The Pope presided over the Chrism Mass this Holy Thursday, April 6, at the altar of the Chair of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican with the assistance of numerous priests of the Diocese of Rome and members of the Roman Curia, whom he warned about 3 “dangerous temptations” that can be overcome thanks to the Holy Spirit.
Below is the full homily of Pope Francis:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me” (Lk 4,18). From this verse began the preaching of Jesus and this same verse began the Word that we have just heard (cf. Is 61,1). So in the beginning there is the Spirit of the Lord.
And I would like to reflect on Him today with you, dear brothers. Because without the Spirit of the Lord there is no Christian life and, without his anointing of him, there is no holiness. He is the protagonist and, on this day when the priesthood was born, it is beautiful to recognize that He is at the origin of our ministry, of the life and vitality of every pastor.
Indeed, Holy Mother Church teaches us to profess that the Holy Spirit is “giver of life”, as Jesus affirmed saying: “The Spirit is the one who gives Life” (Jn 6,63); a teaching echoed 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, the Church would not be the living Bride of Christ either, but at most a religious organization; not the Body of Christ, but a temple built by human hands. How, then, can the Church be built, if not starting from the fact that we are “temples of the Holy Spirit” who “dwells in us” (cf. 1 Cor 6,19; 3,16)? We cannot put it aside or park it in some devotion area. We need to tell him every day: “Come because without your divine help there is nothing in man.”
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. Each of us can say this; It is not presumption, but reality, since every Christian, especially every priest, can make the following words his own: “because the Lord has anointed me” (Is 61,1). Brothers, without merit, by pure grace we have received an anointing that has made us parents and shepherds in the holy People of God. So let us consider this aspect of the Spirit: the anointing.
After the first “anointing” that took place in the womb of Mary, the Spirit descended on Jesus in the Jordan. After this, as Saint Basil explains, “every action [of Christ] was carried out with the co-presence of the Holy Spirit.”
Indeed, by the power of that anointing, he preached and performed signs; by virtue of it “a force came out of him that healed everyone” (Lk 6,19). Jesus and the Spirit always act together, in such a way that they are like the two hands of the Father[4] that, extended towards us, embrace us and lift us up, Irenaeus said this. And by them our hands were marked, noted by the Spirit of Christ. Yes, my brothers, the Lord has not only chosen and called us, but he has poured out on us the anointing of his Spirit of him, the same Spirit that descended on the Apostles. Brethren, we are anointed.
Let us focus, then, on them, on the Apostles. Jesus chose them and at his call they left their boats, their nets, their houses. The annointing of the Word changed their lives. They enthusiastically followed the Master and began to preach, convinced that later they would accomplish even greater things; until Easter came. There everything seemed to stop; They came to deny and abandon the Master, Pedro was the first.
Let’s not be afraid, let’s be brave reading our own life and our own falls. They became aware of their own inadequacy and realized that they had not understood it. The “I do not know that man” (cf. Mk 14,71), which Peter uttered in the high priest’s courtyard after the Last Supper, is not just an impulsive defense, but a confession of spiritual ignorance: he and the others perhaps they expected a life of success behind a Messiah who attracted crowds and did wonders, but they did not recognize the scandal of the cross, which shattered their certainties. Jesus knew that they would not achieve anything alone, and that is why he promised them the Paraclete.
And it was precisely that “second anointing”, at Pentecost, that transformed the disciples, leading them to shepherd the flock of God and no longer themselves. This is the contradiction to be resolved; to be shepherds of the people of God or to be shepherds of themselves, and it is the Spirit who points the way. It was that fervent anointing that extinguished their self-centered religiosity and their own abilities.
Upon receiving the Spirit, Peter’s fears and hesitation evaporate; Santiago and Juan, consumed by the desire to give their lives, stop looking for positions of honor (cf. Mc 10, 35-45), brothers, our careerism; the others no longer remain locked up and fearful in the upper room, but go out and become apostles in the world. The Spirit is the one that changes our heart, puts it on a different and different level.
Brothers, an itinerary like this encompasses our priestly and apostolic life. For us too there was a first annointing, which began with a call of love that captivated our hearts. For her de ella we loosened our moorings, and on that genuine enthusiasm the strength of the Spirit descended, which consecrated us. Then, according to God’s time, the paschal stage arrives for each one, which marks the moment of truth. And it is a moment of crisis, which takes various forms.
Sooner or later, it happens to all of us that we experience disappointments, difficulties and weaknesses, with the ideal that seems to wear out between the demands of reality, while a certain habit prevails; and some tests, previously difficult to imagine, make fidelity seem more difficult than before. This stage, of this temptation and test that we all had and will have, represents a culminating moment for those who have received the anointing.
One can get out of it badly, slipping towards a certain mediocrity, dragging wearily towards a “normality” in which three dangerous temptations hint at themselves: that of commitment, where by one settles for what one can do; that of substitutes, by which one tries to “fill” with something different from our anointing; that of discouragement, whereby, dissatisfied, one moves on out of sheer inertia.
And here is the great risk: while appearances remain intact, we withdraw into ourselves and continue unmotivated; the fragrance of the anointing no longer perfumes life and the heart no longer expands, but shrinks, wrapped in disappointment. It’s a mix of things; when the priesthood slowly slips into clericalism and the priest forgets to be a pastor of the people to become a state cleric.
But this crisis can also become the turning point of the priesthood, in the “decisive stage of the spiritual life, in which the definitive choice must be made between Jesus and the world, between the heroism 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 you will receive as a gift a classic book that deals with this problem: “The Second Call” by Father Voillaume, read it because we all need to reflect on this moment of our priesthood.
It is the blessed moment in which, like the disciples at Easter, we are called to be “humble enough to confess that we are defeated by Christ humiliated and crucified, and accept to start a new path, that of the Spirit, that of faith and that of a love strong and without illusions”. It is the kairos in which to discover that “things are not reduced to abandoning the boat and the nets to follow Jesus for a certain time, but it requires going to Calvary, accepting the lesson and the fruit, and going with the help of the Holy Spirit until the end of a life that must end in the perfection of divine Charity”.
With the help of the Holy Spirit: it is the time, for us as for the Apostles, of a “second anointing”, a second call, in which we welcome the Spirit not in the enthusiasm of our dreams, but in the fragility of our reality. It is an anointing that reveals the truth deep within ourselves, that allows the Spirit to anoint our weaknesses, our jobs, our interior poverty. Then the anointing smells good again: Christ’s fragrance, not ours.
At this moment, I am internally remembering some of you who are in crisis, disoriented and do not know how to get back on track in this second anointing of the Spirit. I think of these brothers and I tell them simply: Courage, the Lord is greater than your weaknesses, your sins, trust in the Lord and let yourself be called a second time, this time with the anointing of the Holy Spirit; the double life will not help you, throwing everything out the window either, look ahead, let yourself be caressed by the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
The way to do this is to admit the truth of one’s own weakness. “The Spirit of Truth” (Jn 16:13) exhorts us to this, prompting us to look deep within ourselves, to ask ourselves: does my fulfillment depend on how good I am, the position I obtain, the compliments that I receive, of the career that I do, of the superiors or collaborators that I have, of the comforts that I can guarantee myself, or of the anointing that perfumes my life? Brothers, priestly maturity passes through the Holy Spirit, it is realized when He becomes the protagonist of our life.
Then everything changes perspective, even disappointments and bitterness, even sins, because it is no longer a question of improving by composing something, but of giving ourselves, without reserving anything, to the One who has impregnated us with his anointing and wants to reach the most deep within us Brothers, let us rediscover then that the spiritual life becomes free and joyful not when the forms are kept and a patch is made, but when the initiative is left to the Spirit and, abandoned to its designs, we prepare to serve where and how we are asked. Our priesthood does not grow by patching up, but by overflowing!
If we allow the Spirit of truth to act in us, we will guard the anointing, because the falsehoods, the clerical hypocrisies, with which we are tempted to live, will come to light. And the Spirit, who “washes away the stains”, will suggest to us, without getting tired, that “we do not stain the anointing”, not one bit. I am reminded of that phrase of Qoheleth that says: “A dead fly corrupts and makes the perfumer’s oil ferment” (10,1).
It is true, all duplicity, clerical duplicity please, all duplicity that is hinted at is dangerous, we must not tolerate it, but bring it to the light of the Spirit. Because if “nothing is more tortuous than the human heart and cannot be fixed” (Jr 17,9), the Holy Spirit is the only one who cures us of infidelity (cf. Hos 14,5).
For us it is a fight that we cannot give up, in fact, it is essential, as Saint Gregory the Great wrote, that “whoever preaches the word of God considers first how he should live, so that later, from his life, he deduce what and how must preach. Let him not dare to say outwardly what he would not have heard first on the inside. The inner teacher that must be listened to is the Spirit, knowing that there is nothing in us that He does not want to anoint.
Brothers, let us guard the annointing; that invoking the Spirit is not an occasional practice, but the encouragement of each day. I, anointed by Him, am called to immerse myself in Him, to let his light of him enter my opacity, which we have so many, to find the truth of who I am. Let us allow ourselves to be impelled by Him to combat the falsehoods that stir within us; and let us allow ourselves to be regenerated by Him in adoration, because when we adore him, He pours out his Spirit of him in our hearts.
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. He sent me” -the prophecy continues- 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 none. Because as Saint Basil says: “The Spirit is harmony”, it is He who makes harmony. After having spoken to you about the annointing, he would like to tell you something about harmony, which is its consequence. Indeed, the Holy Spirit is harmony. First of all, in heaven. Saint Basil explains that “all that supercelestial and inexpressible harmony in the service of God and in the mutual symphony of supracosmic powers, it is impossible for it to be preserved if it is not by the authority of the Spirit”.And then on earth.
He is, indeed, in the Church, that “divine and musical harmony” that unites everything. He raises the diversity of charisms and recomposes it into unity, he creates a concord that is not based on homologation, but on the creativity of charity. Thus he creates harmony in multiplicity. He thus creates harmony in a presbytery.
In the years of the Second Vatican Council, gift of the Spirit, a theologian published a study in which he spoke of the Spirit not in an individual key, but in a plural way. He invited us to think of him as a divine Person, not so much singular, but “plural”, as the “we of God”, the “we” of the Father and the Son, because he is their nexus, he is in himself concord, communion, harmony. I remember that when I read this theological treatise, I was a theology student, I was shocked, it seemed like a heresy. Because in our formation it was not well understood what the Holy Spirit was like.
Creating harmony is what he desires, especially through those on whom he has poured out his anointing. Brothers, creating harmony among us is not only an appropriate method for ecclesial coordination to work better, it is not a question of strategy or courtesy, but rather an internal requirement of life in the Spirit.
One sins against the Spirit, which is communion, when we become, even if it is lightness, instruments of division, gossip, when we are instruments of division, we sin against the Spirit; and we play the game of the enemy, who does not come to light and loves rumors and insinuations, who encourages parties and roped parties, feeds nostalgia for the past, mistrust, pessimism, fear.
Let us be careful, please, not to soil the anointing of the Spirit and the mantle of 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 communal form: availability regarding one’s own needs, obedience regarding one’s own tastes, humility regarding one’s own claims.
Harmony is not a virtue among others, it is much more. Saint Gregory the Great writes: ˝The virtue of concord is worth, then, since, without it, it is demonstrated that the other virtues are not virtues˝.
Let’s help each other, brothers, to guard harmony, starting not with others, but with oneself; asking ourselves: my words, my comments, what I say and write, do they have the seal of the Spirit or that of the world? I also think of the kindness of the priest, but so often we priests are rude, let us think of the kindness of the priest: if people find even in us dissatisfied and discontented people, bachelors, who criticize and point fingers, where will they discover the harmony? How many people do not come close or walk away because in the Church they do not feel welcomed and loved, but looked at with suspicion and judged!
In the name of God, let us always welcome and forgive! Let us remember that being sour and complaining, in addition to not producing anything good, corrupts the announcement, because it counter-testifies to God, who is communion and harmony. This displeases above all the Holy Spirit, whom the Apostle Paul exhorts us not to grieve (cf. Eph 4,30).
Brothers, I leave you with these reflections that I carry in my heart and I conclude by directing you a simple and important word: thank you. Thank you for your testimony and thank you for his service to him; thank you for the hidden good you do, for the forgiveness and consolation you give in the name of God, always forgive, please, never deny forgiveness; thank you for your ministry, which is often accomplished with much effort and little recognition.
May the Spirit of God, who does not disappoint those who trust in Him, fill you with peace and bring to completion what has begun in you, so that you may be prophets of his anointing and apostles of harmony.