Acquiring the Holy Spirit

By Most Rev. John J. Lehman, S.S.B.


Those of us who remember carrying out Pope John XXIII's request
prior to the Vatican II Council in the 1960's, namely, to pray for
a new Pentecost, are seeing our prayers answered. However, to
understand this best, the necessity is to harken back first to
Sacred Scripture the better to interpret what is happening today.
Second, to others' experiences of that reality.  Third to ask God
for a guide so we don't fall into unreality.

Elijah, the prophet, is an excellent starting point.  Beginning in
1 Kings, Chapter 18 Verse 20 (of the New Revised Standard Version),
the sacred authors recount how Elijah pitted himself against four
hundred and fifty prophets of the false god, Baal.  The prophets
were challenged to sacrifice a bull, place it on an altar, call
upon Baal to send down fire to consume the offering.  From morning
till noon the prophets cried to their false god, even cutting
themselves with swords and lances until "the blood gushed out over
them." This went on until the time for the afternoon sacrifice.

Then Elijah began.  First, he repaired the Altar of the True God
that had been thrown down.  He built an altar anew, dug a trench
around it, put wood on the altar, placed the cut up pieces of a
bull upon it.  He then had the people pour water upon it four
successive times soaking the offering, the wood, the altar and
filling even the trench surrounding the whole.

Elijah prayed, "O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" answer n-e
so that these people will know you, O Lord, our God, and that I am
your servant.  The fire of the Lord came down, consumed the stone
altar, as well as the bull offering even the water in the trench.
All at the command of the Prophet Elijah!  The people seized all
the false prophets of Baal and they were killed.

When Jezebel, King Ahab's wife, heard of it - they were her
prophets - she sent a message to Elijah that she was going to kill
the upstart prophet.  So he hurried to the safety of the mountains.
Sleeping after a day's journey under a broom tree, an angel came,
awakened him and fed him a cake and water.  This happened a second
time and he went in the strength of this food forty days and forty
nights to Mount Horeb, "the mount of God." There he came to a cave.

Now comes the crucial part.  The word of the Lord came-- to Elijah
"Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is
about to pass by." A great wind came so strong it was splitting the
mountain and rending the rocks in pieces, but the Lord God was not
in the wind.  After the terrifying wind an earthquake, but the Lord
God was not in the earthquake.  Then a great fire, but the Lord God
was not in the fire.  And after the fire a wee soft voice came to
Elijah. (Remember this small voice.)

Centuries later we read in the Acts of the Apostles, Chapter Two
Verses One and following.  "When the Day of Pentecost came, they
were all together in one place.  And suddenly from heaven there
came a sound like the rush of a violent wind, and it filled the
entire house where they were sitting" (we can presume it shook the
house).  Divided tongues as of fire from a central tongue, appeared
among them, and rested on each.  They were all filled with the Holy
Spirit and began to speak in foreign tongues as the Holy Spirit
gave them the ability.

Nineteen hundred and some years later a relatively young priest
recounted this revelation.  "I was on an island where fifteen years
previously I taught Indian children catechism: I was there to make
an eight-day retreat at a Jesuit Church.  The tiny house for the
priest was in the middle of a field about forty yards from the
small wooden church.  Prayers were finished for the day.  As I
stood up the house began to shake.  I thought first it was I that
was shaky because my knees were getting rather loose and rubbery. A
moment later it came to me that it was really the house all
atremble.  I hurried to the bedroom and plopped full length on the
bed, thinking if I don't get on this bed I'm going to fall right on
my tail bone.  Then came this strong driving wind.  The window was
partially open from the top.  The blind at the window blew level
with the ceiling and I could see an intense white light.  It felt
like my soul was going to leave my body, and I remember thinking if
God wanted to take me in death then and there I could readily and
gladly submit to His will. Suddenly when all was still, a wee small
voice came to me from the area of my heart. It said, 'I love you.'"

"For the next year whenever the wind blew, the hair on the back of
my head would feel like it was standing up," said the priest.
Years later he finally figured out he had met the Holy Spirit in a
very unusual and wonderful way.  He was told by an inner voice to
read "the Epistle of Paul to the Romans, Chapter Eight, to explore
what all this meant.

The Apostles, even though taught by Jesus himself, had to learn
through the Spirit.  Peter, in the Acts of Apostles Chapter Ten had
to learn from a three-fold vision that God does not distinguish
between Jew and Gentile.  Awaiting dinner, he sent atop a tanner's
house,, a man named Simon, who lived by the seaside, to say his
prayers.  He went into ecstasy.  He saw the heavens open and
something like a large sheet came down, lowered by the four
corners.  Looking he saw all kinds of creatures, reptiles and
birds.  "Get up Peter kill and eat," said a voice.  "Not me Lord,"
said Peter, "I have never eaten anything impure." The warning voice
said, "What God has made clean, you must not call unclean." This
happened not once but three times.  God was preparing Peter to go
to the Gentiles.  Every good practicing Jew thought only he was
loved by God - Jews were not to be contaminated by associating or
even visiting with a Gentile, a pagan or heathen at best.

Peter was puzzling over these events when Cornelius' three men were
calling for Simon Peter.  The Holy Spirit said to Peter that he was
to go with them to Caesarea, to the home of Cornelius, a non-Jew
Roman Centurian.  He recounted an angel's appearance to him and the
Angels command to send for Peter.

As Peter, probably dumfounded, spoke to the assembled, friends of
Cornelius, about Jesus of Nazareth, his anointing by the Holy
Spirit, his miracles, his death and resurrection, the Holy Spirit
fell upon all who heard this word of God.  Astounded that the gift
of the Holy Spirit "had been poured out even on the Gentiles,"
(Verse 45), Peter ordered them to be Baptized.

Carefully contemplating the above experiences, both in Scripture
and other - divine favors to humans, we all must conclude we have
unknowingly restricted much of the action of the Holy Spirit to the
Sacrament of Confirmation.  As if in this day and age much of the
workings of the Holy Spirit are restricted to the outpourings at
the time of the conferring of the Sacrament only.  There are even
those who say it happened at the time of the Apostles in the early
stage of the church, but the Holy Spirit does not actually work
that way today.

In the Old Testament the Holy Spirit came to Elijah.  He was
neither Baptized nor Confirmed.  He did not know about the Third
Person of the Trinity, of course, but now we know it was He
working.  The Apostles did not realize the Holy Spirit rested also
on Gentiles, until Peter told the church his experience of the Holy
Spirit coming upon many of the uncircumcised in the house of
Cornelius even prior to their baptism.

The priest who taught Indian Children had the same experience as
Elijah and even the Apostles without the tongue of flame, of
course.  God is not fire or a tongue of fire, but He is behind the
fire; God is not wind, but He is behind the wind; God is not an
earthquake or a shaking of a dwelling, but He is behind the
earthquake.  God the Holy Spirit is so marvelous that He makes
things happen that we know not their significance, until sometimes
decades after.  However, in the meantime, all can take heart in
prayer even though we have not seen this but believe it.

Sometimes, as Elijah, Peter, Cornelius or the catechist to the
Indians, we are so bewildered, we don't know how to pray or what we
ought to pray for.  But the Holy Spirit who plumbs the depths of
God and of our weak spirits interprets to the Father in unutterable
groanings what it is we are trying to say; because the Spirit
intercedes for the saints according to the Will of God. (cf.
Romans Chapter 8 Verses 26-28)

We are now brought to the crux of the experiences written above
provided we do not restrict the actions of the Holy Spirit in
prayer especially.  St. John Vianney, the short, slight but holy
pastor of a little country parish in Ars, France, used to watch a
man coming to church from the fields every late afternoon. (The
little Saint was in church saying his prayers when he was
interrupted daily by the farmer's visit.)

The Cure of Ars observed the man half kneeling, half sitting in the
pew praying.  St. John Vianney wanted to learn to pray better and
asked the farmer what he said to God in prayer.  The farmer
retorted, "I don't say anything." Bewildered, the saintly Cure
said, "Well, what do you do." The farmer replied, "He (God) looks
at me and I look at him!"

Well, this certainly tells us the best kind of prayer.  "Reverent
silence before the Lord is the highest form of prayer," wrote St.
John of the Cross, a mystic of the sixteenth century.  By that he
means we who pray must let the Holy Spirit work as we sit, stand or
lie down in prayer.  I puzzled for many long years about "reverent
silence before the Lord" and what it meant, until a priest
mentioned his experience.

"I was on the Island of Shimea, the next to the last island (Attu
is the last) in the Aleutian chain of Alaska.  I was also puzzling
what was meant by reverent silence before the Lord is the highest
form of prayer.  As I was walking the wind was blowing 50 or 60
knots.  I climbed to the crest of a hill, there in front of me was
the top of an old defunct radar screen of the now obsolete 'dew
line' showing.  The wind was even stronger as I came over the hill.
Before me was a huge screen seemingly as big as a football field
thrust straight up into the sky.  The great breeze, blowing through
the immense screen was making an uncannily weird, eerie, ghostly
sound.  It cast a charming unearthly spell over me.  It was then I
finally realized what it meant to pray in "reverent silence".

"It is like this.  The Sacred Heart of Jesus' Heart strings are
entwined in our heart strings.  When we pray in silence the Divine
breeze of the Holy Spirit blows on these hearts' entwined strings.
The more we submit to the silence, the heart adjusts to the urging
of the spirit hastening the time of a complete symphony of sound
the wind of Holy Spirit is making to the Father.  We are engulfed
as it were in this beautiful, exquisite, elegant, graceful melody
the Holy Spirit is making with our spirit to the Father.  I have
even read that the angels and saints can join in this mysterious
harmony with Christ in us through the Holy Spirit to the Father.
Some even inwardly hear "this sweet succession of sound in the Song
of Songs!"

Foolishly asking how long it lasts, the priest smiled at me and
said, "as long and as short as God wills, mostly short." I further
asked, "Why do you speak in symbols," (like symphonic sounds and
such) "the language of the spirit," said the priest, "is expressed
only in symbols.  The language of the conscious intellect, however,
is mere words.  Peter's threefold vision of animals, reptiles and
birds, in a huge sheet coming from the heavens taught him that
nothing God created is unclean.  These symbols in his vision gave
the message to his spirit and prepared him to meet the Holy
Spirit's overshadowing of the previously thought unclean, unworthy,
heathen Gentiles."

"So," said the priest, "Read about the spirit in Sacred Scripture.
The Bible tells more than we can absorb in a life time about God's
Holy Spirit." From that source, the teaching of the Saints, and a
good friend guide to keep us from falling into absurdity, we too
can learn to live a fair, comely life with Holy Spirit.  The
Spirituality of religion can then be realized in practical love.

Bishop John