Acts 2:33

“"And He had in His right hand seven stars." He said that in His right hand He had seven stars, because the Holy Spirit of sevenfold agency was given into His power by the Father. As Peter exclaimed to the Jews: "Being at the right hand of God exalted, He hath shed forth this Spirit received from the Father, which ye both see and hear." Moreover, John the Baptist had also anticipated this, by saying to his disciples: "For God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him. The Father," says he, "loveth the Son, and hath given all things into His hands." Those seven stars are the seven churches, which he names in his addresses by name, old calls them to whom he wrote epistles. Not that they are themselves the only, or even the principal churches; but what he says to one, he says to all. For they are in no respect different, that on that ground any one should prefer them to the larger number of similar small ones. In the whole world Paul taught that all the churches are arranged by sevens, that they are called seven, and that the Catholic Church is one. And first of all, indeed, that he himself also might maintain the type of seven churches, he did not exceed that number. But he wrote to the Romans, to the Corinthians, to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Thessalonians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians; afterwards he wrote to individual persons, so as not to exceed the number of seven churches. And abridging in a short space his announcement, he thus says to Timothy: "That thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the Church of the living God." We read also that this typical number is announced by the Holy Spirit by the month of Isaiah: "Of seven women which took hold of one man." The one man is Christ, not born of seed; but the seven women are seven churches, receiving His bread, and clothed with his apparel, who ask that their reproach should be taken away, only that His name should be called upon them. The bread is the Holy Spirit, which nourishes to eternal life, promised to them, that is, by faith. And His garments wherewith they desire to be clothed are the glory of immortality, of which Paul the apostle says: "For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on mortality." Moreover, they ask that their reproach may be taken away-that is, that they may be cleansed from their sins: for the reproach is the original sin which is taken away in baptism, and they begin to be called Christian men, which is, "Let thy name be called upon us." Therefore in these seven churches, of one Catholic Church are believers, because it is one in seven by the quality of faith and election. Whether writing to them who labour in the world, and live of the frugality of their labours, and are patient, and when they see certain men in the Church wasters, and pernicious, they hear them, lest there should become dissension, he yet admonishes them by love, that in what respects their faith is deficient they should repent; or to those who dwell in cruel places among persecutors, that they should continue faithful; or to those who, under the pretext of mercy, do unlawful sins in the Church, and make them manifest to be done by others; or to those that are at ease in the Church; or to those who are negligent, and Christians only in name; or to those who are meekly instructed, that they may bravely persevere in faith; or to those who study the Scriptures, and labour to know the mysteries of their announcement, and are unwilling to do God's work that is mercy and love: to all he urges penitence, to all he declares judgment.”

“Therefore also the Lord Jesus Christ Himself not only gave the Holy Spirit as God, but also received it as man, and therefore He is said to be full of grace, and of the Holy Spirit. And in the Acts of the Apostles it is more plainly written of Him, "Because God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit." Certainly not with visible oil but with the gift of grace which is signified by the visible ointment wherewith the Church anoints the baptized. And Christ was certainly not then anointed with the Holy Spirit, when He, as a dove, descended upon Him at His baptism. For at that time He deigned to prefigure His body, i.e. His Church, in which especially the baptized receive the Holy Spirit. But He is to be understood to have been then anointed with that mystical and invisible unction, when the Word of God was made flesh, i.e. when human nature, without any precedent merits of good works, was joined to God the Word in the womb of the Virgin, so that with it it became one person. Therefore it is that we confess Him to have been born of the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary. For it is most absurd to believe Him to have received the Holy Spirit when He was near thirty years old: for at that age He was baptized by John; but that He came to baptism as without any sin at all, so not without the Holy Spirit. For if it was written of His servant and forerunner John himself, "He shall be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother's womb," because, although generated by his father, yet he received the Holy Spirit when formed in the womb; what must be understood and believed of the man Christ, of whose flesh the very conception was not carnal, but spiritual? Both natures, too, as well the human as the divine, are shown in that also that is written of Him, that He received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, and shed forth the Holy Spirit: seeing that He received as man, and shed forth as God. And we indeed can receive that gift according to our small measure, but assuredly we cannot shed it forth upon others; but, that this may be done, we invoke over them God, by whom this is accomplished.”

“Who then was exalted? The lowly or the most high? And what is the lowly if it be not the human? And what is the most high save the divine? But God being most high needs no exaltation, and so the apostle says that the human is exalted, exalted that is in being "made both Lord and Christ." Therefore the apostle does not mean by this term "he made" the everlasting existence of the Lord but the change of the lowly to the exalted that took place on the right hand of God. By this word he declares the mystery of religion, for when he says "by the right hand of God exalted" he plainly reveals the ineffable economy of the mystery that the right hand of God, which created all things, which is the Lord by whom all things were made and without whom nothing consists of things that were made, through the union lifted up to its own exaltation the manhood united to it.”

“Exalted therefore by the right hand of God, because the Psalm had said: "Because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved." And having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this, which you both see and hear. You see the fiery tongues, you hear in our speech. But that which He says, that He received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father and poured it out, shows both natures of the same Christ, because He received as man, and poured out as God.”

“And having received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father, He has poured out this which you see and hear. In Greek it is translated thus: He has poured out this gift which you now see and hear. Indeed, concerning Jesus, whom the Jews crucified and whom God raised, He taught that He is the Christ; but now gradually leading the listeners to higher belief, He signifies that this is the true God, by confirming that He has poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit, which any wise person recognizes to be of divine power alone. And fittingly, He used the same word 'pouring,' which the prophetic statement previously mentioned has the Lord say, to teach them from this that it is the same Lord Jesus Christ who both before taking flesh was accustomed to speaking in the prophets; who disposed the future ages according to His will; who gave signs and wonders in the heaven and on earth; who would save all invoking His name, and fulfill the other things described in prophetic discourse as the Son of God and true God.”

“By the expression "having been exalted," David indicated the ascension and that He (Jesus) is in the heavens, but even this was not clear at first. Look: at the beginning of his speech, when he also brought the prophet Joel as a witness, he did not say that Christ sent the Holy Spirit, but said that the Father sent Him. But when he had reminded them both of the signs of Christ and of what had been done against Christ, and when he had boldly declared the truth about His resurrection, then at last he says that Christ poured out the Holy Spirit, that consequently the prophet spoke of Him: "And it shall come to pass in the last days" (v. 17). By "promise" he means either the one He Himself promised to the apostles, or the one which the Father promised to Jesus before the cross and sufferings. And since Peter was about to declare a great and lofty truth—that Christ poured out the Holy Spirit—he obscures it by saying that the Father gave Him this promise, because no matter what anyone says, if he concludes his word without benefit, he speaks in vain and to no purpose. Peter also shows that the cross not only did not humble Jesus, but gave Him even more splendor. If then, according to the voice of John: "He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire" (Matt. 3:11), the Father gave Him the promise, then now He has fulfilled the promise.”

“And again Peter ascribes the event to the Father. For he knows that this will draw on the listeners. Having spoken, "Having been exalted," and having approached the matter of the ascension, and that he is in the heavens. Therefore he did not speak plainly, saying that he is in the heavens. Since he proceeded so far, and remembered his signs and the resurrection, he next introduces, "He has poured out." For at first he was saying that this had been promised not about Christ but through Joel the prophet. But when he remembered the marvelous things concerning Christ, he now boldly says that he has poured him out. Therefore he was not speaking of the Father, saying "I will pour out," but of Christ. "Receiving the promise," he says, from the Father, or that which he himself promised to us the disciples, namely, "And I will send another Comforter to you," (Jn. 14:16) or that which the Father promised him before his passion, through the words, "And I glorified, and I will glorify again." (Jn. 12:28) He attributes the promise to the Father, shading the statement toward the listeners' easier acceptance. For whatever one might say, if it does not end in benefit, he speaks ineffectively and in vain. He therefore shows that the cross not only did not diminish him, but made him more glorious. For what the Father promised through John the Baptist before the cross, namely, "He will baptize you in the Holy Spirit and with fire," (Matt. 3:11) he gave after the cross.”