The Most Holy Trinity [B]

The Most Holy Trinity [B]

Deuteronomy 4:32-34,39-40  ¾  Romans 8:14-17  ¾  Matthew 28:16-20

June 3, 2012

“…you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear,

but you received a Spirit of adoption….” [Romans 8:15]

               During most of the Church year, we celebrate the “drama” of Christ’s life.  When we celebrate the feasts of the Christmas season, it’s very easy to picture in our hearts the drama that begins with the scene of the angel Gabriel confronting the young virgin Mary with good news from God, and nine months’ later, ends with the perilous journey to Bethlehem, the birth of Jesus, and the frenzied flight from the murderous threats of the jealous King Herod.  All of these events show faithful people doing extraordinary things for God.

               Similarly, the end of Jesus’ life is marked by high drama.  We can see in our minds so easily the events of Holy Week:  the triumphant entrance of Jesus into Jerusalem, his last meal shared with his apostles, his retreat into the Garden of Gethsemani to pray to His heavenly Father, and His arrest there, having been betrayed by one of those same apostles.  He is tried under the Roman Empire, sentenced to death, and crucified on the Cross.  But on the third day is a miraculous event spoken of:  this Jesus of Nazareth has risen from the dead!

And this is the good news of the Christian faith:  life is more powerful than death!  When we look at the Cross, we know that Christ, by choosing to die, conquers death.  This is the point of the entire Christian drama, and this is the message that Christ makes known throughout the forty days following His Resurrection.  After His Ascension to Heaven the apostles gather together in prayer with Mary, and ten days later they are filled with the Presence of the Holy Spirit, sent down from Heaven by the Father and the Son.

               All of this drama, all of this action on the part of God, which we have celebrated during the past few months, had led us only up to Pentecost, the birth of the Church.  All of this drama is only a prelude, as it were, to the story of the Church, which has been unfolding ever since that first Christian Pentecost almost 2000 years ago.  From the moment that the Holy Spirit filled the apostles’ hearts, minds, and souls, it became their mission to preach the Gospel throughout the world, and to do great things for God.  From that point on it was their mission to tell the whole world, through their actions, that life is stronger than death.

And throughout these past 2000 years, the drama of Christ’s life has been lived out in the lives of the saints.  Countless men and women have, in every century and in every country of the world, preached the good news about Christ’s Death and Resurrection, and made sacrifices for the Faith.  Throughout the Church year, every saint has his or her own feast day, on which we recall the drama of that saint’s life.

               All of this action and drama can be very impressive, but it can also leave us wondering about ourselves.  We can begin to second-guess ourselves, and wonder, “What does my spiritual life amount to?  What have I done that amounts to anything with my spiritual life?  Does my role in the drama of this history of the Church really amount to very much?”  If you have ever thought this, than today’s feast of the Most Holy Trinity has something important for you to reflect on.

X   X   X

                Our Catholic belief in the Trinity is one of the most complex beliefs we have, but at its heart, it is really the most simple, because the life of the Trinity amounts, when all is said and done, to one simple word:  “love,” or perhaps better put as “charity.”  When we say “love,” different people in the world might interpret this word in many different ways, but the Church has always said to the world that there is only one real type of love, and this love—“caritas” or “charity”—is the love that defines Who the Most Holy Trinity is.

               The Blessed Trinity—God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—all love each other with an equal love, with their whole being, since God is Love.  Love is based on relationships, not on things given to others, nor on things done for others.  When we consider all the marvelous, dramatic events done by the apostles, the prophets, and all the saints throughout the ages (not to mention our Blessed Mother Mary and Her Son, Our Lord, themselves), we might be tempted to consider a person’s worth being based upon the accomplishments in life, and then it’s very easy to wonder why there is, relatively speaking, so little that we have accomplished ourselves spiritually.

               But this is putting the cart before the horse.  The reason that certain people have been saints is because of how much they loved, not what they accomplished in their lives.  Those who love God and others with their whole minds, hearts, and souls do great things for others, but those deeds flow out of their love.

At times we have to be reminded of this order of things—that we must love first and do things second—just as Jesus reminded Martha that while what she was doing—busying herself with the chores of the home—was all very good and necessary, what Mary had chosen—to sit in the presence of the Lord—was the better part.  When we pray (whether in our homes, or in Adoration here at church), we dwell in God’s love, and by doing that, grow in God’s love.   The more we grow in God’s love, the better equipped we are to deal with all the sacrifices of daily life that come our way during the week.  Without Him, we can do nothing.  With Him, and in Christ, we can love with an extraordinary love.

Monday of the Seventh Week of Easter

Monday of the Seventh Week of Easter

“In the world you will have trouble, but take courage,

I have conquered the world.” [John 16:33]

               In this final week of the Easter Season, the Church calls us to prayer.  Each of us, living his or her individual life in the midst of modern Western culture, is called by the Church to pray.  Each of us is to ask God the Holy Spirit to descend again from Heaven, that He might inflame the hearts, minds and souls of each and every member of the Church.  We pray for this that, by the Power of the Holy Spirit, the Church—as the Mystical Body of Christ—will proclaim the Gospel to the world.

               During these days between the Ascension of Jesus and the Descent of the Holy Spirit, we can imagine ourselves in the Upper Room, gathered in prayer with the Apostles and Our Blessed Mother.  In that same Upper Room where Jesus celebrated the Last Supper, consecrating bread and wine into His Body and Blood, we pray that we will be transformed by the Holy Spirit and become the Mystical Body of Christ.

               As we imagine ourselves in that Upper Room, praying for the day of Pentecost, it’s easy to see how the words of today’s Gospel passage might have echoed in the Apostles’ thoughts and prayers.  Jesus spoke the words of today’s Gospel at the Last Supper, in that same Upper Room, about seven weeks earlier.  Though much of what Jesus is saying in the chapter of today’s Gospel seems to refer more directly to His immanent death, His words today also strike a chord with what we pray for during these ten days of waiting for Pentecost.

“In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world.”  We who live twenty centuries after Jesus and the Apostles know what sorts of “trouble” the Apostles will face:  verbal and physical torment, imprisonment, exile, and in all but one case, martyrdom.  “Trouble” might seem a rather tame word; Jesus, we can reason, was using prudence in speaking here to His Apostles.

You and I, living in a country whose federal government is taking more and more steps against believing Christians, need to recognize that Jesus is speaking these words to us through the Sacred Liturgy:  “In the world you will have trouble, but take courage, I have conquered the world.” 

On June 29, the Bishops of Kansas will be sponsoring a rally in Topeka to promote religious freedom and to stand against the recent federal HHS mandate.  The Office of Respect Life and Social Justice will sponsor buses leaving from various places throughout the diocese.  Fliers with more information are available on the offertory table, where the daily Mass chant sheets are found.  Encourage your fellow parishioners to attend this event with you, with our bishop, and with the Lord who promises always to be with us in proclaiming His Gospel.

The Ascension of the Lord [B]

The Ascension of Our Lord  [B]

Acts 1:1-11  ¾  Ephesians 1:17-23  ¾  Mark 16:15-20

May 19/20, 2012

But they went forth and preached everywhere,

while the Lord worked with them

and confirmed the word through accompanying signs.  [Mark 16:20]

               Today/Yesterday, my parents celebrate/d their fiftieth wedding anniversary.  A golden anniversary—whether of a married couple, or a priest or religious sister—is a time for reflection and thanksgiving.  Our reflection is often about the commitment in general—in this case, reflecting on the question, “What is the Sacrament of Marriage all about?”—but also about the specific persons being honored, and their many, many concrete sacrifices.

               My parents, like most couples who make it to their golden jubilee, would never pretend that their marriage has been a bed of roses.  They would never pretend that every moment of the past fifty years has been joy, laughter, and sweetness.  But there are two facts that they would insist on with all their heart:  that it takes three to make a marriage, and that the greatest growth in their married life was borne of the sacrifices that they freely embraced.

               It takes three to make a marriage:  the husband, the wife, and God.  Marriage as a sacrament comes from God.  It’s God who gives marriage its form, its function, and its power:  it’s not the spouses who do so.  But marriage comes from God not only in a general, historic sense.  Marriage also comes from God in a personal, individual sense.  God is not only the author of the Sacrament of Marriage.  God is the author of each and every marriage.  God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit personally call this individual man and this individual woman together, into the mystery of “one flesh”, so that through their marriage, the life of God may be seen in this world:  so that through their common life, the joy and beauty of God might be seen in this world which otherwise is only a valley of tears.

               In each marriage, God calls an individual man and women towards each other.  Every married couple, of course, has their own unique stories of meeting, courtship, and engagement leading up to their wedding day.  Every family hopefully knows the stories of those events that led up to the wedding day of their parents or grandparents.  Nonetheless, as interesting as those stories are, they can’t compare to the stories of married life itself, because while those former stories can show us how God brings a man and a woman together, within marriage God shows us how a married couple can grow in His very image.

               The greatest growth in married life is borne of sacrifices freely embraced.  Some sacrifices, a married couple freely take upon themselves:  for example, a mortgage so that they can make a house into a home.  Many of the sacrifices that a married couple freely take on are for the sake of their children:  parents sacrifice their time and money in order to help their children grow.  But beyond all the sacrifices that a married couple freely take upon themselves, there are also those sacrifices which impose themselves upon a couple from outside their free will:  those sacrifices that a couple have no choice but to face.

               My parents were forced by fate to deal with the death of their first-born son.  After bearing two healthy daughters, my parents looked forward to the birth of a son.  But when he was born, the doctors told our parents that he would not live very long because of a hole in his heart.  When they buried my older brother next to my grandfather’s grave, they had a hole in their heart:  one which never fully closed.  In the end, our parents bore five children.  But they never had the chance to see their middle child grow up.  Still, by placing their faith in God, the death of their first-born son helped them grow in their appreciation of the four children whom they were given by God to bring up.

               Against this backdrop, please let me speak about the Ascension of Our Lord Jesus.

Each of us has to go through transitions in life.  Sometimes other people leave our lives, and sometimes we leave others behind.  The leave may be forced or freely chosen.  Some transitions are simple and expected.  When a student is promoted from grade school to junior high school; when our seniors graduate from high school; when young people graduate from their studies to a job in the workplace;  ...  a familiar and usually comfortable setting has to be left behind, so that a person can move on to new experiences and new relationships.

               Undoubtedly, though, the most radical form of “leave taking”—the most dramatic separation between people—is when someone leaves this earth.  That’s part of what we’re celebrating this Sunday.  Jesus did not die, of course, when He ascended to Heaven, but His departure evoked in those around Him much the same thoughts and feelings that you and I have when someone close to us dies.

               I’m sure that each one of us could think of many great books or movies which portray dramatic scenes of death:  of moments of death shared between a dying person and someone who loves that person.  From the profound to the popular—from Romeo and Juliet to the “Return of the Jedi”—stories like these show us how death reveals something about the person who is dying, and how that that life is shared with others.

X   X   X

               The readings today proclaim Jesus Christ taking leave of His followers, leaving this earth:  ascending to Paradise, and—in effect—leaving them in the dust.  We hear this Sunday the end of the Gospel according to Saint Mark, and the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles (our first reading).

               For the followers of Jesus, the day of Jesus’ Ascension was filled with a great deal of fear and anxiety.  In a way, the day of Jesus’ Ascension is sort of like Good Friday.  Yet the Church celebrates both, perhaps causing us to ask:  why should we celebrate the end of a good thing?  Why do we call the day of Jesus’ death “Good” Friday?  Both events point us to one of the central mysteries of our spiritual life:  those who are bound together by love do not grow weaker when they are separated.  When we must leave those we love to follow a higher calling, we have the chance to grow in love.  What seems to be a separation is nothing compared to a stronger bond.

               In the life of Christ, and His bride, the Church, these two events—Jesus’ Death and His Ascension—were necessary chapters of God’s story of salvation.  In fact, God is never truly gone from our midst, not on Good Friday, and not today as He rises from the midst of His followers.  Though he departs, He appears in new ways.  The Ascension of Jesus—His leaving this earth in bodily form—allowed his followers to assume their calling to be the Body of Christ.  Without Jesus leaving this earth, there would be no reason for the Church to be the Body of Christ, and there would be to reason to celebrate the Eucharist, to make Christ present sacramentally.

               In our daily life, we have to look for God’s presence.  Back in Jesus’ day, the people of Israel had been demoralized by the Roman Empire.  The nation of Israel had always prided itself on its military power, and then their nation was taken over by the Romans.  “Where was God?” they asked.  When Jesus walked this earth, He claimed to answer their question, and for this answer He was put to death by His own people, sentenced by the Roman procurator.  Now the people asked the same question to the followers of Jesus:  “Where is your God?”  On the third day Jesus answered their question.  But He gave this answer only to His followers.

               Why did He only make His presence known to His followers?  Because it would be their job to speak in His Name, as one Body.  But for some days after the Ascension, the apostles and disciples weren’t sure about this great commission Jesus had given them.  They were afraid, and they locked themselves into an upper room.  It wasn’t a coincidence that it was the same upper room where He had given them the gift of His Body and Blood in the Eucharist.  Ten days later, God revealed himself in a new way:  through His Holy Spirit, God bound the followers of Jesus into the Church.  By the power of the Holy Spirit, God began speaking through the followers of Jesus.

               And so the Ascension is the prologue, the opening credits, of the story of the Church, our story, the story of the Body of Christ.  While Jesus is no longer physically present as one of us, he is still with us:  in fact He is in us, binding us together as one Body through His Spirit.  Now, as St. Teresa of Avila once said, God has no hands, or eyes, or feet on this earth, except ours:  the hands, the eyes, and the feet of the Body of Christ.  The Holy Spirit, after all, is a spirit, and can only be seen through human beings.  It’s up to us to show the face of God to others.

 

Wednesday of the Sixth Week of Easter

Wednesday of the Sixth Week of Easter

John 16:12-15

“…[W]hen He comes, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you to all truth.”  Jesus is telling us in today’s Gospel passage about one of the reasons for the Holy Spirit descending upon the earth.  This outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost was the divine means by which the Church first had life on earth, just as the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit on the day of the Annunciation was the divine means by which Jesus first had life on earth.

               God the Holy Spirit is not, however, just the divine spark by which the Body of Christ began to have life on earth.  The Holy Spirit is, as we profess in the Nicene Creed, “the Lord, the giver of life.”  Keep in mind that God does not give life the way that a human parent gives life.  The human father may die at any point after conception.  The human mother may at any point after birth, or even in rare cases, before giving birth.  Although the normal course of human parenthood involves the rearing of children, the on-going dependence of children upon human parents is not absolute in the way that divine fatherhood is.  God’s gift of life in the Holy Spirit is not just a divine spark, which sets one off on one’s way, but rather is the blaze of holiness itself.

               What form does holiness take in the Church, when her members open their lives each and every day to “the Lord, the giver of life”?  There are many such forms, but one of the more important is knowledge, understanding, and wisdom.

               Jesus says today that “when He comes, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you to all truth.”  Ask the Holy Spirit today, in your prayers, to give you light and insight into what Jesus means in saying these words to you.

Tuesday of the Sixth Week of Easter

Tuesday of the Sixth Week of Easter

John 16:5-11

               There are very few passages in the Gospel that you can say refer to the Most Holy Trinity.  The word “trinity” itself never appears in the Gospel, as you know.  The reality of the Trinity appears only obscurely on those occasions where we do see it.

               Today’s Gospel passages takes place at the Last Supper, as part of those discourses that St. John the Evangelist records in chapters 14-17 of his Gospel account.  Already at the Last Supper Jesus is preparing His Apostles for His immanent departure.  In one sense, we might consider Jesus’ death, occurring the day after the Last Supper, as being the departure that Jesus is speaking of in today’s Gospel.

               However, in another sense, at His Last Supper Jesus is already preparing His Apostles for His Ascension into Heaven, that mystery of Jesus’ life that the Church will celebrate this coming Sunday in our diocese.  Consider Jesus’s words from today’s Gospel passage in that light:  the light of His coming Ascension.

               “Now I am going to the One who sent me. … …[I]t is better for you that I go.  For if I do not, the Advocate will not come to you.”  In these three short sentences, Jesus speaks about the Most Holy Trinity in the context of Pentecost.  Jesus’ Ascension makes possible the day of Pentecost.  Jesus’ departure from the earth makes possible the Holy Spirit’s descent to earth.  Jesus’ leaving in His risen and glorified Body makes possible the life of the Church:  the Holy Spirit descending from Heaven to unite mankind into the one Body of the Church.

               Where is your life in all this?  Ask the Holy Spirit that very question today in your prayers…  Ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen you as a member of God the Son’s Body, the Church.  Only within the Body of the Son will the Holy Spirit raise you up in love, into the embrace of our heavenly Father.

The Sixth Sunday of Easter [B]

The Sixth Sunday of Easter  [B]

Acts 10:25-26,34-35,44-48  ¾  1 John 4:7-10  ¾  John 15:9-17

May 13, 2012

“In this is love:  not that we have loved God, but that He loved us,

and sent His Son as expiation for our sins.”  [1 John 4:10]

The twentieth century was a time of much bloodshed, especially along the Iron Curtain in Eastern Europe following the Second World War.  In the kingdom of Hungary, Joseph Mindszenty was consecrated Bishop in 1944.  From November 1944 to April 1945, he was imprisoned by the Nazis.  Pope Pius XII appointed him the Cardinal Primate of Hungary a few months after his release.  At the ceremonies for the new cardinals, as the Pope placed the Cardinal’s hat on his head, the Pope said:  “Among the thirty-two [new cardinals], you will be the first to suffer the martyrdom whose symbol this red color is.”

When the Communists arrested Cardinal Mindszenty in December 1948, twenty-three long years of persecution, suffering and enforced isolation began.  He went into exile in 1971, and died four years later.

You might think that under this harsh oppression, Cardinal Mindszenty would have become hard and bitter:  many persons under those conditions do.  But the venerable cardinal cupped his sufferings in his hands, and offered them up to God.  So instead of becoming hard and bitter, he became like clay in the hands of the Potter:  soft and tender.  It’s only grace that makes it possible for a human person to become tender and soft while surrounded by the harsh and ugly lies of a culture that spends itself trying to hammer wrong into right, perversion into virtue, and mandate into liberty.

               This man, surrounded during his adult life by the Nazi and Soviet regimes, looked to the love of Christ to find real power.  It was this man, who held the throne of the highest church office in the Kingdom of Hungary, who composed a tribute to honor “the most important person on earth”:  not the Pope, Emperor, or President, but someone who more clearly reflects the power of God’s Love.  It’s fitting to recite this poem this weekend:

     “The most important person on earth is a mother.  She cannot claim the honor of having built Notre Dame Cathedral.  She need not.  She has built something more magnificent than any cathedral—a dwelling for an immortal soul, the tiny perfection of her baby’s body.

     “The Angels have not been blessed with a such a grace.  They cannot share in God’s Creative miracle to bring new Saints to Heaven.  Only a human mother can.  Mothers are closer to God the Creator than any other creatures.  God joins forces with mothers in performing this act of creation.

     “What on God’s good earth is more glorious than this: to be a mother?”

— József Cardinal Mindszenty

The line of this tribute that ties most closely with our readings today is when he says that “Mothers are closer to God the Creator than any other creatures.”  When a mother shares in God’s act of creation—not only at conception and during pregnancy, but throughout her entire relationship with her child—she shares directly in the divine life of God.  Our Second Reading today is taken from the first letter of Saint John, and in this letter Saint John defines God’s divine life in one simple word:  “love”.  This is what God is:  it is God’s very nature to be love.  This is the definition of motherhood, as well.  Can we ever thank our mothers enough for accepting the vocation to be our mother?

Saint John, the Beloved Disciple, not only in his letters but also in his Gospel account, fleshes out his description of God as “love”.  In the last sentence of today’s Second Reading, St. John does so very poignantly, telling us that “In this is love:  not that we have loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son as expiation for our sins.”  The first part of St. John’s description insists on the primacy of God’s love.  The second part describes the concrete choices by which the Father, and then the Son, manifested divine Love for sinners like you and me.

X   X   X

When St. John says that love consists in the truth that God loved us, and not that we have loved God, he’s pointing out that God doesn’t wait to love you until He determines whether you will love Him.  God doesn’t withhold His love.  God doesn’t stop loving you if you stop loving Him.  In a word, God’s Love is primary.  Our love for Him can only be a response, and cannot diminish His love for us.

But we all know from experience, our own and others’, that confusion arises here.  Human beings feel at times as if God does not love them.  One reason for this feeling is that love—at least, divine love—is itself not a feeling.  When people expect God to make them feel good about themselves, or about Him, they can easily become confused about the real meaning of God’s Presence.  This doesn’t mean that our feelings are illusory, or that God cannot manifest Himself through emotions:  it’s to say, rather, that divine Love is not identical with positive emotions.

The second main reason that someone might feel that God no longer loves him is the fact that it’s not unusual for God to be absent from the human soul.  Yet God being absent from someone’s soul does not mean that God does not love that person.  Most often, this absence is a sign that the human person has distanced himself from God.  But there can be very different reasons for this absence, one negative and one positive.

On the one hand, the absence of God from a human soul can be the result of mortal sin.  A mortal sin that’s freely and knowingly chosen destroys all the grace dwelling in that soul.  What’s more, the presence of a mortal sin on a soul is like a force field surrounding one’s soul, blocking God’s love from penetrating the human heart, mind and soul.  Ironic though it may seem, it’s a sign of God’s love that He endows the human person with a free will strong enough to keep His own love at bay.

On the other hand, the absence of God from someone’s soul can be a sign of immanent growth.  Many saints, in writing about the three basic stages of the spiritual life, note that God often spurs the human person towards growth by removing Himself from the person’s soul, in order to increase the human person’s longing for Him:  that is, in order to teach the human person to live for God alone, which is to live for love alone.

One of the saints who wrote profoundly about the spiritual life was Saint Bernard of Clairvaux.  In addition to serving as one of the first abbots of the Cistercian religious order, he also wrote many commentaries on Sacred Scripture.  In these commentaries, he often wrote about divine love, and because he wanted to promote deeper study of the Catholic Faith, he often wrote about the relationship between knowledge and divine love.  As we honor this weekend our parishioners graduating from a course of studies, it would be good to reflect on these words of St. Bernard, who writes that:

“…there are some who want knowledge for the sole purpose of knowing, and this is … curiosity.  And there are some who seek knowledge in order to be known themselves; and this is… vanity …  and there are… those who seek knowledge in order to sell their knowledge… for money or for honors; and this is [greed]. But there are also those who seek knowledge in order to edify [others], and this is charity.[1]

               Charity—the love of Christ—urges us forward:  to high school, to college, to our first full-time job, into our vocation, to further growth in holiness… even to death and Heaven’s gates.  It’s to convince us of this simple truth that we hear Jesus today:  “I command you:  love one another.”

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[1] In Cantica, Serm. XXXVI, 3; Migne, P. L., CLXXXIII, 968c,-d., quoted in Pope Pius XII, Doctor Mellifluus, 4.

Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter

Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Easter

               God the Holy Spirit—the Third Person of the Trinity—is the Gift given us by the Father and the Son.  In the writings of the Church Fathers, this is one of the most common names for the Holy Spirit: “Gift”.  Jesus speaks about this Gift in today’s Gospel passage, and in this light, consider the new translation of Holy Mass, which the Church began celebrating last Advent.

               In the new translation of the Mass, there are some changes that are so slight that they could easily escape our notice.  But it’s a basic truth of our Catholic Faith that God is often found in the smallest things.  By way of example, take the Collect of Holy Mass (what used to be called the “Opening Prayer”).  The main body of this prayer changes, of course, each day.  But the conclusion is almost always the same, and it’s in this conclusion that we hear a difference in the new translation.

               The change is very subtle, occurring in the middle of the last sentence.  In the old translation, the priest, praying to God the Father, speaks of Jesus as “your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit….”  In the corrected translation, the priest speaks of Jesus as “your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit….”

               The change seems, perhaps, small and insignificant.  In fact, it is small.  But it’s not insignificant.  Instead of “with you and the Holy spirit”, the priest now prays, “with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit”.  What’s the difference?  In addition to the fact that the new translation is more faithful to the original Latin text, there is a spiritual truth that’s neglected by the old translation.  The old translation emphasizes the unity of the three persons of the Trinity: the three divine Persons live and reign together equally.  By contrast, the new translation, in its fidelity to the Latin, emphasizes the uniqueness of the Holy Spirit: namely, the fact that God the Holy Spirit is the Love of the Father and the Son for each other.  This divine Love—the Person of the Holy Spirit—is the Life and Kingdom of Heaven:  that is, Jesus living and reigning with God the Father.  This Gift of unity, who is the Person of the Holy Spirit, is the Gift whom the Church asks us to reflect upon as we prepare for the great feast of Pentecost, and is the Peace which Jesus gives you in the Eucharist.