nature the Creator impressed on it the Holy Spirit – the Breath of Life.

Thus the creature became moulded unto the archetypal Beauty, and completed after the image of Him that created it, enabled unto every form of excellence, by virtue of the Spirit given to dwell in it.

Having free will, and entrusted with the reins of its own purposes – for this also is an element in the image, forasmuch as God has power over His own purposes – the creature turned and has fallen.

God the Father both determined and took in hand to gather together once more in Christ the nature of man unto its ancient estate, and, willing it, He accomplished it.

[...] It was not otherwise possible for man, forasmuch as he was of a nature that was perishing, to escape death, save by recovering that ancient grace, and partaking once more in God.

For God holds all things together in being and preserves them in life through the Son in the Spirit.

Therefore He has become partaker of blood and flesh. He has become man, being by nature Life, and begotten of the Life that is by nature, of God the Father.

He is the Father’s Only-begotten Word, Who became man in order that, uniting Himself with the flesh that by the law of its own nature was perishing, He might bring it back unto His own Life and make it through Himself partaker of God the Father.

For He is Mediator between God and men, according as it is written, knit unto God the Father naturally as God and of Him, and again unto men as man; and withal having in Himself the Father and being Himself in the Father.

For He is the impress and effulgence of His Person, and not distinct from the Essence, whereof He is impress and wherefrom He proceeds as effulgence.

[...] And He wears our nature, remoulding it unto His own Life. And He is also Himself in us; for we have all been made partakers of Him, and have Him in ourselves through the Spirit.

Thus we have Both, being made partakers of the Divine Nature, and are entitled sons, in this way having in us also the Father Himself through the Son.

And Paul will testify hereof where he says: Because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. 

Cyril of Alexandria (c. 376-444): Commentary on St John’s Gospel, book 9 [on John 14:20].

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Benedict XVI: “He is the Image of the Invisible God” Friday, Apr 26 2013

(On Colossians 1:15-20)

The Greek term eikon, “icon”, is dear to the Apostle: in his Letters he uses it nine times, applying it both to Christ, the perfect icon of God (cf. II Cor 4:4), and to man, the image and glory of God (cf. I Cor 11:7).

However, by sin, men and women “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images representing mortal man” (Rom 1: 23), choosing to worship idols and become like them.

We must therefore continuously model our being and life on the image of that of the Son of God (cf. II Cor 3:18), so that we may be “delivered…from the dominion of darkness” and “transferred… to the Kingdom of his beloved Son” (Col 1: 13).

This is a first imperative in this hymn: to model our life on the image of the Son of God, entering into his sentiments, his will and his thoughts.

Christ is then proclaimed the “firstborn” of “all creation” (v. 15). Christ is before all things (cf. v. 17) because he has been begotten since eternity, for “all things were created through him and for him” (v. 16). The ancient Jewish tradition also says that “the whole world was created in view of the Messiah” (Sanhedrin, 98b).

For the Apostle, Christ is the principle of coherence (“in him all things hold together”), the mediator (“through him”) and the final destination toward which the whole of creation converges.

He is the “firstborn of many brothers” (Rom 8: 29), that is, the Son par excellence in the great family of God’s children, into which we are incorporated by Baptism.

At this point, our gaze turns from the world of creation to that of history. Christ is “the Head of the Body, the Church” (Col 1: 18); he already became this through his Incarnation.

Indeed, he entered the human community to support it and make it into a “body”, that is, in harmonious and fruitful unity. Christ is the root, the vital pivot and “the beginning” of the coherence and growth of humanity.

Precisely with this primacy Christ can become the principle of the resurrection of all, the “firstborn from the dead”, so that “in Christ all will come to life again”: first Christ, the first fruits; then, at his coming, all those who belong to Christ (cf. I Cor 15:22-23).

The Canticle draws to a close celebrating the “fullness”, in Greek pleroma, which Christ possesses in himself as a gift of love of the Father. It is the fullness of divinity that shines out, both in the universe and in humanity, becoming a source of peace, unity and perfect harmony (Col 1: 19-20).

[...] By pouring out his Blood and giving himself, Christ has spread peace, which in biblical language is a synthesis of the Messianic goods and saving fullness extended to the whole of created reality.

Benedict XVI (b. 1927): Commentary on the Psalms and Canticles of Vespers (General Audience, 7th September 2005).

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Athanasius of Alexandria: We are Renewed in the Holy Spirit Tuesday, Apr 23 2013

St Paul says… ‘I myself with the mind serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin. There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin.’

[...] This God promised by Ezekiel, saying: ‘A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you; and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh, and I will put my Spirit within you.’

When has this been fulfilled, save when the Lord came and renewed all things by grace? … Our spirit is renewed; but the Holy Spirit is not simply spirit, but God says it is his Spirit, whereby ours is renewed.

As the Psalmist says in Psalm 103: ‘Thou shalt take away their spirit, and they shall die and return to their dust. Thou shalt put forth thy Spirit, and they shall be created, and thou shalt renew the face of the earth.’

But if it is by the Spirit of God that we are renewed, then the spirit here said to be created is not the Holy Spirit but our spirit…; the Holy Spirit is not created, but…it is our spirit which is renewed in him.

Of this spirit David also prayed in the Psalm: ‘Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.’ Here he is said to create it, but aforetime, as Zechariah says, he formed it: ‘Stretching forth the heavens and laying the foundations of the earth, and forming the spirit of man within him.’

For when that which he formed aforetime had fallen he remade it, coming himself in the creature, when the Word became flesh; so that, in the words of the Apostle, ‘He might create in himself of the twain one new man, who after God had been created in righteousness and holiness of truth’.

For it was not as if another man had been created, other than he who from the beginning was made in God’s image.

But he was counselling them to receive the mind that was remade and renewed in Christ; as is once more made clear through Ezekiel, when he says: ‘Make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. For why will ye die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dieth, saith the Lord God.’

Athanasius of Alexandria (c.293-373): Letters to Serapion, 1.8-9.

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Anselm of Canterbury: With an Unwearying Love Thou Shouldst be Mindful of God Monday, Apr 22 2013

Awake, my soul, awake! show thy spirit, arouse thy senses, shake off the sluggishness of that deadly heaviness that is upon thee, begin to take care for thy salvation.

Let the idleness of vain imaginations be put to flight, let go of sloth, hold fast to diligence.

Be instant in holy meditations, cleave to the good things which are of God: leaving that which is temporal, give heed to that which is eternal.

Now in this godly employment of thy mind, to what canst thou turn thy thoughts more wholesomely and profitably than to the sweet contemplations of thy Creator’s immeasurable benefits toward thee.

Consider therefore the greatness and dignity that He bestowed upon thee at the beginning of thy creation; and judge for thyself with what love and reverence He ought to be worshipped.

For when, as He was creating and ordering the whole world of things visible and invisible, He had determined to create the nature of man, He took high counsel concerning the dignity of thy condition, forasmuch as He determined to honour thee more highly than all other creatures that are in the world.

Behold therefore to what greatness thou wast created, and again consider what manner of love thou oughtest to render therefore.

Let Us make man, saith God, in Our image, after Our likeness.

If thou art not aroused by this word of thy Creator, if thou art not at so unspeakable a goodness of condescension in Him towards thee, set all on fire of love towards Him, if thy whole heart is not inflamed with longing after Him, what shall I say? Shall I count thee asleep, or rather dead?

[...] God if, considering that He is good, we study to be good; if, knowing that He is righteous, we endeavour to be righteous; if, beholding His mercy, we give ourselves to mercy.

But how can we be in His image. Hearken. God is mindful of Himself, understandeth Himself, loveth Himself.

And thou too, if thou after thy measure art mindful of God, understandest God, lovest God, then wilt thou be in His image; for thou wilt be striving to do that which God ever doth.

Man ought to make this the end of all his life, to be mindful of the Chief Good, to understand it and to love it; to this should every thought, every motion of the heart be bent, be whetted, be conformed:

that with an unwearying love thou shouldst be mindful of God, understand God, love God, and so for thy health set forth the dignity of thy creation, wherein thou wast created after the image of God.

Anselm of Canterbury (1033-1109): Meditations, 1,1. 

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Macarius the Egyptian: One who Wishes to be a Partaker of the Divine Glory Must Seek the Help which Comes Mightily from God Friday, Apr 12 2013

Those upon whom the divine law is written, not with ink and letters, but implanted in hearts of flesh, these, having the eyes of their mind enlightened, and reaching after a hope, not tangible and seen, but invisible and immaterial, have power to get the better of the stumbling- blocks of the evil one, not by themselves, but from the power that never can be defeated.

But those who have not been honoured with God’s word, nor instructed by divine law…fancy that by their own free will they can bring to nought the resources of sin, which is only condemned through the mystery contained in the Cross.

It lies in the power of man’s free will to resist the devil, but it does not extend to an absolute command over the passions. Except the Lord build the house…and keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain, and the builder laboureth in vain (Ps. 126:1).

You cannot go upon the asp and basilisk and tread under your feet the lion and the dragon [cf Ps. 90:13] without first purging yourself as far as human ability goes, and being strengthened by Him who said to the apostles, Behold, I have given you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and upon all the power of the enemy.

If human nature had had force, without the whole armour of the Holy Ghost, to stand against the wiles of the devil, St Paul would not have said, The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly, and again, Whom the Lord shall destroy with the Spirit of His mouth.

That is why we are bidden of the Lord to pray, Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. If we are not delivered by the superior power from the fiery darts of the wicked one and admitted to the adoption of sons, our social existence is in vain; we are far from the power of God.

Accordingly, one who wishes to be a partaker of the divine glory, and to see as in a glass the form of Christ in the ruling faculty of his own soul, ought with insatiable affection and an inclination which is never filled, with all his heart and all his might, by night and when it is day, to seek the help which comes mightily from God.

Of this help, as I have said before, it is impossible to partake, unless a man first abstains from the luxury of the world, from the desires of the opposing power, which is alien to the light, and is an activity of wickedness with no kinship to a good activity, but wholly estranged from it.

Macarius the Egyptian (c. 300-391) [attributed]; Fifty Spiritual Homilies, 27,1-3, trans. by A.J. Mason DD.

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Gregory Nazianzen: Yesterday I was Crucified with Him; Today I am Glorified with Him Monday, Apr 1 2013

Yesterday the Lamb was slain and the door-posts were anointed, and Egypt bewailed her Firstborn, and the Destroyer passed us over, and the Seal was dreadful and reverend, and we were walled in with the Precious Blood.

To-day we have clean escaped from Egypt and from Pharaoh; and there is none to hinder us from keeping a Feast to the Lord our God—the Feast of our Departure; or from celebrating that Feast, not in the old leaven of malice and wickedness, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, carrying with us nothing of ungodly and Egyptian leaven.

Yesterday I was crucified with Him; today I am glorified with Him; yesterday I died with Him; to-day I am quickened with Him; yesterday I was buried with Him; to-day I rise with Him.

But let us offer to Him Who suffered and rose again for us—you will think perhaps that I am going to say gold, or silver, or woven work or transparent and costly stones, the mere passing material of earth, that remains here below, and is for the most part always possessed by bad men, slaves of the world and of the Prince of the world.

Let us offer ourselves, the possession most precious to God, and most fitting; let us give back to the Image what is made after the Image.  Let us recognize our Dignity; let us honour our Archetype; let us know the power of the Mystery, and for what Christ died.

Let us become like Christ, since Christ became like us.  Let us become God’s for His sake, since He for ours became Man.

He assumed the worse that He might give us the better; He became poor that we through His poverty might be rich; He took upon Him the form of a servant that we might receive back our liberty;

He came down that we might be exalted; He was tempted that we might conquer; He was dishonoured that He might glorify us; He died that He might save us; He ascended that He might draw to Himself us, who were lying low in the Fall of sin.

Let us give all, offer all, to Him Who gave Himself a Ransom and a Reconciliation for us.  But one can give nothing like oneself, understanding the Mystery, and becoming for His sake all that He became for ours.

Gregory Nazianzen (c.330-390): Oration 1, 3-5.

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Dorotheus of Gaza: The Sickness of Sin and the Healing of God Friday, Feb 15 2013

In the beginning when God created man he set him in paradise, as the divine holy scripture says (Gen 2:25), adorned with every virtue, and gave him a command not to eat of the tree in the middle of paradise (Gen 2:16-17).

He was provided for in paradise, in prayer and contemplation in the midst of honor and glory; healthy in his emotions and sense perceptions, and perfect in his nature as he was created.

For, to the likeness of God did God make man (Gen 1:27); that is, immortal, having the power to act freely, and adorned with all the virtues.

When he disobeyed the command and ate of the tree that God commanded him not to eat of, he was thrown out of paradise and fell from a state in accord with his nature to a state contrary to nature: i.e. a prey to sin, to ambition, to a love of the pleasures of this life and the other passions; and he was mastered by them, and became a slave to them through his transgression.

Then little by little evil increased and death reigned (Rom 5:14). There was no more piety, and everywhere was ignorance of God.

[...] Then God in his goodness had mercy on his creatures and gave Moses a written law…as a help, for their conversion, for putting right what was evil, but they did not reform. He sent the prophets, but they were able to do nothing.

For evil prevailed as said Isaiah, “no injury, no bruise, no wound was cauterized; no chance of soothing dressings; no oil, no bandaging of wounds” (Is 16), as much as to say that the evil was not in one member, or in one place, but in the whole body.

It took in the whole soul and all its powers. Everything was a slave to sin, everything was under the control of sin. As Jeremiah said, “We would heal Babylon but she would not be healed” (Jer 28:9). That is to say, we have revealed your [God’s] name, we have announced your commandments, your benefits and your warnings.

[...] All the same she is not healed; she has not been converted, she has not feared, she has not turned from her wickedness. In another place he says, “they have not submitted to discipline” (Jer 2:30), that is, correction and instruction. And in the psalm it says, “their soul abhors all nourishment and has come near to the gates of death” (Ps 107:18).

Then at last the good, man-loving God sends his only begotten Son. It was for God alone to heal and prevail against such miseries.

Dorotheos of Gaza (505-565 or 620: Conference on Renunciation @ Fr Luke Dysinger, OSB.

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