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Dear Parish Faithful & Friends,
We continue in the (fast-free) Week of Pentecost, liturgically and personally enjoying an awareness of the Holy Spirit in the Church and in our lives.
The Holy Spirit is the other Parakletos (Advocate/Comforter) that Jesus spoke of as recorded in the Gospel According to St. John:
"And I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever - the Spirit of truth ... " (JN. 14:16-17)
"But when the Comforter comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify to me." (JN. 15:26)
"However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth ... " (JN. 16:13)
The Risen Lord sends the Spirit, and it is the Spirit who makes Christ present to us. As Fr. Lev Gillett wrote: "The Spirit is sent to us by the Son, the Son is revealed to us by the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not a substitute for Christ, but prepares us for Christ, forms him in us, makes him present in us."
It is precisely here that we are so aware of the reciprocal work of the Son and the Holy Spirit - the "two hands of God" according to St. Irenaeus of Lyons. On the Day of Pentecost, we liturgically actualized the experience of receiving the Holy Spirit as did the apostles on the fiftieth day after the Resurrection. Then, following the Liturgy, during the Vespers of Pentecost, we "bent the knee" for the first time since Pascha, as we offered special and theologically-rich prayers to the Holy Spirit, seeking His abiding, healing, and transforming presence among us.
