This year the novena in preparation for the feast of Our Holy Father St Philip corresponds almost exactly with the novena of novenas, the first novena, the nine days of prayer between the Ascension and Pentecost when we wait once more with the Apostles for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. And this is most appropriate, as St Philip was, more than anything else, a man of the Spirit — as we say in his litany, he is the “vessel of the Holy Spirit”. The story of his life, which we read during the novena, really begins with his singular experience of the Spirit on the Vigil of Pentecost 1544 in the catacomb of St Sebastian when the Spirit descended like a ball of fire, entering his mouth and then into his heart. After that experience — Philip’s own Pentecost — his life would never be the same again.

Behind his holiness of life, and his preaching, and his miracles, and his founding of our Institute, there is something fundamental we can learn from St Philip — conveniently for this time in the Church’s liturgical calendar, something about the Holy Spirit. St Philip’s life shows us what happens when we do not simply possess the Holy Spirit, but allow ourselves to be possessed by him. We all have the Holy Spirit dwelling in us — all of us who have been baptised and confirmed. He is in us as much as he was in St Philip Neri, as much as he was in the Apostles at Pentecost. But we are very good at closing ourselves to the Spirit — we, through our sins and our selfishness, our attachments and our self-will, block him out; we ignore his prompting and are deaf to his call, we partition him away into a little forgotten compartment in our souls. Or we make of him a very petty little thing indeed, our God — a God who always agrees with what we say, who wants us to do precisely what we want to do, and makes me right and everyone else wrong.

But this is not the Holy Spirit whom we worship; this is not the awesome power of Almighty God, who hovered over the waters at creation, who raised Jesus from the dead, who came down on the Apostles and Our Lady in the Upper Room, who wonderfully penetrated the heart of St Philip, and who gives power and authority to the Church. The Holy Spirit blows where he wills; his ways are not always our ways; and if we give ourselves to him and allow him to possess us completely — as St Philip did — then we will find that he will do more for us than we ask or even imagine; do more through us and with us. St Philip wanted to be a layman — the Spirit called him to the priesthood; he wanted to be a martyr, the Spirit made him a martyr not of blood, but of charity; Philip wanted to preach the Gospel to the pagans in the Indies, the Holy Spirit had other plans. He wanted to be a humble, hidden servant of the Church, living at San Girolamo and doing what good he could, but the Spirit gave him the gift of preaching and teaching and working miracles and reading men’s hearts and winning souls, and brought him to the Vallicella, and through him founded the Congregation of the Oratory, spread, as it now is, across the world. St Philip loved to be unknown — the Holy Spirit moulded and fashioned and transformed him into one of the most popular saints, the Apostle of Rome. St Philip wanted to reform the hearts and souls of those men and women he met — the Spirit used him to reform the very heart of the Church herself.

It is not enough to have the Holy Spirit — it is not enough even to think we are serving God or doing great things in his honour. We must allow ourselves to be led by the Spirit, formed and transformed by the Spirit. We must be prepared to give up our own desires and plans — even the good ones — and be taken over by the Holy Spirit to be used for his own purposes. If we do this, if we open up to the Spirit who dwells in our hearts, then the life of St Philip Neri, and indeed of all the saints, shows us that the Spirit will do great things for, in, and through us. St Philip, Vessel of the Holy Spirit and Sweetest of Fathers. Pray for us.

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On Monday this week some of the Fathers and Brothers spent the day erecting and moving scaffolding — with all due health and safety measures observed — in order to change and improve the lighting on the sanctuary of our church. It is already a great boon for us to see more clearly the beautiful decoration which adorns that focal point of the whole building, as well as being a great help for the priest reading from the missal. Tomorrow as we celebrate the feast of the Ascension, our eyes are directed upwards once more as Our Risen Lord ascends to heaven and for a moment like the Apostles we gaze upwards as he is taken from our sight.

How very much more clearly do we see when we make that effort to lift up our eyes towards the Lord. We not only contemplate his glory but from that vantage point are able to see all things in their fullness, seeing them from the perspective of heaven. Prayer, the lifting of the mind and heart to God, enables us to understand and to see clearly, all those other things of life in which we are otherwise immersed. That daily shifting our focus from the things of this world to the vantage point of heaven is that great encouragement for our daily striving for God, so that where Christ goes we too may follow him.

It is often an effort for us to pull ourselves out of the daily round in order to lift up our heads and our hearts to the things of heaven, but if we are to have the desire for heaven to drive us on, it is essential that we always keep our goal before us. Not only in prayer, but all those things which form the way we see things must have heaven as their vantage point and aim. Monsignor Knox wrote:

In all ages, in all countries, the world acts as a solvent to Catholic piety; breathes an air in which Catholic piety languishes. Man’s intellect always wants to approach things from the human side, from the side from which they can be known by man; shirks and burkes discussion of things from the side of reality, from the side which relates them to God. Man’s art and literary genius is constantly concerned with man at his most human level, his passions, his craven fears, the rebellion of his will against the order in which he lives. All that breathes a poison, for which writers who care about the truth as it is in God have to provide an antidote; they must fight, they must react, but still more they must see things, they must record things, from that higher standpoint which is God’s. You must, sometimes, give the lungs of your soul an airing on these heights, even if the atmosphere of it is more rare, is breathed with more effort, than the other. Or else, the miasma of the modern world will get you down, will weaken your resistance; you will be a prey to the germs of infidelity, to the infection of bad example. And you will forget your Friend.

As the Church invites us then on the Ascension to gaze up towards heaven, to contemplate Our Lord, Risen and Ascended, it is perhaps a good time for us to think on the place we give to the things of heaven in our life each day — not only in terms of the time we give to heaven, but also in terms of what we strive for, on what really all our efforts are in fact based.

And from our gazing upon heaven, we can then go on like the Apostles, down from that mountain and into the world — to teach the Good News and make disciples of all nations, keeping ever in mind that he whom we meet on those heights of prayer is with us always, even to the end of time.

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One could not have missed the many images of crowns in the past week. On posters and flags, on shop advertisements and on the official emblem of the coronation of His Majesty the King. The whole world, it seems, was caught up in amazement at that moment when St Edward’s crown was placed on the King’s head, the only time it is ever worn, to be replaced by the Imperial State Crown, impressive in its size and its jewels. One could not help but feel a certain sympathy with them — perhaps especially Her Majesty the Queen — as they walked around gingerly with several pounds’ weight of crown on their heads, lest they take a tumble. A crown is a symbol not only of a regal inheritance, but of a sacred anointing and the leadership of a nation. It also shows that one is set apart from the rest, is chosen, is consecrated.

Crowns are a familiar sight even in church. Our Lady’s statue is crowned, there are crowns above the cabinets in the Relic Chapel and they are even to be found, accompanied by palm branches, on the reliquaries placed on the High Altar on feast days. These crowns too stand for those set apart, who are chosen to bear the ultimate witness to the greatest truth.

On Friday we keep the feast of Saints Nereus and Achilleus. Baptised by St Peter himself, these two soldiers having obeyed the cruel orders of their emperor out of fear alone, it is said, came quite suddenly to faith in Christ and in doing so were liberated. They were freed from their obedience to a tyrant to embrace obedience to Christ and in so doing were called to shed their blood in witness to their faith. Theirs is the story of so many brave Christians who saw eternal life as the greatest prize against which everything the world has to offer pales in comparison. St Philip had a great devotion to the saints. Their relics are enshrined at the Roman Oratory and the Venerable Cardinal Baronius was the Cardinal Priest of their ancient church, often frequented by St Philip.

St Philip had a marvellous devotion to the saints and their relics. In his last years we are told he had the lives of the saints read to him daily and took great care to preserve the relics of the saints with devotion at the Vallicella. He saw in the lives of the saints a guide for the rest of us so that where they have gone we might follow.

Earthly crowns fall on the heads of very few men. The crowns on our relic cabinets, on the altar reliquaries and paintings in the church are a reminder to us that there is a lasting crown in store for all of us, a crown of glory that will never fade and is given us by the Lord. It may not be that we have to win it by shedding our blood like Nereus and Achilleus, but rather through the long and arduous path of growing in holiness day by day. We are chosen and set apart, we are consecrated by our baptism to win the crown that is fitted for us. In the eyes of the world it rarely glitters, but it is more lasting than anything the world can dream up. And go for it we must.

And we pray for our King Charles, that the golden crown set on his head a few days ago may always remind him of that crown of glory that awaits him, please God, after a life of service and virtue. May he be helped in seeking that crown by our prayers.

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