By Henry Aloysius Barry
CHAPTER X.
PARTING GLIMPSES OF THE DIVINITY OF THE HOLY GHOST.
The Father, Son and Holy Ghost comport themselves always in concert. The divine nature is one and indivisive with all its perfections; its action is one and indivisible, in the three Persons, in every point that lies outside the inner circle of the hypostatic relations of the three to one another, that is, their individualistic being. In other words in the irradiant relationship called technically works ad extra, there is one and indivisive action on the part of God— unity of workmanship, so to speak. Now the Holy Ghost does the same things and puts into operation the same powers as the Father— which means, of course, that the Holy Ghost is in nature and essence God. Because the Father and the Holy Ghost do the same things, in view of the fact, as we have said, that there is, and can be, but one action in God, the Holy Ghost thus acting in concert with the Father must be imbedded or ingrained in the divine unity. To make good His title to divine sonship and at the same time clear Himself of the charge of blasphemy, which was drawn up against Him, our Lord formulated the aforesaid reasoning in these words:—"If I do not the works of My Father, believe Me not, but if I do, though you will not believe Me, believe the works that you know, and believe the Father is in Me and I in the Father." (John x, 37, 8.) The same principle applies in the ease of the Holy Ghost —"Believe the works." Now what about the premise of fact? Does the Holy Ghost perform the works of the Father and thereby make good the divinity of His essence? Let us reverently go in the Scriptural forest. Here we find, right off, our Lord's words to the effect that the Father sanctified Him—"Do you say of Him Whom the Father hath sanctified and sent into the world," (John x, 36) and, close by,we come upon the same thing which the Master predicates of the Holy Ghost—"The spirit of the Lord is upon Me. Wherefore He hath anointed Me—He hath sent Mo." (Luke iv, 18,19.) The Holy Ghost operates the "sanctification" and "sending" as well as the Father. The two texts are clear; their fore-echo can be distinctly caught upon the lips of Isaias—"The Lord God hath sent me and His spirit." (Is. xlviii, 10.) Then, again, in conjunction, the Father and the Holy Ghost wrought the "Incarnation" of the Lord. St. John says, "God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh." (Rom. viii, 3)—So much for the Father. "For that which is conceived in her, is of the Holy Ghost," quoth the angel. (Matt, i, 20.) Unity of action in such a purely divine achieve merit plainly demonstrates that the Holy Ghost is divine in nature. In the miracles with which our Lord startles mankind we can trace the hands, so to speak, of the Father and the Holy Ghost clasped in unity of action —"But the Father Who abideth in me, He doth the works." (John xiv, 10.) Yet we find our Lord saj's again "I by the spirit of God cast out devils." (Matt, xii, 28.) We find the Father and Holy Ghost, hand in hand again, so to speak, in the world's tragedy in the oblation of the Son of Man. St. Paul says, "He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all." (Rom. viii, 32.) Of the Holy Ghost the apostle says,
"How much more shall the blood of Christ, Who by the Holy Ghost offered Himself up unspotted to God." (Heb. ix, 14.) The vine, the tendril and the crushed grape— Father, Son and Holy Ghost! The Father and the Holy Ghost are the counter gravity, drawing forth the deceased Messiah from His death-lodging and the enfolding mortuary drapery to the skies and life in joyous unity contemning alike earth's gravitation and the stratagems of malignant counter activity and vigilance decided upon imprisoning him beyond hope in a dungeon of stone and clay. "Being exalted therefore by the right hand of God and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost." (Acts ii, 33.) At the same time the "resurrection" and "postmortem life" of the Messiah is imputed to the Third Person,—"The spirit of Him that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead dwell in you." (Rom. viii, 2.)
These texts have a marked, indisputable Trinitarian flavor. They unveil the inner and mutual attraction of the Third Person in the unity of Godhead. Altogether, then, from such a conclave of luminant and star-like textual evidence we can remain no longer free to dispute unity of action in the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The practical conclusion forces itself into the foreground that the Holy Ghost is on a level with the Father and, therefore, coequal, co-living and co-true, co-wonderful, co worshipful, co-lovable and co-worthy of world-praise. Yet, alas, this august personage is in a sense, not indeed in theory, I grant, but for all that, on point of practical realization, a sort of shunted and neglected individualism showing in our lives as a dimly discerned presence, as a figure veiled in thick haze, a mummy-like factor, existent but not a living, vascular, pulsating power, impressing its personality upon the thoughts and actions; the Holy Ghost is a sort of closeted dogma—of course it is confessed in theory every day, yes, many times a day, as, for example, in the Sign of the Cross and the Gloria Patri, but, it is, for all that, to a certain extent, as far as being a living force, an unused one; yet the grace of God, by which the soul lives, is his very breath; the incentive to good stirring and quickening the soul to spiritual action is the effect of His indwelling in us or His seeking to dwell in us. He is the very atmosphere of the souL that lives. The action of His grace is, however, noiseless as the snowflake falling on the earth or the undulations of a light-wave. Encased in the invisible mist He treads our lives, and, yet, He is a tremendous personalism, a great heritage, a living ontological organism, a necessity to our souls seen by those who have eyes to see, heard by those who have ears to hear. As a matter of fact the divinity of the Holy Ghost has not been merely demonstrated but positively emphasized. Brought into comparison with our Lord's humanity, the Holy Ghost takes precedence in dignity. It, of course, must be clear to any one that no creature, who is such and nothing more, could, without grave blasphemy, claim for himself superiority over even the humanity of our Lord. The revealed fact, therefore, that, when gauged from the standpoint of His mere humanity, the Holy Ghost is superior to our Lord proves beyond any reasonable doubt that the Holy Ghost is not a creature merely, but, on the contrary, a really and truly divine being, the Saviour's equal, when viewed in His divine nature. All this is made clear from the fact that it is a more grievous sin to err against the Holy Ghost than against Christ as man,— "Whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven them, but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world nor in the world to come." (Matt, xii, 32.)
