Amid the impressive diffusion of modern technology, life experience is showing us how many people are feeling lonely and without a sense of orientation in their lives.

They crave that somebody would console, defend, exhort and encourage them. They would cherish the company of a sincere friend, a loving presence, a consoler, an inseparable companion, in other words, a paraclete.

It is the Holy Spirit who is the Paraclete. He is the one who embrace the aforementioned qualities. Yet, if we hold fast to our calling as Christians, none of us is exempted from the Apostle’s injuction: “if we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit”(Gal 5,25).

In one of his most insightful sermons, Cardinal John Henry Newman maintains that if we are deeply in touch with our own humanity, it will enable us to be outstanding paracletes to one another. “Instructed by our own sorrows and our own sufferings, and even by our own sins, we will be trained in mind and heart for every work of love for those who are in need of love. To the measure of our ability, we will be consolers in the image of the Paraclete in every sense that this word implies: advocates, helpers, bringers of comfort. Our words and our counsel, our manner, our voice, our glance, will be gentle and tranquil”.

So why don’t we pray to the Holy Spirit, the Praraclete, to makes us contemporary paracletes to the people we meet? I find the invocation to the Paraclete, which is found in the Office of Solemn Vespers of Pentecost in the Orthodox liturgy superb.

Heavenly King, Consoler, Spirit of truth, who are present everywhere and fill the universe, treasure of graces who give life: come and dwell in us, purify us of all that is vile and save our souls, Oh God of all goodness.

Fr Mario Attard OFM Cap