The Holy Spirit Comes

Pentecost, Jean Fouquet

The Holy Spirit comes at the price of Christ's “departure.” While this “departure” caused the Apostles to be sorrowful, and this sorrow was to reach its culmination in the Passion and Death on Good Friday, “this sorrow will turn into joy.” For Christ will add to this redemptive “departure” the glory of his Resurrection and Ascension to the Father. Thus the sorrow with its underlying joy is, for the Apostles in the context of their Master's “departure,” an “advantageous” departure, for thanks to it another “Counselor” will come. At the price of the Cross which brings about the Redemption, in the power of the whole Paschal Mystery of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit comes in order to remain from the day of Pentecost onwards with the Apostles, to remain with the Church and in the Church, and through her in the world.

-Saint John Paul II, Dominum et Vivificantem