Inspiration can come from seemingly out of nowhere. My wife and I were at Mass on Pentecost Sunday at St. Anselm and Cecilia in London. The pastor’s homily centered on the fruits of the Holy Spirit. What were the fruits of the Holy Spirit I asked my 3rd-grade self. This priest had a handout! The fruits of the Holy Spirit are charity, generosity, joy, gentleness, peace, faithfulness, patience, modesty, kindness, self-control, goodness, and chastity. He spoke about reflecting on each of the fruits of the Holy Spirit and how together provide a guide of sorts to determine how well we are doing on your journey to sanctity.
The pastor repeated what has been a rallying cry at Attollo. We are all called to be saints! Never ever forget that. We can reflect on the fruits of the Holy Spirit during a quick examen at the end of the day to help us improve our outward behaviors the next day. Our outward behaviors are a reflection of our interior disposition and our closeness or distance to God.
- A fit of road rage today? Work on your patience.
- A bit of lust or making or thinking lude comments? Work on your chastity.
- Feeling down? Work on your joy.
- Talking smack about someone or gossip? Work on your kindness.
- Feeling agitated about the events in our world? Work on your peace.
- Does your ego need constant feeding through consumer products? Work on your modesty.
As I researched for this post, I found that John of St. Thomas a student of Saint Thomas Aquinas, was way ahead of me in the metaphor department. I think that’s what St. Paul meant when he said that there was nothing new under the sun! (Ecclesiastes 1:9)
John wrote that our souls were like a sailboat, the gifts of the Holy Spirit were the sails, and the oars were our own efforts to move our souls in cooperation with the Holy Spirit through the practice of the virtues both theological and human, in the direction of the distant shore – our sanctity.
My contribution to the sailboat metaphor is the addition of the fruits of the Holy Spirit as a kind of navigation system, a compass to help us determine if our earthly efforts are aligned with rather fighting against the winds of the Holy Spirit.
My last addition then is the dock, ropes, and cleats. The dock represents the physical or temporal world we were born into and must detach ourselves from in order to even start our journey to sanctity and the ropes and cleats are the actual attachments we cling onto that keep us tied securely to the word. We all have our own ropes and cleats we custom make for ourselves that keep us from starting the great adventure God has waiting for us!
I am sailing, I am sailing
Home again ‘cross the sea
I am sailing stormy waters
To be near you, to be free
Can you hear me, can you hear me
Thro’ the dark night, far away
I am dying, forever crying
To be with you, who can say
We are sailing, we are sailing
Home again ‘cross the sea
We are sailing stormy waters
To be near you, to be free
Oh Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh (My) Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh Lord
Oh Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh (My) Lord, to be near you, to be free
Oh Lord
“Sailing” is a song composed by Gavin Sutherland of the Sutherland Brothers in 1972, best known as a 1975 international hit for Rod Stewart.
