Rejecting Holy Spirit's work in Vatican II is 'foolish,' Pope says

Vatican City, Apr 17, 2013 / 11:09 am

The work of the Holy Spirit at the Second Vatican Council is not yet finished, Pope Francis said, because many in the Church are unwilling to fully embrace what God inspired in the council fathers.

In his homily at an April 16 Mass at St. Martha's Residence, the Pope observed that the Holy Spirit always "moves us, makes us walk and pushes the Church forward."

However, he said, we often respond by saying, "Don't bother us."

"We want to put the Holy Spirit to sleep," the Pontiff noted. "We want to 'tame' the Holy Spirit. And that doesn't work, because He is God. He is the wind that comes and goes and we know not from where."

"He is the strength of God, the one who gives us comfort and drives us to continue forward," Pope Francis continued. But the idea of "going forward" is what often bothers us, because we want to "remain comfortable," he explained.

"This temptation is still here today," the Holy Father observed, pointing the Second Vatican Council as an example.

"The Council was a beautiful work of the Holy Spirit," he stressed.

"But after 50 years have we done everything that the Holy Spirit told us at the Council?" he asked, questioning whether the Church currently contains the council's "continuity of growth."

"No," he answered.

Some Catholics want to "build a monument" to the council without being willing to change, the Pope lamented. "And what's more, there are some who want to turn back." 

"This is called being stubborn, this is called wanting to tame the Holy Spirit, this called being foolish and slow of heart," he stressed.

The same thing happens with our own personal lives, the Holy Father continued, explaining that we often resist when "the Holy Spirit pushes us to take a more evangelical path."

"Do not resist the Holy Spirit," Pope Francis urged. "It is the Spirit that makes us free, with that freedom of Jesus, that freedom of the children of God!" 

"This is the grace that I wish all of us would ask of the Lord: docility to the Holy Spirit, to that Spirit who comes to us and makes us advance down the path of holiness, that holiness of the Church that is so beautiful," the Pope concluded.