Devotional: The gift of God is the Holy Spirit...

The gift of God is the Holy Spirit. The gift of God is love-God shares himself as love in the Holy Spirit... The presence of the Holy Spirit makes itself known in the manner of love. Love is the criterion of the Holy Spirit as against unholy spirits; indeed, it is the presence of the Holy Spirit himself and, in that sense, the presence of God. The essential and central concept summing up what the Holy Spirit is and what he effects is, in the end, not "knowledge" but love... The basic criterion of love, its "proper work," so to speak-and, thereby, the "proper work" of the Holy Spirit-is this, that it achieved abiding. Love shows itself by being enduring. It can by no means be recognized at a given moment and in the moment alone; but in abiding, it does away with uncertainty and carries eternity within it. And thus in my view the relationship between love and truth is also thereby given: love, in the full sense, can be present only where something is enduring, where something abides. Because it has to do with abiding, it can occur, not just anywhere, but only there where eternity is. ...Benedict XVI image