Pope Francis' Chrism Mass Homily "We need to say every day: Come" to the Holy Spirit" and on the birth day of the priesthood, to recognize that He is at the origin of our ministry" with 1,800 Priests -
Chrism Mass in the Vatican Basilica, 06.04.2023
At 9.30 this morning, the anniversary of Holy Thursday, the Holy Father Francis presided over the Chrism Mass in the Vatican Basilica, the Liturgy which is celebrated on this day in all the Cathedral Churches.
The Chrism Mass was concelebrated by the Holy Father with the Cardinals, Bishops, the Vicar General of His Holiness and the Vicegerent of the Diocese of Rome and the Presbyters (diocesan and religious) present in Rome.
FREE Vatican PDF Mass Booklet with Music: https://www.vatican.va/news_services/liturgy/libretti/2023/20230406-libretto-messa-crismale.pdf
During the Eucharistic celebration, the priests renewed the promises made at the moment of the Sacred Ordination; then the blessing of the oil of the sick, of the oil of the catechumens and of the chrism took place.
FULL TEXT homily that the Pope delivered after the proclamation of the Holy Gospel:
Homily of the Holy Father
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me" (Lk 4:18): Jesus' preaching began from this verse and the Word we heard today took its cue from the same verse (cf. Is 61:1). In the beginning, therefore, is the Spirit of the Lord.
And it is on him that I would like to reflect with you today, dear confreres, on the Spirit of the Lord. Because without the Spirit of the Lord there is no Christian life and, without his anointing, there is no holiness. He is the protagonist and it is beautiful today, on the birth day of the priesthood, to recognize that He is at the origin of our ministry, of the life and vitality of every Pastor.
In fact, Holy Mother Church teaches us to profess that the Holy Spirit "gives life"[1], as Jesus affirmed when he said: "It is the Spirit who gives life" (Jn 6:63); teaching taken up by the apostle Paul, who wrote that "the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (2 Cor 3:6) and spoke of the "law of the Spirit, which gives life in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:2) . Without him not even the Church would be the living Bride of Christ, but at most a religious organization - more or less good; it would not be the Body of Christ, but a temple built with human hands. How then to build the Church, if not starting from the fact that we are "temples of the Holy Spirit" who "dwells in us" (see 1 Cor 6:19; 3:16)? We cannot leave it outside the house or park it in some devotional area, no, in the centre! We need to say every day: "Come, because without your strength there is nothing in man"[2].
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. Each of us can tell; and it is not presumption, it is reality, since every Christian, especially every priest, can make the following words his own: "for the Lord has anointed me" (Is 61:1). Brothers, without merit, by pure grace we have received an anointing which made us fathers and shepherds in the holy People of God. Let us then dwell on this aspect of the Spirit: the anointing.
After the first "anointing" which took place in Mary's womb, the Spirit descended upon Jesus at the Jordan. Following this, as St. Basil explains, "every action [of Christ] was being accomplished with the co-presence of the Holy Spirit"[3]. With the power of that anointing, in fact, he preached and worked signs, by virtue of it "a power flowed from him that healed everyone" (Lk 6:19). Jesus and the Spirit always work together, so as to be like the two hands of the Father[4] - Irenaeus says this - which, reaching out towards us, embrace us and lift us up. And by them our hands were sealed, anointed by the Spirit of Christ. Yes, brothers, the Lord has not only chosen and called us here and there: he has poured into us the anointing of his Spirit, the same one who descended on the Apostles. Brothers we are the "anointed ones".
So let us look to them, to the Apostles. Jesus chose them and at his call they left their boats, nets, houses and so on ... The anointing of the Word changed their lives. Enthusiastically they followed the Master and began to preach, convinced that they would later accomplish even greater things; until Easter came. There everything seemed to stop: they came to deny and abandon the Master. We don't have to be afraid. We are brave to read about our own lives and our falls. They came to deny and abandon the Master, Peter, the first. They came to terms with their inadequacy and realized that they had not understood it: the "I do not know this man" (Mk 14:71), which Peter chanted in the courtyard of the high priest after the Last Supper, is not just an impulsive defence, but an admission of spiritual ignorance: he and the others perhaps expected a life of success behind a Messiah who drove crowds and worked wonders, but they did not recognize the scandal of the cross, which crumbled their certainties. Jesus knew that they could not have done it alone and for this he promised them the Paraclete. And it was precisely that "second anointing" at Pentecost that transformed the disciples, leading them to feed the flock of God and no longer themselves. And this is the contradiction to be resolved: am I a shepherd of God's people or of myself? And there is the Spirit to teach me the way. It was that anointing of fire that extinguished their religiosity centered on themselves and on their own abilities: having welcomed the Spirit, Peter's fears and hesitations evaporated; James and John, burnt by the desire to give their lives, stop pursuing places of honor (see Mk 10:35-45), our careerism, brothers; the others are no longer closed and fearful in the Upper Room, but go out and become apostles in the world. It is the spirit that changes our heart, that puts it on that different, different level.
Brothers, such an itinerary embraces our priestly and apostolic life. There was also a first anointing for us, which began with a call of love that stole our hearts. For it we left the moorings and the strength of the Spirit descended on that genuine enthusiasm, which consecrated us. Then, according to God's timing, the Easter stage arrives for each one, which marks the moment of truth. And it is a moment of crisis, which takes various forms. Everyone, sooner or later, experiences disappointments, hardships, weaknesses, with the ideal that seems to wear out among the demands of reality, while a certain habit takes over and some trials, previously difficult to imagine, make fidelity appear more uncomfortable than at a time. This stage - of this temptation, of this trial that we have all had, have and will have - this stage represents a decisive ridge for whoever has received the anointing. One can come out badly, gliding towards a certain mediocrity, dragging oneself tired into a "normality" where three dangerous temptations creep in: that of compromise, whereby one is satisfied with what one can do; that of surrogates, for which we try to "recharge" ourselves with something other than our anointing; that of discouragement – which is the most common -, whereby, dissatisfied, one goes on by inertia. And here is the great risk: while appearances remain intact - "I am a priest, I am a priest" - we withdraw into ourselves and tend to live listlessly; the fragrance of the anointing no longer perfumes life and the heart; and the heart does not expand but shrinks, wrapped in disenchantment. It's a distillate, you know? When the priesthood slowly slips into clericalism and the priest forgets that he is a pastor of the people, to become a state cleric.
But this crisis can also become the turning point for the priesthood, the "decisive stage of the spiritual life, in which the final choice must be made between Jesus and the world, between the heroic nature of charity and mediocrity, between the cross and a certain well-being , between holiness and honest fidelity to religious commitment»[5]. At the end of this celebration they will give you as a gift a classic, a book that deals with this problem: "The second call", is a classic by Father Voillaume that touches on this problem, read it. Then all of us need to reflect on this moment of our priesthood. It is the blessed moment in which we, like the disciples at Easter, are called to be "humble enough to confess ourselves conquered by the humiliated and crucified Christ, and to agree to begin a new journey, that of the Spirit, of faith and of a strong love and without illusions»[6]. It is the chairos in which he discovers that "everything is not reduced to abandoning the boat and the nets to follow Jesus for a certain time, but it requires going to Calvary, accepting its lesson and fruit, and going with the help of the Holy Spirit until the end of a life which must end in the perfection of divine charity" [7]. With the help of the Holy Spirit: it is the time, for us as for the Apostles, of a "second anointing", a time for a second call that we must listen to, for the second anointing, where we welcome the Spirit not on the enthusiasm of our dreams, but on the fragility of our reality. It is an anointing that makes truth deep down, which allows the Spirit to anoint our weaknesses, our hardships, our interior poverty. Then the anointing smells again: of Him, not of us. At this moment, inwardly, I am recalling some of you who are in crisis - let's say - who are disoriented and who don't know how to take the road, how to get back on the road in this second anointing of the Spirit. To these brothers - I have them present - I simply say: courage, the Lord is greater than your weaknesses, your sins. Trust the Lord and let yourself be called a second time, this time with the anointing of the Holy Spirit. The double life won't help you; throw everything out the window, not even. Look ahead, let yourself be caressed by the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
And the way to this step of maturation is to admit the truth of one's weakness. To this exhorts us "the Spirit of truth" (Jn 16:13), who moves us to look inside ourselves to the depths, to ask ourselves: my fulfillment depends on my skill, on the role I get, on the compliments I receive, on my career what do I do, from my superiors or collaborators, or from the comforts I can guarantee, or from the anointing that perfumes my life? Brothers, priestly maturity comes from the Holy Spirit, it is accomplished when He becomes the protagonist of our life. Then everything changes perspective, even the disappointments and bitternesses – even the sins -, because it is no longer a matter of trying to get better by fixing something, but of handing ourselves over, without holding back anything, to the One who has impregnated us in his anointing and wants to descend into us all the way. Brothers, let us then rediscover that the spiritual life becomes free and joyful not when forms are saved and a patch is sewn, but when the initiative is left to the Spirit and, abandoned to his designs, we are ready to serve where and how we are asked : our priesthood does not grow by mending, but by overflowing!
If we let the Spirit of truth act in us, we will keep the anointing - keep the anointing -, because the falsehoods - clerical hypocrisies - the falsehoods with which we are tempted to live with will come to light immediately. And the Spirit, who "washes away what is filthy", will tirelessly prompt us to "not stain the anointing", not even a little. That phrase from Qoheleth comes to mind, which says: "A dead fly spoils the perfumer's ointment" (10:1). It is true, every duplicity – clerical duplicity, please – every duplicity that creeps in is dangerous: it should not be tolerated, but brought to the light of the Spirit. Because if "nothing is more treacherous than the heart and hardly heals" (Jer 17:9), the Holy Spirit, He alone, heals us from infidelities (see Hos 14:5). For us it is an inalienable struggle: it is in fact indispensable, as St. Gregory the Great wrote, that «whoever proclaims the word of God first dedicates himself to his own way of life, so that then, drawing from his own life, he learns what and how to say it. [...] Let no one presume to say outside what he has not heard inside before »[8]. And the Spirit is the inner teacher to listen to, knowing that there is nothing of us that He does not want to anoint. Brothers, let us guard the anointing: invoking the Spirit is not an occasional practice, but the breath of every day.
Come, come, keep the anointing. I, consecrated by him, am called to immerse myself in him, to let his light enter my opacities - we have many - to rediscover the truth of who I am. Let us allow ourselves to be pushed by Him to fight the falsehoods that stir within us; and let us be regenerated by Him in adoration, because when we adore the Lord He pours His Spirit into our hearts.
“The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me; he sent me", the prophecy continues, and he sent me to bring good news, liberation, healing and grace (cf. Is 61:1-2; Lk 4:18-19): in a word, to bring harmony where there is not. Because as St. Basil says: "The Spirit is harmony", it is He who creates harmony. After having told you about the anointing, I would like to tell you something about this harmony which is its consequence. Indeed, the Holy Spirit is harmony. Above all in Heaven: St. Basil explains that «all that super-celestial and ineffable harmony in the service of God and in the reciprocal symphony of the super-cosmic powers, it is impossible for it to be preserved except by the authority of the Spirit»[9]. And then on earth: in the Church He is in fact that "divine and musical Harmony" [10] that binds everything. But think of a presbytery without harmony, without the Spirit: it doesn't work. It arouses the diversity of charisms and recomposes it into unity, it creates a harmony that is not based on homogenization, but on the creativity of charity. So does harmony among the many. So does harmony in a presbyter. During the years of the Second Vatican Council, which was a gift of the Spirit, a theologian published a study in which he spoke of the Spirit not in an individual key, but in the plural. He invited us to think of him as a divine Person not so much singular, but "plural", like the "we of God", the we of the Father and the Son, because he is their nexus, he is in himself concord, communion, harmony [11 ]. I remember that when I read this theological treatise - it was in theology, while studying - I was scandalized: it seemed like a heresy, because in our training we didn't quite understand what the Holy Spirit was like.
Creating harmony is what he desires, especially through those on whom he has poured his anointing. Brothers, building harmony among us is not so much a good method for the ecclesial structure to proceed better, it is not dancing the minuet, it is not a matter of strategy or courtesy: it is an internal need of the life of the Spirit. We sin against the Spirit who is communion when we become, even out of frivolity, instruments of division, for example - and we return to the same theme - with gossip. When we become instruments of division we sin against the Spirit. And he plays into the hands of the enemy, who doesn't come out and loves rumors and insinuations, foments parties and consortia, feeds nostalgia for the past, distrust, pessimism, fear. Let us be careful, please, not to soil the anointing of the Spirit and the robe of Holy Mother Church with disunity, with polarizations, with any lack of charity and communion. Let us remember that the Spirit, "the we of God", prefers the community form: that is, availability with respect to one's needs, obedience with respect to one's tastes, humility with respect to one's claims.
Harmony is not one virtue among others, it is more. St. Gregory the Great writes: "How much the virtue of concord is worth is demonstrated by the fact that, without it, all the other virtues are worth absolutely nothing"[12]. Let us help each other, brothers, to preserve harmony, to preserve harmony - this would be the task - starting not from the others, but each one from himself; asking ourselves: in my words, in my comments, in what I say and write, is there the stamp of the Spirit or that of the world? I also think of the kindness of the priest - but many times priests, we ... are rude - : let's think of the kindness of the priest, if people even find in us dissatisfied people, disgruntled old men who criticize and point fingers, where will they see the 'harmony?
How many do not approach or move away because in the Church they do not feel welcomed and loved, but viewed with suspicion and judged! In the name of God, we welcome and forgive, always! And let us remember that being edgy and complaining, in addition to not producing anything good, corrupts the announcement, because it counter-witnesses God, who is communion and harmony. And this is so displeasing and above all to the Holy Spirit, that the Apostle Paul exhorts us not to grieve (cf. Eph 4:30).
Brothers, I leave you these thoughts that have come from my heart and I conclude by addressing you a simple and important word: thank you. Thank you for your testimony, thank you for your service; thank you for so much hidden good you do, thank you for the forgiveness and consolation you give in the name of God: always forgive, please, never deny forgiveness; thank you for your ministry, which often takes place amid much effort, misunderstanding and little recognition. Brothers, may the Spirit of God, who does not leave those who place their trust in him disappointed, fill you with peace and bring to completion what he began in you, so that you may be prophets of his anointing and apostles of harmony.
________________________
[1] Nicene-Constantinopolitan symbol.
[2] Cf. Sequence of Pentecost.
[3] Spir. 16.39.
[4] Cf. Irenaeus, Adv. haer. IV,20,1.
[5] R. Voillaume, «The second call», in S. Stevan, ed. The Second Call. The courage of fragility, Bologna 2018, 15.
[6] ibid., 24.
[7] ibid., 16.
[8] Homilies on Ezekiel, I,X,13-14.
[9] Spir. XVI, 38.
[10] In Ps. 29.1.
[11] See H. Mühlen, Der Heilige Geist als Person. Ich – Du – Wir, Münster in W., 1963.
[12] Homilies on Ezekiel, I,VIII,8.
During the Eucharistic celebration, the priests renewed the promises made at the moment of the Sacred Ordination; then the blessing of the oil of the sick, of the oil of the catechumens and of the chrism took place.
FULL TEXT homily that the Pope delivered after the proclamation of the Holy Gospel:
Homily of the Holy Father
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me" (Lk 4:18): Jesus' preaching began from this verse and the Word we heard today took its cue from the same verse (cf. Is 61:1). In the beginning, therefore, is the Spirit of the Lord.
And it is on him that I would like to reflect with you today, dear confreres, on the Spirit of the Lord. Because without the Spirit of the Lord there is no Christian life and, without his anointing, there is no holiness. He is the protagonist and it is beautiful today, on the birth day of the priesthood, to recognize that He is at the origin of our ministry, of the life and vitality of every Pastor.
In fact, Holy Mother Church teaches us to profess that the Holy Spirit "gives life"[1], as Jesus affirmed when he said: "It is the Spirit who gives life" (Jn 6:63); teaching taken up by the apostle Paul, who wrote that "the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" (2 Cor 3:6) and spoke of the "law of the Spirit, which gives life in Christ Jesus" (Rom 8:2) . Without him not even the Church would be the living Bride of Christ, but at most a religious organization - more or less good; it would not be the Body of Christ, but a temple built with human hands. How then to build the Church, if not starting from the fact that we are "temples of the Holy Spirit" who "dwells in us" (see 1 Cor 6:19; 3:16)? We cannot leave it outside the house or park it in some devotional area, no, in the centre! We need to say every day: "Come, because without your strength there is nothing in man"[2].
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. Each of us can tell; and it is not presumption, it is reality, since every Christian, especially every priest, can make the following words his own: "for the Lord has anointed me" (Is 61:1). Brothers, without merit, by pure grace we have received an anointing which made us fathers and shepherds in the holy People of God. Let us then dwell on this aspect of the Spirit: the anointing.
After the first "anointing" which took place in Mary's womb, the Spirit descended upon Jesus at the Jordan. Following this, as St. Basil explains, "every action [of Christ] was being accomplished with the co-presence of the Holy Spirit"[3]. With the power of that anointing, in fact, he preached and worked signs, by virtue of it "a power flowed from him that healed everyone" (Lk 6:19). Jesus and the Spirit always work together, so as to be like the two hands of the Father[4] - Irenaeus says this - which, reaching out towards us, embrace us and lift us up. And by them our hands were sealed, anointed by the Spirit of Christ. Yes, brothers, the Lord has not only chosen and called us here and there: he has poured into us the anointing of his Spirit, the same one who descended on the Apostles. Brothers we are the "anointed ones".
So let us look to them, to the Apostles. Jesus chose them and at his call they left their boats, nets, houses and so on ... The anointing of the Word changed their lives. Enthusiastically they followed the Master and began to preach, convinced that they would later accomplish even greater things; until Easter came. There everything seemed to stop: they came to deny and abandon the Master. We don't have to be afraid. We are brave to read about our own lives and our falls. They came to deny and abandon the Master, Peter, the first. They came to terms with their inadequacy and realized that they had not understood it: the "I do not know this man" (Mk 14:71), which Peter chanted in the courtyard of the high priest after the Last Supper, is not just an impulsive defence, but an admission of spiritual ignorance: he and the others perhaps expected a life of success behind a Messiah who drove crowds and worked wonders, but they did not recognize the scandal of the cross, which crumbled their certainties. Jesus knew that they could not have done it alone and for this he promised them the Paraclete. And it was precisely that "second anointing" at Pentecost that transformed the disciples, leading them to feed the flock of God and no longer themselves. And this is the contradiction to be resolved: am I a shepherd of God's people or of myself? And there is the Spirit to teach me the way. It was that anointing of fire that extinguished their religiosity centered on themselves and on their own abilities: having welcomed the Spirit, Peter's fears and hesitations evaporated; James and John, burnt by the desire to give their lives, stop pursuing places of honor (see Mk 10:35-45), our careerism, brothers; the others are no longer closed and fearful in the Upper Room, but go out and become apostles in the world. It is the spirit that changes our heart, that puts it on that different, different level.
Brothers, such an itinerary embraces our priestly and apostolic life. There was also a first anointing for us, which began with a call of love that stole our hearts. For it we left the moorings and the strength of the Spirit descended on that genuine enthusiasm, which consecrated us. Then, according to God's timing, the Easter stage arrives for each one, which marks the moment of truth. And it is a moment of crisis, which takes various forms. Everyone, sooner or later, experiences disappointments, hardships, weaknesses, with the ideal that seems to wear out among the demands of reality, while a certain habit takes over and some trials, previously difficult to imagine, make fidelity appear more uncomfortable than at a time. This stage - of this temptation, of this trial that we have all had, have and will have - this stage represents a decisive ridge for whoever has received the anointing. One can come out badly, gliding towards a certain mediocrity, dragging oneself tired into a "normality" where three dangerous temptations creep in: that of compromise, whereby one is satisfied with what one can do; that of surrogates, for which we try to "recharge" ourselves with something other than our anointing; that of discouragement – which is the most common -, whereby, dissatisfied, one goes on by inertia. And here is the great risk: while appearances remain intact - "I am a priest, I am a priest" - we withdraw into ourselves and tend to live listlessly; the fragrance of the anointing no longer perfumes life and the heart; and the heart does not expand but shrinks, wrapped in disenchantment. It's a distillate, you know? When the priesthood slowly slips into clericalism and the priest forgets that he is a pastor of the people, to become a state cleric.
But this crisis can also become the turning point for the priesthood, the "decisive stage of the spiritual life, in which the final choice must be made between Jesus and the world, between the heroic nature of charity and mediocrity, between the cross and a certain well-being , between holiness and honest fidelity to religious commitment»[5]. At the end of this celebration they will give you as a gift a classic, a book that deals with this problem: "The second call", is a classic by Father Voillaume that touches on this problem, read it. Then all of us need to reflect on this moment of our priesthood. It is the blessed moment in which we, like the disciples at Easter, are called to be "humble enough to confess ourselves conquered by the humiliated and crucified Christ, and to agree to begin a new journey, that of the Spirit, of faith and of a strong love and without illusions»[6]. It is the chairos in which he discovers that "everything is not reduced to abandoning the boat and the nets to follow Jesus for a certain time, but it requires going to Calvary, accepting its lesson and fruit, and going with the help of the Holy Spirit until the end of a life which must end in the perfection of divine charity" [7]. With the help of the Holy Spirit: it is the time, for us as for the Apostles, of a "second anointing", a time for a second call that we must listen to, for the second anointing, where we welcome the Spirit not on the enthusiasm of our dreams, but on the fragility of our reality. It is an anointing that makes truth deep down, which allows the Spirit to anoint our weaknesses, our hardships, our interior poverty. Then the anointing smells again: of Him, not of us. At this moment, inwardly, I am recalling some of you who are in crisis - let's say - who are disoriented and who don't know how to take the road, how to get back on the road in this second anointing of the Spirit. To these brothers - I have them present - I simply say: courage, the Lord is greater than your weaknesses, your sins. Trust the Lord and let yourself be called a second time, this time with the anointing of the Holy Spirit. The double life won't help you; throw everything out the window, not even. Look ahead, let yourself be caressed by the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
And the way to this step of maturation is to admit the truth of one's weakness. To this exhorts us "the Spirit of truth" (Jn 16:13), who moves us to look inside ourselves to the depths, to ask ourselves: my fulfillment depends on my skill, on the role I get, on the compliments I receive, on my career what do I do, from my superiors or collaborators, or from the comforts I can guarantee, or from the anointing that perfumes my life? Brothers, priestly maturity comes from the Holy Spirit, it is accomplished when He becomes the protagonist of our life. Then everything changes perspective, even the disappointments and bitternesses – even the sins -, because it is no longer a matter of trying to get better by fixing something, but of handing ourselves over, without holding back anything, to the One who has impregnated us in his anointing and wants to descend into us all the way. Brothers, let us then rediscover that the spiritual life becomes free and joyful not when forms are saved and a patch is sewn, but when the initiative is left to the Spirit and, abandoned to his designs, we are ready to serve where and how we are asked : our priesthood does not grow by mending, but by overflowing!
If we let the Spirit of truth act in us, we will keep the anointing - keep the anointing -, because the falsehoods - clerical hypocrisies - the falsehoods with which we are tempted to live with will come to light immediately. And the Spirit, who "washes away what is filthy", will tirelessly prompt us to "not stain the anointing", not even a little. That phrase from Qoheleth comes to mind, which says: "A dead fly spoils the perfumer's ointment" (10:1). It is true, every duplicity – clerical duplicity, please – every duplicity that creeps in is dangerous: it should not be tolerated, but brought to the light of the Spirit. Because if "nothing is more treacherous than the heart and hardly heals" (Jer 17:9), the Holy Spirit, He alone, heals us from infidelities (see Hos 14:5). For us it is an inalienable struggle: it is in fact indispensable, as St. Gregory the Great wrote, that «whoever proclaims the word of God first dedicates himself to his own way of life, so that then, drawing from his own life, he learns what and how to say it. [...] Let no one presume to say outside what he has not heard inside before »[8]. And the Spirit is the inner teacher to listen to, knowing that there is nothing of us that He does not want to anoint. Brothers, let us guard the anointing: invoking the Spirit is not an occasional practice, but the breath of every day.
Come, come, keep the anointing. I, consecrated by him, am called to immerse myself in him, to let his light enter my opacities - we have many - to rediscover the truth of who I am. Let us allow ourselves to be pushed by Him to fight the falsehoods that stir within us; and let us be regenerated by Him in adoration, because when we adore the Lord He pours His Spirit into our hearts.
“The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord hath anointed me; he sent me", the prophecy continues, and he sent me to bring good news, liberation, healing and grace (cf. Is 61:1-2; Lk 4:18-19): in a word, to bring harmony where there is not. Because as St. Basil says: "The Spirit is harmony", it is He who creates harmony. After having told you about the anointing, I would like to tell you something about this harmony which is its consequence. Indeed, the Holy Spirit is harmony. Above all in Heaven: St. Basil explains that «all that super-celestial and ineffable harmony in the service of God and in the reciprocal symphony of the super-cosmic powers, it is impossible for it to be preserved except by the authority of the Spirit»[9]. And then on earth: in the Church He is in fact that "divine and musical Harmony" [10] that binds everything. But think of a presbytery without harmony, without the Spirit: it doesn't work. It arouses the diversity of charisms and recomposes it into unity, it creates a harmony that is not based on homogenization, but on the creativity of charity. So does harmony among the many. So does harmony in a presbyter. During the years of the Second Vatican Council, which was a gift of the Spirit, a theologian published a study in which he spoke of the Spirit not in an individual key, but in the plural. He invited us to think of him as a divine Person not so much singular, but "plural", like the "we of God", the we of the Father and the Son, because he is their nexus, he is in himself concord, communion, harmony [11 ]. I remember that when I read this theological treatise - it was in theology, while studying - I was scandalized: it seemed like a heresy, because in our training we didn't quite understand what the Holy Spirit was like.
Creating harmony is what he desires, especially through those on whom he has poured his anointing. Brothers, building harmony among us is not so much a good method for the ecclesial structure to proceed better, it is not dancing the minuet, it is not a matter of strategy or courtesy: it is an internal need of the life of the Spirit. We sin against the Spirit who is communion when we become, even out of frivolity, instruments of division, for example - and we return to the same theme - with gossip. When we become instruments of division we sin against the Spirit. And he plays into the hands of the enemy, who doesn't come out and loves rumors and insinuations, foments parties and consortia, feeds nostalgia for the past, distrust, pessimism, fear. Let us be careful, please, not to soil the anointing of the Spirit and the robe of Holy Mother Church with disunity, with polarizations, with any lack of charity and communion. Let us remember that the Spirit, "the we of God", prefers the community form: that is, availability with respect to one's needs, obedience with respect to one's tastes, humility with respect to one's claims.
Harmony is not one virtue among others, it is more. St. Gregory the Great writes: "How much the virtue of concord is worth is demonstrated by the fact that, without it, all the other virtues are worth absolutely nothing"[12]. Let us help each other, brothers, to preserve harmony, to preserve harmony - this would be the task - starting not from the others, but each one from himself; asking ourselves: in my words, in my comments, in what I say and write, is there the stamp of the Spirit or that of the world? I also think of the kindness of the priest - but many times priests, we ... are rude - : let's think of the kindness of the priest, if people even find in us dissatisfied people, disgruntled old men who criticize and point fingers, where will they see the 'harmony?
How many do not approach or move away because in the Church they do not feel welcomed and loved, but viewed with suspicion and judged! In the name of God, we welcome and forgive, always! And let us remember that being edgy and complaining, in addition to not producing anything good, corrupts the announcement, because it counter-witnesses God, who is communion and harmony. And this is so displeasing and above all to the Holy Spirit, that the Apostle Paul exhorts us not to grieve (cf. Eph 4:30).
Brothers, I leave you these thoughts that have come from my heart and I conclude by addressing you a simple and important word: thank you. Thank you for your testimony, thank you for your service; thank you for so much hidden good you do, thank you for the forgiveness and consolation you give in the name of God: always forgive, please, never deny forgiveness; thank you for your ministry, which often takes place amid much effort, misunderstanding and little recognition. Brothers, may the Spirit of God, who does not leave those who place their trust in him disappointed, fill you with peace and bring to completion what he began in you, so that you may be prophets of his anointing and apostles of harmony.
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[1] Nicene-Constantinopolitan symbol.
[2] Cf. Sequence of Pentecost.
[3] Spir. 16.39.
[4] Cf. Irenaeus, Adv. haer. IV,20,1.
[5] R. Voillaume, «The second call», in S. Stevan, ed. The Second Call. The courage of fragility, Bologna 2018, 15.
[6] ibid., 24.
[7] ibid., 16.
[8] Homilies on Ezekiel, I,X,13-14.
[9] Spir. XVI, 38.
[10] In Ps. 29.1.
[11] See H. Mühlen, Der Heilige Geist als Person. Ich – Du – Wir, Münster in W., 1963.
[12] Homilies on Ezekiel, I,VIII,8.
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