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As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Having said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit”
(Jn 20:21-22).
Jesus appeared to Mary Magdalene on Easter morning and that same evening Jesus came among his disciples for the first time. Their immediate reaction was one of joy, which filled them with peace, the true peace that only God can give.1 “Peace be with you” (v. 21). Joy and peace are fruits of the Holy Spirit.2 In fact, Jesus immediately told them: “Receive the Holy Spirit” (v. 22).
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Having said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
The Holy Spirit not only enables the disciples to carry out the same mission given to Jesus by the Father, but also “re-creates” them as a “new” humanity. The gesture of the Risen Lord breathing on them is the same as that of the Creator breathing into the nostrils of the first human being, Adam, who was formed from the dust of the earth.3
Just as creation is the ongoing work of the Father’s love that sustains the entire universe, so the new creation wrought by the Risen Lord in the Holy Spirit continually sustains humanity on its journey towards the kingdom of God.
This month’s Word of Life reminds us that we have a great opportunity in our life, which is that of becoming “another Jesus.” This is true for each of us individually, but even more so as a community. Jesus speaks to his disciples in the plural – in fact, it is only together that all the members of the Church, with their own specific characteristics, can “repeat” the mystical body of Jesus.
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Having said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
As sons and daughters in the Son of God, we therefore have the same vocation as Jesus. Having come from the Father’s creative love, we are called to return to him, repeating his gestures and words in the world, accompanied by the grace of the Holy Spirit. If we open ourselves to this gift, we too can affirm with Paul: “It is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me.”4
This Word of Life, therefore, invites us to deepen our relationship with the Holy Spirit, both in prayer and in everyday life, “listening to his voice” within us, reminding us that “without the Holy Spirit, God is distant, Christ remains in the past, the Gospel is a dead letter, the Church is a mere organization, and ‘mission’ is mere propaganda. But being in the Holy Spirit, the cosmos is lifted up and groans in the gestation of the kingdom of God, the risen Christ is present, the Gospel is the power of life, the Church signifies trinitarian communion and ‘mission’ is a Pentecost.”5
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Having said this, he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”
Andrew was a teenager in the midst of a personal crisis: doubts about the meaning of life, fear of the future, and the sense of personal fragility seemed like insurmountable mountains to him, and he often found himself discouraged and unhappy. Someone suggested that he talk about it with Chiara Lubich. As he entered the room, Andrew heard Chiara whispering the words, “Holy Spirit,” and he realized she was praying.
During the conversation, he felt deeply understood, listened to, and accepted just as he was. He found peace again: not because his problems had suddenly disappeared, but because now there was someone with whom he could share them.
“From Chiara, I not only received concrete help,” he confided years later, “but I also learned a way to live my life – being close to those who suffer, with sensitivity and understanding, without judging, just as Jesus would do.”
Only the Holy Spirit can achieve this, if we welcome him and allow him to work in us.
Prepared by Claudio Cianfaglioni and the Word of Life team
1. Cf. Jn 14:27.
2. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience…” (Gal 5:22).
3. Cf. Genesis 2:7.
4. Gal 2:20.
5. Metropolitan Ignatius of Laodicea, General Assembly of the World Council of Churches, July 5, 1968, quoted by Pope Francis in his homily on the Solemnity of Pentecost, May 31, 2020.