By his saving death, Christ has freed us from the burden of sin, and reconciled us with God. By his resurrection he has opened up for us the way to eternal life; that is, to communion in endless joy with God, who is the source and fullness of all life.
Through our baptism we have already entered into the new life Christ has won for us. This new life has a law - the new law of the Gospel. Christ’s law is not complicated, or burdensome. On the contrary: it’s perfectly simple, and liberating. It’s the law of love, and its guiding principle is the Holy Spirit. That must be so, since the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, is himself love. He’s the bond of communion in love between the Father and the Son, and between all of us who are in Christ. If we ever separate ourselves from love, then, by that very fact we separate ourselves also from God, who is love. Whereas to live in accordance with the law of love is not only our duty as Christians, and our vocation, but our joy, our freedom, and our glory.
Jesus teaches us these things above all in his sublime last discourse, as recorded by St. John. It’s appropriate that we read from that especially in the final weeks of Paschaltide, as we prepare for Pentecost. Pondering these words helps us also to live the Easter season as we desire: walking always in the light of the Resurrection; pondering with thanksgiving and joy the fruits of our redemption, and setting our hearts ever towards the final consummation in heaven, when all the words of Jesus will be perfectly fulfilled.
Today’s Gospel begins with very familiar words: If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
I recall how many years ago - I think I was still a postulant, or maybe a novice - I was puzzled about the meaning of this. Which commandments exactly must we keep to prove our love for Jesus? So I went through St. John’s Gospel with a tooth comb, pen in hand, intending to set down in a list each commandment as I came across it.
I found that there weren’t any. At least, there weren’t any apart from the commandment of love. A new commandment I give you, says Jesus: love one another, as I have loved you (13:34; 15:12,17).
The love of Jesus is utterly free from the selfishness that results from sin. It’s also divine. On our own, then, we can’t possibly imitate it. So our Gospel passage immediately continues with the promise of the Holy Spirit. Possession of the Spirit will be the reward for our keeping the commandments of Jesus, though it’s through him alone that we will be able to do so. That might sound a bit circular, but it isn’t, because through the gift of the Holy Spirit we are truly enabled to perform the works of the Holy Spirit. This means that our love cannot remain confined, or inactive. It must ever be turned outwards, embracing everyone, however unattractive they may seem, in unconditional self-giving generosity.
In our Gospel passage today, the focus of Jesus’ words passes from love to knowledge. As St. John often insists, the Son was sent into the world in order to reveal the Father: to manifest the truth about God. This knowledge is in function of life, and of communion. For just as we are to be caught up in the three Divine Persons’ love for one another, so we are to enter also into their knowledge of one another. Through the indwelling Holy Spirit, this knowledge of God is already manifested in the hearts of the faithful as inner conviction: a certainty that nothing whatever can shake.
It seems that in the early Church a vivid sense of the Holy Spirit was quite commonplace. We see that throughout the book of Acts, and in the letters of St. Paul. Nowadays again lots of people are recovering that sense through external manifestations like prayer in tongues, prophecy, or the working of miracles in the Spirit. But for us by far the most important manifestation of the Spirit’s presence is our love for one another. If we refuse to forgive; if we bear hatred in our hearts; if we merely tolerate one another; if we only love those who appear to deserve our love, then we are not loving with the love of Jesus, and our witness to him will be ineffective. So we always need to ask the help of the Holy Spirit: without him, we can do nothing; with him, if we will, we can set the world ablaze.
I will not leave you orphans; I will come back to you.
The enigmatic words of Jesus about leaving, no longer being seen, then returning, and again being seen, apply in the first place to his going away in death and returning in resurrection. But they can apply equally to the mystery of the Ascension, which we will celebrate next Thursday. Then his bodily presence will be hidden from the Church, until his final coming in glory. But the communion of his disciples with him will not as a result diminish. On the contrary, its intensity will be immeasurably increased. You will be in me, he says, and I in you.
How could we fail here to think of the Holy Eucharist, the context in which we are considering these things now, just as the Last Supper was the context in which Jesus first taught them? He’d already set out the doctrine of our mutual abiding in his Bread of Life discourse. Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood, said Jesus in Capharnaum then, abides in me, and I in him (6:56).
In the Eucharist, which is the sacrament of love, and of his sacrificial death, we have repeated proof and confirmation of Jesus’ love for us. And through the Eucharist we are able to offer proof of our love for him. Participation in the Eucharist efficaciously signifies our unity in charity with Christ’s mystical Body the Church, with one another here present, and with God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
Manifest yourself to us, then, Lord, today (14:21). Show us how you are perfectly united with your Father and with the Holy Spirit, in one divine goodness, and beauty, and power, and wisdom, and life and love. Help us truly to live out your commandment of love, through the power of your Spirit, until at last we come to contemplate your mystery forever in the joy of heaven.