Basing his reflection
on the Hebrew word
for “Spirit”,
Pope Francis explains
that the Third Person of the Trinity
is able to make us
truly free.
-By Christopher Wells
Pope Francis began his catechesis on Wednesday with a reflection on the Name of
the Holy Spirit, which is revealed in the Old Testament as Ruach, a
Hebrew word meaning “breath, wind, or puff of air.”
This word, he said, contains “the first fundamental
revelation about the Person and function of the Holy Spirit.”
Recalling the “roar of rushing wind” that accompanied
the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, the Pope explained that the
name Ruach expresses the “power” of the Holy Spirit, which
like the wind is “an overwhelming and indomitable force… capable even of moving
oceans.”
The freedom of the Holy Spirit
But “to discover the full meaning of the realities of
the Bible,” the Pope continued, it is necessary to go beyond the Old Testament
“and come to Jesus,” who emphasizes the freedom of the Spirit: “The wind blows
where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes
from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
Like the wind, that cannot “be bridled, ‘bottled up,’
or put in a box, the Holy Spirit cannot be reduced to “concepts, definitions,
theses, or treatises,” nor enclosed within “canons, institutions, or
definitions.” The Spirit “creates and animates institutions, but cannot be
‘institutionalized’,” the Pope said.
Freedom to serve
At the same time, Pope Francis said, the freedom of
the Spirit is not “a freedom to do what one wants, but the freedom to freely do
what God wants!” This, he explained, “is a freedom that expresses itself in
service, which appears to be the opposite, but is
Following St Paul, who exhorts Christians not to allow
their freedom to become a pretext for the flesh, Pope Francis denounced the
false freedom “that allows the rich to exploit the poor, the strong to exploit
the weak, and everyone to exploit the environment with impunity.”
Pope Francis concluded his address by pointing out that the true freedom of the Spirit must come from Jesus, and inviting everyone to pray that, Jesus might make us “through His Holy Spirit, truly free men and women.”
POPE'S SPEECH
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