Day 102: The Holy Spirit’s Mission (721-730)

• It’s Day 102!!

• Paragraphs 721-726 are ALL ABOUT MARY!!

• We have been following the working of the Holy Spirit in the Economy of Salvation

• We are going to talk about the working of the Holy Spirit with regard to the Blessed Virgin Mary

• Then we will talk about Jesus in Paragraphs 727-731

• How does the Holy Spirit interact with Our Lady

• How do Jesus and the Holy Spirit…

• (Squirrel!! 😉)

• Fr. Mike is going off on a story here that I’m not going to type out…just listen 😉

• OOH WAIT!!! He’s talking about BATMAN AND SUPERMAN TEAMING UP!! 

• COOL!!!

• Ok this is not the same as that…

• IT’S BETTER!!

• Paragraph 727 says, “The entire mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit, in the fullness of time, is contained in this: that the Son is the one anointed by the Father’s Spirit since his Incarnation-Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah. Everything in the second chapter of the Creed is to be read in this light. Christ’s whole work is in fact a joint mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit.”

• Have you ever thought about that?

• It’s a critical paragraph

• You might think we covered that already

• We kinda did

• BUT…

• The Catechism is underscoring and highlighting that Christ’s WHOLE WORK is a JOINT MISSION of the Son and the Holy Spirit

• Paragraph 727 continues, “Here, we shall mention only what has to do with Jesus’ promise of the Holy Spirit and the gift of him by the glorified Lord.”

• There are other ways the Son and the Holy Spirit have worked together

• When you have an Eternal God there are many many ways in which they have interacted with this world

• We are specifically going to mention only what has to do with Jesus’ Promise of the Holy Spirit and the Gift of the Holy Spirit by the Glorified Lord

• The first 6 paragraphs are about Mary and how the Holy Spirit prepared a dwelling place for the Son

• Then we will talk about how the Holy Spirit prepared Mary herself by His Grace

• THIS IS THE DOGMA OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION!!

• Ahead of time, the Holy Spirit prepared Mary at the MOMENT OF HER CONCEPTION

• We will also talk about how the Holy Spirit FULFILLS GOD’S PLAN OF LOVING GOODNESS in Mary

• We will also talk about how the Holy Spirit MANIFESTS IN MARY the Son of the Father bringing Him into the world

• We will also talk about how through Mary the Holy Spirit brings to human beings the object of God’s merciful love into communion with Christ

• THIS IS INCREDIBLE!!

• So…

• The Holy Spirit prepares a dwelling place in Mary

• The Holy Spirit prepares Mary 

• The Holy Spirit fulfills God’s plan through Mary

• The Holy Spirit manifests the Son through Mary

• The Holy Spirit brings us into communion with Jesus through Mary

• It’s a little big exciting

• As we are getting further and further into this teaching of how the Holy Spirit has been working 

• Here Fr. Mike is recapping what we read a couple of days ago…not going to write it down

• And now Fr. Mike is recapping what he’s told us so far today etc.

• So let’s say a prayer and ask that same Holy Spirit that prepared Mary etc….

Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven, in the name of your Son Jesus Christ we ask you to please hear our prayer, receive our prayer, and send your Holy Spirit upon our lives, into our lives right now. Send your Holy Spirit to illumine our minds so that we can see clearly. Send your Holy Spirit to inflame our hearts, so that we can love in truth and we can love in spirit, that we can worship you in truth, that we can worship you in spirit. We make this prayer in the mighty name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen”

• There we have it!!

• Here is the remarkable way in which the Holy Spirit was preparing the Prophets

• Here is Isaiah writing about Jesus

• Here is the Holy Spirit preparing John the Baptist as the PRECURSOR, PROPHET, BAPTIST

• AND YET…

• Here is Mary

• The Spouse of the Holy Spirit

• And the way the Holy Spirit interacted with humanity in the person of Mary

• THIS IS REMARKABLE!!

• Paragraph 722 says, “The Holy Spirit prepared Mary by his grace…”

• (SQUIRREL!! 😉)

• We believe that Mary was conceived WITHOUT ORIGINAL SIN

• By the merits of her Son’s Life, Death, and Resurrection Mary was PRESERVED FROM ALL STAIN OF ORIGINAL SIN

• Paragraph 722 continues, “It was fitting that the mother of him in whom ‘the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily’ should herself be ‘full of grace.’”

• Mary is the NEW EVE

• Remember the old Eve without sin and the old Adam without sin?

• The devil spoke words to her, the woman without sin, that caused her to disbelieve and disobey

•  She hands on the disbelief and disobedience to the man who hands it on to the whole world

• In the New Covenant Jesus is the NEW ADAM

• AND YET…

• We also have an angel announcing

• We also have a WOMAN

• The New Adam, Jesus, is without sin

• And since the First Adam and First Eve were at first without sin…

• It is FITTING that Mary, the New Eve, would also be without sin

• Is it NECESSARY that Mary be without sin?

• Who knows?

• BUT…

• The Church says IT IS FITTING

• IT MAKES SENSE!!

• Paragraph 722 continues, “She was, by sheer grace, conceived without sin as the most humble of creatures, the most capable of welcoming the inexpressible gift of the Almighty.”

• THIS IS SO IMPORTANT!!

• Sometimes people think we are elevating Mary to a place that is beyond needing God

• THAT IS NOT TRUE!!

• IT IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE!!

• BY THE COMPLETE GIFT OF GOD SHE WAS CONCEIVED WITHOUT SIN!!

• GRACE is the MERCY that we DO NOT DESERVE

• GRACE is the LOVE that we DO NOT DESERVE

• GRACE is the GIFT that we NEVER DESERVE

• The Catechism makes it ABSOLUTELY CLEAR

• Before she even existed she had done NOTHING to merit her existence nor to merit God’s particular favor

• IT IS REMARKABLE!!

• The more GRACE God gives to a person, the more HUMBLE they are called to be

• Why?

• Humility is NOT thinking less of oneself

• It’s not thinking, “I’m no good. I’m superbad. Aw shucks, I’m nothing.”

• Humility is THINKING OF ONESELF LESS

• It’s not being preoccupied with one’s own virtue, beauty, gits, or self

• It is recognizing that EVERYTHING IN MY LIFE HAS BEEN GIVEN TO ME

• EVERYTHING IN MY LIFE IS A GIFT

• The proud person has NO ONE TO THANK

• The proud person are “self sufficient”

• The humble person is ALWAYS THANKFUL

• The humble person is ALWAYS REJOICING

• The humble person is ALWAYS GIVING GLORY TO GOD

• Because they realize that EVERYTHING THEY HAVE COMES FROM THE LORD

• So Mary is more capable than ANYONE to welcome the inexpressible gift of God

• The inexpressible gift of Christ in her womb

• The inexpressible gift of Jesus in this world

• Why?

• Because as the most HUMBLE she is the most GRATEFUL and the most THANKFUL

• The last 4 paragraphs talk about Jesus and the Spirit

• So as the Holy Spirit prepared and worked through Mary in all these ways…

• This massive and important reality is in Paragraph 727, “The entire mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit, in the fullness of time, is contained in this: that the Son is the one anointed by the Father’s Spirit since his Incarnation-Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah.”

• Christ’s whole work is in fact a JOINT MISSION of the Son and the Holy Spirit

• We can see this all the way through the Gospels

• Paragraphs 728-730 are about all the ways Jesus is giving hints about the Holy Spirit’s work and then fully revealing the fact that the Holy Spirit is promised to the disciples and the Church

• Paragraph 730 says, “At last Jesus’ hour arrives: he commends his spirit into the Father’s hands at the very moment when by his death he conquers death, so that, ‘raised from the dead by the glory of the Father,’ he might immediately give the Holy Spirit by ‘breathing’ on his disciples.”

• Keep this in mind…

• All through the Gospels we have HINTS of the Holy Spirit

• At the end of the Gospels we have the PROMISE of the Holy Spirit

• At the very end we have the GIVING of the Holy Spirit

• HINTS

• PROMISES

• GIVING

• OF THE HOLY SPIRIT!!

• Paragraph 730 continues, “From this hour onward, the mission of Christ and the Spirit becomes the mission of the Church.”

• THIS IS SO HUGE!!

• God SHARES with us now

• He has now ENTRUSTED TO US, in the power of the Holy Spirit, His mission

• “Oh my goodness! Lord, Jesus, while you were on this earth your mission was to redeem to the world. Your mission was to glorify the Father. Your mission was all these things to bring all those scattered people of Israel and all the scattered of the world, and all the Gentiles into ONE.”

• Now that mission is the mission of the Church

• We will talk about that for a number of days

• What is it?

• People will discount the Church

• “Well, did Jesus say it? Or did the Church say it? Was that in the Bible? Or is it something the Church teaches?”

• With Pentecost, Jesus Christ has shared HIS ENTIRE MISSION and the Holy Spirit’s ENTIRE MISSION with the Church

• Right now you and I are PART OF THAT MISSION

• WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY PHENOMENAL!!

• To be part of this mission WE NEED THE HOLY SPIRIT’S HELP

• Without Him we can do NOTHING

• Without Jesus we can do NOTHING

• SO WE NEED TO PRAY!!

• Fr. Mike is praying FOR YOU!!

• Please pray for Fr. Mike and for each other!!

• I cannot WAIT to see you tomorrow!!