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Come Holy Spirit, Our Comforter
“I am telling you these things now while I am still with you. But when the Father sends the Comforter —and by the Comforter I mean the Holy Spirit—he will teach you much, as well as remind you of everything I myself have told you." (John 14:26)
It’s nice to have a comforter and Pentecost reminds us that the Holy Spirit will come to each of us as our comforter, our advocate, our helper.
Last year Richard Rohr gave us a great analogy for the Holy Spirit. He told us in the London subway system before the doors open and you get out of the train, they say, “Mind the gap.” When the doors open, it’s written in big words in front of every door: “Mind the gap.” It means, of course, that there are a few inches between the doors and the sidewalk, and they don’t want anyone to fall in that gap.
He tells us that's just what the Holy Spirit does, he helps us “mind the gap”. He reminds us the Holy Spirit fills the gaps of everything. First, we need to be aware that there usually is a gap. He says there’s a space because we don’t recognize that God is as available to us as our breath. We always allow God, by our own silliness and stupidity, to be distant, to be elsewhere. We always find a gap between ourselves and our neighbor, between ourselves and almost everything. We therefore feel quite lonely and isolated in this world. Without some awareness of the Holy Spirit’s presence, frankly, we’re not connected to anything or anybody. We just live an isolated life.
The Holy Spirit within us is the desire inside all of us that wants to keep connecting, relating, and communing. It isn’t above us. It isn’t beyond us—it is within us. It’s as available as our breath, and that’s why the Risen Christ gives the Holy Spirit by breathing upon the disciples. He’s saying, in effect, “Here it is! Here it is! Can you breathe in what I have breathed out?”
As we grow on the journey, we’ll begin to experience that breath, that Spirit, as if it is the very air. It’s everywhere, all the time, and we can’t live one minute without it. Isn’t it amazing that air, the thing that’s most essential, most invisible to most people is the one thing that’s everywhere all the time and free? The Holy Spirit likewise has been given to us freely.
Not only that but since we have the Holy Spirit as our comforter we can be more willing to come out of our personal “comfort zone” and allow the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, to use us to be a comfort to others.
Blessings on the upcoming feast of Pentecost. May you allow the Holy Spirit to be your Comforter.
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