The Spirit...

I will send you …the Spirit of Truth…John 15

As Dominicans, we are flexible indeed. We move like dancers taught by a founder who chose white for the color of the religious habit for his Order, symbol of grace, light, and the baptismal garment. Dominic is also the Doctor of Truth.

But what is truth? (We sound like Pilate!) First and most important, for the Dominican, Truth is a person, not a proposition. Truth is not a statement of belief about God, about Jesus. It is far more. We are referring to the One who is Truth itself, the fullness of Truth. Once we realize our Dominican life is all about a relationship with a person, then we can ask again, “Risen Lord, what are you the Truth about? Let’s take it step by step…

Truth is the real…as known by the mind. Now what is real is real, whether we know it or not. But when we do know it, it gets inside us. We are bonded with it. Our mind is bonded with it. When we come to know this One who is the fullness of Truth, then we are in him, and he is in us. So John is spot on in putting these words into the mouth of Jesus in his gospel.

There is nothing as real as this One who is Divine Love itself in our skin. There is nothing more concretely real than God, even if God is not material. We Dominicans have Truth as our motto: veritas! Wonder of wonders, we are talking about our relation with this Christ as the motto, the focus of our Dominican life. This is no airy-fairy head trip. This is no abstraction. We are referring to our ever-deepening relationship with the One who the realist of the real.

No wonder then, that Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit as “the Spirit of Truth.” He’s talking about sending us the Spirit of his very self. The Risen One, who is the very Truth about himself and the   life he has restored to us, becomes the gate, the door, and the way in. Into what?  Into the very heart of God.

So is that what you are the Truth about, Jesus? You are my way, my truth, and my unending life? And you are giving me your own Spirit so I don’t ever forget it? Then I think I get it. You’re all I’ll ever really need.