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Copyright 2002 St Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary Press
23. The Gifts of the Holy Spirit Until we have been cleansed from the passions, the gifts of the Holy Spirit received during the Mystery of Holy Chrism aren’t fully manifested, although they too work in a covered way through each virtue. But once the passions which cover them are removed, the gifts of the Holy Spirit blaze up in our consciousness, from the hidden part of the heart, in all their brilliance. Strictly speaking, in distinction to the grace of Baptism which directs the work of mortifying the old man and of the general growth of the new, they are intended to remake and intensify the powers of the knowledge of the soul and of courageous perseverance in God, after he has known Him. They are first of all the gifts for enlightening the mind, and precisely because of this, gifts for its fortification in its orientation toward God. Therefore they show their full efficiency only when our intellectual powers, which work with them, have been sufficiently developed. They are the fruits of a Mystery which imparts to us the gifts of the Holy Spirit; they are meant to open the spirit in us and to make rich the life “in the Spirit,” but this can’t be realized before purification from the passions. |
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