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Chapter 9. Receive the Holy Spirit • 105

“wind.” The Spirit was thus understood to be the source of inspiration,

life, and movement within God’s people.

Among these holy writings, the Church honors the promise that

the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon the Messiah and endow him with

spiritual gifts (cf. Is 11:1-2), and the prophecy that the Messiah will be

moved by him to “bring glad tidings to the lowly, / to heal the broken-

hearted / . . . to announce a year of favor from the Lord” (Is 61:1-2).

The Gospels show us the dynamic action of the Holy Spirit. It is by

the Spirit that Jesus is conceived in the womb of Mary. The Holy Spirit

appears in the form of a dove over Jesus at his baptism in the Jordan. He

leads Jesus into the desert before he starts his public mission. In the Last

Supper discourse in John’s Gospel, Chapter 16, Jesus speaks at length

about the promised revelation and the sending of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit is again revealed at Pentecost, when the seven weeks

after Easter have concluded. “Christ’s Passover is fulfilled in the out-

pouring of the Holy Spirit, manifested, given, and communicated as a

divine person: of his fullness, Christ, the Lord, pours out the Spirit in

abundance” (CCC, no. 731).

The Acts of the Apostles and the various epistles of the New

Testament give us further evidence of the presence and action of the

Holy Spirit in the first-century Church. Later, in response to a denial

of the divinity of the Spirit, the First Council of Constantinople (AD

381) declared as the constant faith of the Church the divinity of the

Holy Spirit.

Even though the Holy Spirit is the last Person of the Trinity to be

revealed, we must understand that, from the beginning, he is a part of

the loving plan of our salvation from sin and of the offer of divine life.

He has the same mission as the Son in the cause of our salvation. When

the Father sends the Son, he also sends the Holy Spirit:

When the Father sends his Word, he always sends his Breath. In

their joint mission, the Son and the Holy Spirit are distinct but

inseparable. (CCC, no. 689)

The Holy Spirit continues to give us knowledge of God, living and

active in the Church. The

Catechism

sets out eight ways in which the