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Especially in times of upset within the Church, we might well ask just what the Holy Spirit is doing. Does the Spirit really lead the Church? And if so, why so many problems and confusions? Jimmy Akin responds.
Cy Kellett:
How does the Holy Spirit lead the church? Jimmy Akin next. Hello, and welcome to Focus, the Catholic Answers podcast for living, understanding, and defending your Catholic faith. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. And the question came to us via the email about just how does the Holy Spirit lead the church? And I think that it’s obvious to anybody why this question would have a particular urgency now, because a lot of people are kind of asking these kinds of questions, because when people are unsettled, and upset about the condition of the church, we turn to the Holy Spirit, and we’re like, “What’s up? Are you here? Are you paying attention? Do you see this?”.
And so, we have to go back to asking basic questions. Well, how does the Holy Spirit lead the church? If you’re going to ask a basic question like that, nobody better to ask than Jimmy Akin. He’s got a brand new book. This is the new book, The Words of Eternal Life: True Happiness and Where to Find It. Jimmy, we asked, how does the Holy Spirit lead the church? Jimmy Akin, thank you very much for being here with us. Appreciate that.
Jimmy Akin:
Oh, my pleasure, Cy.
Cy Kellett:
I want to share some of the problems I have of understanding my own Christian faith. Among them, how Jesus can be both God, and man? It seems inexhaustible. How the scriptures can be both fully human writing, and also, be the word of God? Never seems to come to a final, “Oh, I get the whole thing now.” And how the Holy Spirit could be the leader of the church, but the church is still such a flawed institution.
Jimmy Akin:
So, you’re laying out future Focus topics for us?
Cy Kellett:
Okay. It could be. It just seems to me like these are all somehow related, because they have to do with the divine relationship with the human, and it’s hard, from the human side, to get it. So, I want you to help me with how the Holy Spirit leads the church today.
Jimmy Akin:
Okay.
Cy Kellett:
We’ll leave the others for another day.
Jimmy Akin:
Okay. Sounds good.
Cy Kellett:
And it seems to me, we maybe should start upside down on this, because the church is a big thing, and it’s a big deal. And maybe, you could start with the relationship of the Holy Spirit to the individual Christian, how we can think of the Holy Spirit as leading us. And maybe, in the course of that conversation, we’ll work our way up to, in what sense? Because I probably should have laid a little bit of groundwork, but I think in particular, when people are experiencing the church as troubled, then people are saying, “Well, how can the Holy Spirit be leading this?” And I do think a lot of people are experiencing the church as, troubled, right now. And so, this is … It’s not just a theoretical question, but an urgent question. In what sense can I think that the Holy Spirit is leading us? So, let’s start at the individual level. In what sense is the Holy Spirit leading me?
Jimmy Akin:
Okay. Well, the Holy Spirit leads individual Christians in a number of ways. And so, this includes everybody in the church. Really, it includes everybody in mankind, because scripture makes it clear that God cares for everybody. And as the Second Vatican Council said, in its document, Gaudium et Spes, “God gives his grace to everybody, so that they have the possibility of becoming associated with Christ, and His Paschal mystery.” Even if it’s in a mysterious way that we can’t readily perceive, God will give His grace to everybody, sufficiently, that they have the opportunity to be saved. Now, in terms of once you’ve entered the church, how does the Holy Spirit guide us? There are different ways. One way that the Holy Spirit guides us is through external circumstances. The Holy Spirit allows us to be placed in certain circumstances that present us with opportunities, and we can exploit those opportunities, we can learn different things. And this can include both secular, and religious things.
I mean, we have certain aptitudes, natively, that are born into us. And the Holy Spirit may put us in a place where we have a really good opportunity to use those abilities, to do good in the world. Maybe by taking a trade that suits us, by having a family, by being able to be kind to other people. And so, some of the ways the Holy Spirit guides us are simply external to us. So, we have these external inputs coming into us from our environment, that the Holy Spirit has allowed us, or guided us to be in. Then, the Holy Spirit also guides us internally by directly working with us. And part of that … I already mentioned, we have certain inborn talents that the Holy Spirit allowed us to have, that have at least been with us in potential forms since we were conceived. Our genetics play a role in-
Cy Kellett:
Right, right.
Jimmy Akin:
… things that we do, and abilities we have. Then, we have the life experiences, growing up, that shaped those, and bring those out. And then, when we become Christians, the Holy Spirit continues to work in our lives in a bunch of ways. And this is something that people often get into a little bit of perplexity about when they read the Bible, and they read about the Holy Spirit say, coming at Pentecost, or at different points in people’s lives. And the fact is, the Holy Spirit works with us throughout the Christian life. So, we shouldn’t think about it as, we receive the Holy Spirit only once in our lives. We interact with the Holy Spirit in many ways over the course of the Christian life. One of the ways that the Holy Spirit leads us individually is by giving us what are called, actual graces. Actual graces are graces that help us act in a way that pleases God. So, these graces can help us repent when we’ve fallen into sin, they can help us do good for other people, by performing acts of love for our neighbor, or acts of love for God.
But the basic thing is, actual graces help us act in a good way. Now, these actual graces can take different forms. If you read in St. Paul’s writings, particularly Romans 12, and 1st Corinthians 12 to 14, St. Paul talks about how the Holy Spirit gives gifts, spiritual gifts to individual Christians. And so, St. Paul says, “We all have some kind of gift, or set of gifts.” It doesn’t have to be just one, but, “The Holy Spirit enables us to do good in the body of Christ by the various spiritual gifts that he gives us.” And these gifts can build on nature. We may have a native, inborn talent that the Holy Spirit then amplifies.
Different people have different gifts. St. Paul lists a bunch of them. Some people have listed them out, and numbered them. But really, none of his lists are meant to be comprehensive. And in fact, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, a few years ago, put out a document on these gifts. They’re sometimes called, charismatic gifts. But they put out a document in which they pointed out that the Holy Spirit is not limited in the gifts that He gives people. So, He can give people new gifts, ones that aren’t mentioned in the Bible that-
Cy Kellett:
Oh, yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
… enable them to meet the changing circumstances that they find themselves in, as Christians. And so, for each of us, there’s a question of identifying, “What gift has the Holy Spirit given me, that he’d like me to use in the body of Christ?” Different people have different ones. Some people have fancy, miraculous ones like speaking in tongues, or the ability to do healings through God’s grace.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
In looking at my own talents, I think that the gift that I’m meant to exercise … At least, principally, is a teaching charism. I have-
Cy Kellett:
Yeah, yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
… even before I was a Christian, I had a native aptitude. Both of my parents, in fact, were teachers. And I have a native aptitude for teaching. And subsequent to becoming a Christian, I think the Holy Spirit has amplified that with His grace. And so, that’s how I strive to labor in His vineyard. But everybody has something that they can do, to help other people, and to help the body of Christ. And it’s a question of identifying that. We also shouldn’t think too rigidly about what our gifts may be. It’s not necessarily like you’ve got one gift, and only one gift for your entire life, as a Christian.
Cy Kellett:
Oh-
Jimmy Akin:
The-
Cy Kellett:
… yeah. Right.
Jimmy Akin:
… St. Paul talks about, in 1st Corinthians, “If you have certain gifts, but not others, you can pray for additional gifts. You can ask the Holy Spirit to give you additional gifts.” The particular context in which he mentions that is, speaking in tongues. Because there was an issue that he addresses in the church of Corinth, where they were speaking in tongues, in worship services, in a kind of uncontrolled manner. And they were not interpreting the tongues for the benefit of the people who were there. And St. Paul said, “It’s spiritually edifying to speak in tongues.” And he said, “Actually, I do that a lot.” He said, “I speak in tongues more than all of you.” But he would do it privately, unless there was someone there to translate it.
And so, he says, for example, “If you don’t have someone there who has the gift of translating tongues, you should pray that God will give you someone like that. And in public services, if you’re going to have speaking in tongues, it should be translated, so people will benefit by understanding what’s being said.” And so that outsiders won’t think you’re just crazy and babbling. But he also said, “You can pray to have additional gifts, including things like prophecy, and so forth, like that, that are very edifying for people.” The key is not to glorify yourself by what gifts you have, but to be of service to other people. So, there’s a lot of flexibility when it comes to these types of gifts. Did you have a question?
Cy Kellett:
Yeah. As you’re saying that, I’m thinking that God is generous in giving these gifts, but I can fail to cooperate with those gifts. I know that, because I know that I have, in some occasions. And I think it’s also possible that I could catastrophically fail. That is just, refuse God, refuse the gifts, and all of that. But it seems to me that at the higher level, at the level of the church, aren’t we told that, that can’t happen? That the church can’t just disastrously, in a catastrophic way say, “No,” and reject the gifts that God’s given, or the leadership that comes from the Holy Spirit.
Jimmy Akin:
Well, I’ve got some good news for you in that regard. But before we get there, I wanted to mention additional ways-
Cy Kellett:
Oh, okay.
Jimmy Akin:
… that the Holy Spirit can guide individuals.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
In addition to the circumstances that we find ourselves in, which is external guidance. And then, the internal guidance He gives us by actual grace, and the gifts that He gives us to help serve others … He also, sometimes, can directly speak to us via private-
Cy Kellett:
Oh-
Jimmy Akin:
… revelation.
Cy Kellett:
Right, right.
Jimmy Akin:
And that can take subtle forms, where you just have a feeling, or it can be very overt, where you could have a vision. But we have to be careful, as individuals, in all of these realms. In our external realm, we are put in situations where we can have opportunities to do good, and stuff, but we have to use the gift of reason that God gave us. It’s not enough to say, “Well, I’m in a circumstance, and I could take action here.” You have to ask the question, “Is it prudent to act here?” Because sometimes, there can be unintended consequences. One of the things that people of goodwill often struggle with a little bit is, they want to take action on something when really, it may not be their place.
Cy Kellett:
Oh, yeah. Okay. Right, right.
Jimmy Akin:
And that can cause problems for them, and it can harm their ability to do good later on. Similarly, when we are being guided by actual graces, we have to think carefully, because we can mistake a human impulse, even a sinful impulse, for something that God is telling us, because we want God to tell us what we want to do. And sometimes, what we want to do is not actually the best thing, or even, a moral thing to do. And so, we have to be careful, and use the gift of reason to say, “What does God’s word say about this thing that I think may be guidance? Is it really an impulse that’s coming from God? Or is it an impulse that I’m generating on my own? Or that’s coming from somewhere else?” And that also applies to the spiritual gifts.
St. Paul indicates, in 1st Corinthians, they can be misused. One of the principle things he’s discussing there, is the misuse of spiritual gifts. And also, when it comes to direct revelation, we’re warned by St. Paul, and St. John not to trust every spirit, because not every spirit is of God. And so, we need to test the spirits. And so, even if you think you’re being given a revelation, you need to use the gift of reason to evaluate that and say, “Is this really a revelation that’s coming from God? And do I need to trust it? Or do I need to not trust it?” Because as the Bible tells us, some spirits are out there to deceive us, and they can give visions too.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. Right. And no end of mischief has been done, because on instances where people didn’t discern the spirits, didn’t … Say, ask for a spiritually wise person to evaluate this. And just went right ahead and said, “Oh, the Virgin Mary appeared to me, and she said, you all need to do this.” But-
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah.
Cy Kellett:
… we’ve got all kinds of stories of disaster there. Okay. So, you said you had good news for me though, about my question.
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah. So, the good news is, when Jesus talks about instituting His church, when He’s talking with St. Peter in Matthew 16, He says that, “I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.” Hades, in their vocabulary, meant the place of the dead. So, anybody who is dead went to Hades. And so, by saying the gates of Hades will never prevail against His church, Jesus is saying that His church will never die. So, His church will remain, and we can have confidence in that. It’s not going to pass out of existence. Now, that’s good news. It doesn’t mean, though that we’re not going to have hard times, or confusing times in the church. But it does mean, we have a fundamental guarantee that His church will never die, it will never apostatize. It will never fall away from the Christian faith. Individuals can do that, but not the church as a whole. Also, later on in Matthew, at the very end of Matthew, in chapter 28, Jesus is talking to the disciples, and he gives them the great commission to go, and make disciples of all nations.
But then He also says, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me, and I will be with you to the end of the age.” And so, He’s going to be personally guiding His church through the Holy Spirit. But He is going to be personally guiding His church. And so, we also have that assurance. Similarly, in St. Paul’s letters to Timothy, he says that the church is the pillar, and foundation of truth, in the world. And so, the church has a special preservation, and truth. And so, we do have these guarantees, but that doesn’t mean, as I said, we’re not going to have hard times, or confusing times.
Cy Kellett:
Can you give me some insight as to practically how that works? Because you could have a bishop, for example, who is the rightful head of the local place, that local church, who’s bad, who’s a bad bishop, or a bad person. I’m not naming anybody. We just know that, that’s happened many, many times throughout history. So, it doesn’t seem like it’s like … Well, once you’re a bishop, then there’s some kind of guarantee. And of course, we have bad popes, but we do have this special thing where we can look at through the history of the church, and say, “Well, even when we’ve had bad popes though, we have not had popes who taught against the core teachings of the Catholic church. Even the worst popes haven’t done that.” So, give me some practical sense. How does all this work in practice?
Jimmy Akin:
Basically, it works for the leaders of the church like it works for ordinary Christians. Only more so.
Cy Kellett:
Okay.
Jimmy Akin:
Christ willed that His church have a hierarchical constitution. We see the first stage of the hierarchy when Jesus, himself, instituted the 12 apostles, and left them in charge of the church when He departed for heaven. And then, as the church grows, over the course of the book of Acts, we see the apostles instituting other forms of ministry. By the end of the first century, by the close of the apostolic age, there were the three orders with we’re familiar with today. Deacons, priests, and bishops, in ascending order. And the college of bishops is then headed by the successor of St. Peter, who headed the original college of the apostles. And basically, as you move up that hierarchy, you get additional graces, and guidance from the Holy Spirit, to enable you to perform the office that you’re in. And so, all Christians have a role in proclaiming the faith. And that applies even more to deacons, and priests, and bishops, and the pope. And so, as you move up, the Holy Spirit gives you additional grace, to help you do that. Also, it’s not just teaching, there are also administrative functions.
Ordinary Christians need to regulate their families, and their lives. Deacons, and priests, and bishops need to regulate local churches. And then, the pope needs to regulate the overall church. And so, in addition to graces to help people be good teachers, there are also graces that are given to help them be good pastors, depending on their station in life. Good leaders, or people who are guiding particular areas within the church, even if it’s just your own personal life. And because the higher you go in the hierarchy, the more influence you have for good, or bad, the more grace you’re given to help you use that influence for good. And so, the pope at the top is given a guidance in a special way that isn’t given to any other individual bishop. But bishops are still given a lot of guidance, so our priests, or our deacons, and so, are individual Christians. The basic means by which the Holy Spirit guides people in these situations though, is the same. It’s a combination of external circumstances, and internal graces, whether it’s actual grace, or charismatic gifts, or even direct revelation.
Cy Kellett:
I have had people actually tell me this, Jimmy, devout Catholics who have said, “Well, the Holy Spirit tells the pope, directly, what to do.” So-
Jimmy Akin:
Sometimes, maybe. Not all the time.
Cy Kellett:
I got you.
Jimmy Akin:
Not most of the time.
Cy Kellett:
Right. We should think of it as … The Holy Spirit has many means to accomplish what He wants accomplished. And yeah, there’s no barrier to the Holy Spirit speaking directly to the pope and saying, “Do this,” or “Do that.” But we shouldn’t think of the papacy in those terms.
Jimmy Akin:
No. Most of the time, the Holy Spirit uses the subtler, more natural means in the pope’s life, or the bishop’s lives just like He uses those mostly with us, in our lives. Most of the time, average Christians aren’t getting spectacular revelations. And neither are the bishops, and the pope.
Cy Kellett:
Okay. All right. So, the Holy Spirit leads the church. But even that leading of the church, you can say things about it, but there is a mystery to it too, that, how is the Holy Spirit-
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah.
Cy Kellett:
… leading? Yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
And it doesn’t prevent people from making mistakes. Obviously, individual Christians make mistakes. Obviously, members of the hierarchy make mistakes. In fact, the very first pope, Peter, made big mistakes. I mean, during the ministry of Christ, he denied Christ three times. And that is really bad. Jesus still though, confirmed him in His office. That’s the point of the encounter in John chapter 21, where He meets the disciples by the sea of Galilee. And He asked Peter three times, “Do you love me?” That corresponds to the three denials that Peter had made of Jesus. And so, God is willing to work, even through flawed leaders like Peter. Back in 1990, there was a document that the congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith released for theologians, about how they can pursue their ministry in the church. It was called, Donum Veritatis, which is Latin for, the gift of truth. And it pointed out that there are, at times, decisions that may get made, and even magisterial statements that may not be freed from all defects.
But it pointed out, you can’t take a case here, or a case there, where a mistake was made, and conclude from that, that we can just ignore the teaching of the church, because the Holy Spirit does guide the church in its overall mission. And so, we have to start from the assumption that the Holy Spirit is guiding the church in a particular matter. Even if it’s challenging to us, personally, we start with that understanding, and we don’t leap to the conclusion, “Oh, I don’t like that. Therefore, it must be wrong,” because we don’t have a universal perspective either. We’re dealing with the world from our own little angle, and we’re not privy to everything God is.
And so, we have to be trusting, and recognize that even though mistakes can be made, the Holy Spirit is still in charge, and is still guiding things, and is still responsible for the overall direction over the course of the centuries. Before we close, I wanted to mention a story that is-
Cy Kellett:
Okay.
Jimmy Akin:
… from the Decameron. The Decameron is a classic piece of European literature. It was written by Boccaccio, in the 1300s. So, during the Renaissance. And actually, it’s a set of lockdown stories.
Cy Kellett:
Oh, right-
Jimmy Akin:
Because-
Cy Kellett:
… right. Because the plague.
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah.
Cy Kellett:
Yeah.
Jimmy Akin:
Because in the story, there’s a plague in the city. And so, you have this group of 10 people who have retreated to the countryside, and they’re under lockdown, to avoid the plague. And since they don’t have the Internet yet, they spend the time by telling each other stories. And then, over the course of 10 days, the 10 people tell a 100 stories. And the second story that gets told is about a gentleman who is a devout Christian. And he’s got a friend who is a devout Jew. And he really likes his friend who’s Jewish. And he wants him to be a Christian. And so, his Jewish friend says, “Well, okay, I’m willing to investigate this Christian thing. Tell you what? I’m going to go to Rome. And I’m going to study all the prelates there, and the bishops, and the cardinals, and the pope. And I’ll come back, and tell you what I think.” And his Christian friend is like, “Oh no, we were living in Renaissance era, Europe. He’s going to see a bunch of bad stuff when he goes to Rome.”
Cy Kellett:
You’re right.
Jimmy Akin:
And so, he does. He goes to Rome. He investigates, and observes carefully. He sees a bunch of bad stuff. And he comes back, and meets with his friend. And they have a feast. And his friend is not wanting to ask, because he’s despairing that the guy is going to become a Christian. But finally, he does. He finally asks. And he says to his friend, “What did you think when you went to Rome?” And his friend says, “Well, I think God owes those guys that I saw a big comeuppance, because they’re up to no good. There’s a lot of bad stuff going on. And yet, your religion continues to thrive, and flourish all over the world.”
Cy Kellett:
Right.
Jimmy Akin:
“And that can only be a sign that despite the flaws of the human beings within it, this is of God, overall. So, I want to be baptized.” And he is. And then, he leads a virtuous, and Holy life as a Christian Jew.
Cy Kellett:
That’s a great story. A perfect story for episode as well. And it brings a kind of peace in a way that to be able to trust in the Holy Spirit, you don’t have to worry too much about this. You can let go of some worry and say, “It’s all going to be all right.”
Jimmy Akin:
Yeah.
Cy Kellett:
Thanks, Jimmy Akin.
Jimmy Akin:
My pleasure.
Cy Kellett:
It does seem to me that a lot of … And listening to Jimmy, I got this impression as well. A lot of our tendency to lose faith in what the Holy Spirit is up to is because our time horizons are so short. Because you haven’t done it now, because you haven’t fixed the world now, or you haven’t fixed the church now, or the foreseeable future looks very upsetting. Then, now I’m upset, but 1,000-year timelines … Then, you just see this beautiful arc of history in which the church is preserved, and cared for. And also, in which the church continues to play her role in the world. That role expanding, becoming clearer, drawing in more, and more people. The Holy Spirit’s on the job. We got nothing to worry about. The Holy Spirit is on the job.
If you don’t agree with that, or anything else that happens here, you can always email us. Focus@catholic.com is our email address. We take agreeing emails as well, and we take ideas for future shows. Focus@catholic.com. Don’t forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts, so that you will be updated whenever a new episode is available. And if you’re watching on YouTube, this is your chance. Like, and subscribe. If you like and subscribe, the podcast grows. You can support us by going to givecatholic.com. Givecatholic.com. I’m Cy Kellett, your host. We’ll see you next time, God willing, right here. Catholic Answers Focus.