The universe is a womb for religious consciousness, and the Holy Spirit is our host.

I was a very confused young man. In January 1996, I became interim co-director of Programa Nogalhillos, a Presbyterian Border Ministry site based in Nogales, Arizona. The purpose of the program was to foster cooperation between the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the National Presbyterian Church in Mexico, that country’s second largest Protestant denomination. Each site had two co-directors, one Mexican and one American. I was a returned Peace Corps volunteer who had never been to Mexico, hadn’t spoken Spanish in three years, and had no theological training. I liked challenges. This would be a challenge.

The previous American co-director of the program had brought some Pentecostal (Holy Spirit-centered) pastors into the program and was trying to integrate them into the more staid Presbyterian system. The integration presented certain difficulties, as the Pentecostals had a few practices that the Presbyterians were suspicious of, like exorcisms.

My Mexican co-director was a traditional Presbyterian and licensed medical doctor who had taken up a second career in ministry. He considered mental illness to be a medical problem that should be treated by a psychiatrist while the church provided love and support. The Pentecostals believed mental illness to be caused by demon possession. This disagreement was fairly minor until one of my co-director’s parishioners began to struggle with mental illness.

My co-director referred him to a psychiatrist and offered him pastoral support, but the parishioner believed himself to be possessed. His family called the Pentecostals, two of whom traveled down to Hermosillo to exorcise the demon. They told me about the exorcism beforehand, without telling me that it was my co-director’s parishioner. I must have gotten a look of wild-eyed excitement when I heard about a potential exorcism, because they gently declined to invite me: “When the demon leaves the body, it looks for someone weak in their faith to possess,” they explained. “It would be dangerous for you to be there.”

They performed the exorcism, which was successful—for a while. Unfortunately, the parishioner got repossessed during the next Sunday’s worship service and began throwing chairs around their little church, causing a bit of a disturbance among the rest of the congregation. My co-director found out that the Pentecostals had performed the exorcism and drove six hours from Hermosillo to Nogales to confront them. He asked me to moderate, since I had come to know them quite well, being in the same town.

What ensued was one of the most fascinating conversations I have ever been involved in. By “involved in” I mean “listened to in a state of uncertainty and dread.” It covered the relationship between science and religion, with my co-director arguing that mental illness was a brain disease that required medical treatment and the Pentecostals arguing it was a spiritual curse that required exorcism. It covered the theology of the Holy Spirit, with my co-director arguing that Christians couldn’t be possessed by evil spirits because they were already filled by the Holy Spirit and the Pentecostals arguing that evil spirits were more attracted to Christians because they wanted to drive out the Holy Spirit.

As the conversation continued, I had the startling realization that I was completely out of my depth. To be honest, I wasn’t even sure what the Holy Spirit did. The Father created and the Son saved, but what did the Holy Spirit do? I knew that it was part of the Trinity, and that it came to the church on Pentecost, and that it was supposed to be in all Christians, but I still didn’t really know why it was necessary or important. I had the vague feeling that it made you feel good. My Presbyterian tradition valued doing things decently and in order, so an uncontrollable Holy Spirit placed a distant third to the Creator and Savior within the Trinitarian pecking order.

Over the years, I have come to see the Holy Spirit as a life-giving power, coequal within the Trinity. I still believe that mental illness is a medical problem, and I remain suspicious of exorcisms. But the Holy Spirit has a distinct and necessary role to play in faith. I will share my interpretation of her work below.

The Holy Spirit is a divine promise. “Is it possible to live on this earth with a generosity, abundance, fearlessness, and beauty that mirror Divine Being itself?” asks Cynthia Bourgeault. Her implicit answer is that we can, if imperfectly. As the perfectly living person, Jesus of Nazareth is the portal through which divine communion flows into the world. Jesus runs with the grain of the universe and teaches us how that grain runs. In so doing, Jesus lets loose a new Spirit in the world, an enlivening Spirit who quickens us toward abundance. Hence, we do not become Christlike by imitation but by empowerment, not by will but by inspiration.

Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, an evolutionary scientist and Jesuit priest, observes, “There is something afoot in the universe, something that looks like gestation and birth.” To him, the universe isn’t a collection of surprisingly well-organized, dead matter. The universe is a womb for religious consciousness. Every evolution—the evolution of stars into elements, of elements into chemistry, of chemistry into biology, and of biology into consciousness—every evolution has led to increased complexity and increased capacity, culminating in the twin blessings of self-awareness and God-consciousness. The evolution of matter culminates in the generation of Spirit.

We can interpret this sprawling, magnificent process as a glorious accident that inexplicably produced us, or we can interpret it as a divine gift that begs gratitude toward the Giver. If there is a Giver, then our evolution into ever increasing enjoyment is no accident. It is God’s plan, mediated by matter.

Material evolution has instilled in us a great metaphysical hunger, a hunger that can be satisfied only by the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, a hunger that can be satisfied only by God. For those of us overawed by the graciousness of this process, we can only conclude that the universe is an invitation, and the Holy Spirit is our host. (adapted from Jon Paul Sydnor, The Great Open Dance: A Progressive Christian Theology, pages 150-151)

For further reading, please see:

Bourgeault, Cynthia. The Wisdom Jesus: Transforming Heart and Mind—A New Perspective on Christ and His Message. Boston: Shambhala, 2008.

Evers-Hood, Ken. The Irrational Jesus: Leading the Fully Human Church. Eugene, Oregon: United States: Cascade Books, 2016.

Meyers, Robin R. Saving Jesus from the Church: How to Stop Worshiping Christ and Start Following Jesus. San Francisco: HarperCollins, 2009.