John 15:26-16:4a

Acts 16:11-15

Psalm 149:1b-2, 3-4, 5-6a and 9b

John 15:26-16:4a

Jesus said to his disciples:

“When the Advocate comes whom I will send you from the Father,

the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father,

he will testify to me.

And you also testify,

because you have been with me from the beginning.

“I have told you this so that you may not fall away.

They will expel you from the synagogues;

in fact, the hour is coming when everyone who kills you

will think he is offering worship to God.

They will do this because they have not known either the Father or me.

I have told you this so that when their hour comes

you may remember that I told you.”

Opening Prayer: Lord God, send your Spirit of truth, the Advocate, into my heart. Unmask the lies I have welcomed and lead me to be authentic in all that I say, think, and do. Open my ears to hear the testimony of the Spirit.

Encountering the Word of God

1. Two Advocates: Both Jesus and the Holy Spirit are referred to as Advocates or Counselors (Paracletes). The word “paraclete” is a legal term in Greek that means an attorney or spokesperson, i.e., someone you call to your side to defend you in a courtroom. Jesus uses the term “for a heavenly intercessor who is called to the side of God’s children to offer strength and support. Jesus is a ‘Paraclete’ because in heaven he pleads to the Father for believers still struggling on earth (1 John 2:1)” (Ignatius Catholic Study Bible, 1917. Jesus is a good Advocate before the Father because, through his Incarnation, he has identified himself with us and has solidarity with us. He was tempted like us, and yet did not fall into temptation. He knows our strengths, our weaknesses, our struggles, and our very real temptations to power, pleasure, and possessions. And yet, he did not sin. He did not, like the old Adam, give in to temptation. His solidarity with us informs his merciful and priestly intercession on our behalf.

2. Spirit of Truth: The Holy Spirit is also one of our advocates. The Spirit is sent to strengthen the disciples in Jesus’ absence (John 14:16), instruct them in the truth (John 14:26; 15:26), and defend them against the prosecutions of the devil (John 16:7-11), who is the ‘accuser’ of the family of God (Revelation 12:10) (see Ignatius Catholic Study Bible, 1917). While Jesus lived our life and can plead for us at the right hand of the Father and intercede for us as our eternal and merciful high priest, the Holy Spirit fills us with his Love and moves us in each moment to choose the good and act in accord with the Father’s plan. The Spirit knows the depths of our hearts and can offer good counsel and move us to live truly as adopted children of God.

3. The Western and Eastern Traditions on the Procession of the Spirit: One of the theological issues that divided Christianity was how to understand the eternal procession of the Holy Spirit. While both the East and the West affirm and confess the divinity of the Spirit, Catholics hold that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, while Orthodox Christians hold that the Spirit proceeds from the Father through the Son. The Catechism summarizes that this is not so much a controversy as a legitimate complementarity: “At the outset the Eastern tradition expresses the Father’s character as first origin of the Spirit. By confessing the Spirit as he ‘who proceeds from the Father,’ it affirms that he comes from the Father through the Son (see John 15:26). The Western tradition expresses first the consubstantial communion between Father and Son, by saying that the Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son (filioque). It says this, ‘legitimately and with good reason,’ (Council of Florence from 1438-1445) for the eternal order of the divine persons in their consubstantial communion implies that the Father, as ‘the principle without principle,’ is the first origin of the Spirit, but also that as Father of the only Son, he is, with the Son, the single principle from which the Holy Spirit proceeds (Second Council of Lyons in 1274). This legitimate complementarity, provided it does not become rigid, does not affect the identity of faith in the reality of the same mystery confessed” (CCC, 248)

Conversing with Christ: Lord Jesus, I contemplate today how the Spirit guided you in your life and guided the Apostles as they preached the Gospel. I pray that I be docile to the action of the Holy Spirit and patient when I do not understand where or how the Spirit is leading me.

Living the Word of God: How am I giving witness to Jesus in my daily life? Do I see how the Spirit empowers me? Am I striving for authenticity of life?