Tuesday in the Sixth Week of Easter, May 24, 2022

John 16:5-11

Jesus said to his disciples: “Now I am going to the one who sent me, and not one of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ But because I told you this, grief has filled your hearts. But I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes he will convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation: sin, because they do not believe in me; righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will no longer see me; condemnation, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.”

“Now I am going to the one who sent me.”  It seems to me that some of the Last Supper Discourse in John 13-17 might actually have been said by the Lord Jesus shortly before his Ascension into heaven.  The passage used for the Gospel reading for today’s Mass would have made just as much sense then as before his Death.  Because the Lord is teaching about the coming of the Holy Spirit, it would fit the time before the Ascension better than before his Death.  We could explain John’s placing this passage within the Last Supper Discourse by exploring John’s intention in the final chapter of his Gospel, which contains narratives of the Lord’s appearances to his Apostles after his Resurrection.  John wants to emphasize that the Lord, Body as well as Soul, had risen — that he truly rose from the dead — that Peter, flawed as he was, would lead the Apostles and die for the Lord, and that the Lord did not say that John would remain alive until the end of the world.  In order to keep these facts clear, John would have simply moved any teaching about the Holy Spirit to an earlier discourse.  St. Matthew does something similar in his Gospel in that he groups the Lord’s teachings together not so much chronologically as thematically.  Whatever the case may be, the meaning remains the same.

“Now I am going to the one who sent me, and not one of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ ”  Here we might say that this verse makes more sense in a later chapter because the Lord has already told the Apostles that he is going to the Father.   But the Lord Jesus does not say, To whom are you going, but Where are you going.  He is going to heaven.  We may take it for granted that his Father is in heaven but the Lord is still teaching the Apostles that he is the Son of God the Father.  He makes a momentous, unique claim and he has to keep making it because the Apostles find it difficult to understand and accept.  “But because I told you this, grief has filled your hearts.”  What the Apostles do understand is that the Lord whom they love is departing from them.  It must have seemed that he was preparing to abandon them before finishing the work he came to do, which, in their minds, meant restoring the kingdom of Israel.  Grief, confusion, perhaps a little panic.  The Greek word translated as “grief” means something more like “pain” and “distress”.  What would now become of them?

“But I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go.”  The Lord, knowing what is in their hearts, begins to explain why he must go, and why it is better for them that he does, though they will not see it that way for a long time, if they every do.  “For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.”  The Lord will finish his work on earth by dying on the Cross to take away the sins of the world.  He rises and shows himself to the Apostles in order to bolster their faith and command them to go out to all the world to preach the Gospel.  Because his mission on earth is completed, he returns to the Father, but with the Father sends the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles so that they can carry out his command to go and preach.  It is “better” for them that he return to heaven and send the Holy Spirit because they will achieve their salvation through their missionary work and martyrdom.  If the Lord had remained on earth after his Resurrection, they would never have left him again.  They would have clung to him and the world would not have been evangelized.  He did not want anyone clinging to him when he had a mission for that person.  This is the meaning of telling Mary Magdalene, “Do not cling to me.”

“But if I go, I will send him to you.”  Elsewhere, he says that the Father will send the Holy Spirit.  Both the Father and the Son send the Holy Spirit, for he proceeds from them both.  St. Thomas Aquinas calls the Holy Spirit the “nexus” of the Father and Son, the “connection” or “embrace”.  

“And when he comes he will convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation.”  The Greek word translated as “convict” actually means “to expose” or “to rebuke”, which makes more sense in the passage: He will rebuke the world in regard to sin, etc.  The Lord explains, “Sin, because they do not believe in me.”  The Holy Spirit, the Advocate, will rebuke the wicked by showing their lack of belief in God and Christ as the Gospel spreads to people of good will.  This will culminate at the Last Judgment when the Lord Jesus says to the wicked, “Depart from me, you cursed, into everlasting fire, which was prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25, 41).  “Righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will no longer see me.”  The Holy Spirit will show that the Lord, though risen from the dead, did not appear to the Pharisees and the people of Israel who rejected him, but returned to the bosom of the Father.  He will come again only to judge the living and the dead.  “Condemnation, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.”  The Holy Spirit will reveal through the teaching of the Apostles that the power of the devil over the world is broken.  He will have power now only over those who choose him as their king.

We have received the Holy Spirit in our baptisms and the Sacrament of Confirmation.  We pray that we may remove all the obstacles in our hearts so that he may be effective in our lives as he was in the lives of those believers who first received him.