III. The Church is the Temple of the Holy Spirit

“What the soul is to the human body, the Holy Spirit is to the Body of Christ, which is the Church.”1 “To this Spirit of Christ, as an invisible principle, is to be ascribed the fact that all the parts of the body are joined one with the other and with their exalted head; for the whole Spirit of Christ is in the head, the whole Spirit is in the body, and the whole Spirit is in each of the members.”2 The Holy Spirit makes the Church “the temple of the living God”:3

Indeed, it is to the Church herself that the “Gift of God” has been entrusted…. In it is in her that communion with Christ has been deposited, that is to say: the Holy Spirit, the pledge of incorruptibility, the strengthening of our faith and the ladder of our ascent to God…. For where the Church is, there also is God’s Spirit; where God’s Spirit is, there is the Church and every grace.4

The Holy Spirit is “the principle of every vital and truly saving action in each part of the Body.”5 He works in many ways to build up the whole Body in charity:6 by God’s Word “which is able to build you up”;7 by Baptism, through which he forms Christ’s Body;8 by the sacraments, which give growth and healing to Christ’s members; by “the grace of the apostles, which holds first place among his gifts”;9 by the virtues, which make us act according to what is good; finally, by the many special graces (called “charisms”), by which he makes the faithful “fit and ready to undertake various tasks and offices for the renewal and building up of the Church.”10

Whether extraordinary or simple and humble, charisms are graces of the Holy Spirit which directly or indirectly benefit the Church, ordered as they are to her building up, to the good of men, and to the needs of the world.

Charisms are to be accepted with gratitude by the person who receives them and by all members of the Church as well. They are a wonderfully rich grace for the apostolic vitality and for the holiness of the entire Body of Christ, provided they really are genuine gifts of the Holy Spirit and are used in full conformity with authentic promptings of this same Spirit, that is, in keeping with charity, the true measure of all charisms.11

It is in this sense that discernment of charisms is always necessary. No charism is exempt from being referred and submitted to the Church’s shepherds. “Their office (is) not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to what is good,”12 so that all the diverse and complementary charisms work together “for the common good.”13