•And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit… (Acts 2:4)
•When you send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth. (Psalm 104:30)
•For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons, and we were all given to drink of one Spirit. (1 Corinthians 12:13)
•Jesus came and stood in their midst and said to them, “Peace be with you.” (John 20:19)
•And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.” (John 20:22)

 

•Describe “filled with the Holy Spirit.”
•Explain “in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body.”
•What is John saying when he writes, “he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’”?

The problem of forming Christ in us is not to be solved by our own efforts. It is not a matter of studying the Gospels and then working to put our ideas into practice, although we should try and do that too, but always under the guidance of grace, in complete subjection to the Holy Spirit.

For if we depend on our own ideas, our own judgment and our own efforts to reproduce the life of Christ, we will only act out some pious charade which will ultimately scare everybody we meet because it will be so stiff and artificial and so dead.

It is the Spirit of God that must teach us Who Christ is and form Christ in us and transform us into other Christs.<sup>1



1</sup>Merton, Thomas, New Seeds of Contemplation, New Directions: New York, 1961, p. 156.