Life in the Spirit, Part III: First Things Last

Continuing from Parts I and II...

One of the best ways of discerning the workings of the Holy Spirit is in conjunction with others. This is part of the reason why Rome supports the Charismatic Renewal through the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships, an organization under the auspices of the Pontifical Council for the Laity. I mentioned the Catholic Fraternity in my first post, but did not elaborate on its significance. This is not just an organizational matter. Discerning the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives is not something one learns overnight. Some people attend a single prayer meeting, are told they have received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and are then released out into the world, without explanation, without formation and without the support of a community. This is at odds with natural common sense and with God's revelation in the Church, which unites its many members in a single body. Thus, charismatic prayer ought not be separated from community life and the guidance of holy and mature leaders.

Like all aspects of our faith, we should remember that the charismatic life does not happen in a vacuum. As mentioned above, we must be faithful to reading the Scriptures and listening to God's voice there if we also want to hear Him in our hearts. We must be striving to grow in virtue: in patience, generosity, humility, self-control. These and the other virtues orient us to truth and goodness, disposing us to the Lord's will and giving us the continence to act upon it. Moreover, if we are to grow and flourish in the charismatic life we need to be receiving the sacraments, sources of grace and mercy.

I shall conclude this discussion with a point which I probably ought to have made explicit from the beginning. The Holy Spirit is not a force or an idea or a feeling. The Holy Spirit is a person, the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, one in being with the Father and Son, but also distinct from them. Thus, we should not think about charismatic prayer as a mechanistic process, whereby we can expect experiences X, Y and Z if we engage in actions A, B and C. No, charismatic prayer is primarily a relationship, a personal relationship with the Holy Spirit, Whom Christ sent to us after His ascension. If we recall that the Holy Spirit is a person and our prayer is a relationship, many things fall into their proper place. Of course we cannot "master" charismatic prayer in a day; relationships take time to grow and develop. Moreover, just as I relate to some friends differently than others, so different people will have different relationships with the Spirit. This is not a deficiency in anyone's prayer, but a sign of intimacy, that the Spirit knows and loves us in unique ways.

These are but a few thoughts that came to me over the course of a couple evenings. I hope they have elucidated a few dimensions of the charismatic life. But if you really want to meet the Holy Spirit, it will not on a blog. Rich Mullins once explained, "If you really want spiritual nourishment, read your Bible, go to church." And if you want to encounter the Holy Spirit, it will be in prayer. So go meet Him there.

Life in the Spirit, Part I: Emotionalism?

The Charismatic Renewal is often accused of emotionalism. This is an interesting claim. It is frequently true in practice, but masks a far more interesting understanding of the human person and of the work of the Holy Spirit found in proper charismatic life. Moreover, in addressing the question of emotionalism, I discovered that a lot of other important issues are addressed as well.

By way of introduction, it is worth pointing out that the Catholic Church has endorsed the Charismatic Renewal, particularly in the form of the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships. So if one accepts the Church's authority - and I realize not all do - then the question is not whether charismatic spirituality is legitimate, but how or why.

In the first instance, I think it important to remember the integrity of the human person. Loosely following Plato's tripartite division of the soul, we might describe ourselves as physical, emotional and intellectual. Since God made all three, He has declared them all good. Thus, use of reason is of God, and a good thing. (More on that below.) Only slightly less obviously, the body is a good thing and should be used for good purposes. One can take this in a Theology of the Body direction, but even more prosaically, one can look at something like liturgical gestures. Unlike the Gnostics, who contended that the body was at best irrelevant and at worst evil, we respect the body and the physical things we do with it. Thus, it matters if you stand or sit. Waving our hands about in the sign of the cross is meaningful, even good. Through our physical actions we can glorify God. Thus, it should come as little surprise that people may experience a physical response to the presence of the Holy Spirit: tears, laughter, speaking in strange languages.

And here it is worth a brief digression to clarify a point. C. S. Lewis, hardly a tongues-speaking charismatic - so far as I can tell - wrote an interesting little essay titled "Transposition". In it he makes the argument that there are more interior states or experiences than there are physical sensations for them. Thus, your stomach may leap when you hear bad news or when you hear a brilliant musical crescendo, but even if the two feel the same, they are manifestations of different things. (The same might be said for tears of sorrow and tears of joy.) Following this line, Lewis says that we should not be scandalized if speaking in tongues sounds like the kind of gibberish that results from mass psychology and hysteria. They may in fact sound exactly alike. That need not mean they are the same things (even if some people claiming to exhibit the one are actually suffering from the other). But more on tongues to follow...

Returning to the tripartite division of the soul. If God can work through and be glorified in the intellectual and the physical, so too in the emotional. This is not to say that one should give himself totally over to his emotions. But it should come as little surprise that the Holy Spirit might operate at times through our emotions. On a related note: if we sometimes utilize intellectual arguments to convince people of the truth, and we sometimes create beautiful works of physical art to attract them to it, is it so wrong to utilize the emotions to draw people to the truth? As Plato notes, the emotions should not run rampant on their own but should be harnessed to a higher purpose. But if that higher purpose is rightly understood, is a little mood lighting and music to place worshipers in a proper emotional disposition impermissible?

If, then, we conclude that the inclusion of the emotions in one's spirituality is plausible, even desirable, one might ask more specifically about receiving a "word" of insight from the Holy Spirit. Is this anything more than listening to one's own emotions? Here we can note several things: Prophesy happens in Scripture, both for revelation of doctrine (now closed with the perfect revelation of Christ) and for specific exhortations and admonitions for specific people. In some instances we see the prophet actually hearing a message, but as often as not, "the word of the Lord came unto..." How that word came is left ambiguous. But if one receives a word from the Holy Spirit, how do we know that is what it is?

We shall take up that question tomorrow.