Father Christopher Warren, St Mary’s RC Church, comments on John 16 v 6 - 9:

Every year in the front cover of my diary I inscribe the following: ‘Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.’

Written in 1976 by Pope Paul VI, those words remind me that integrity and authenticity are the most effective signs of holiness.

Truly inspirational people teach us by words that are lived and witness to their message with integrity.

Much of our dissatisfaction with public figures comes when we realise that in spite of their lofty ideals, they do not practice what they preach.

Of course, human nature means that often we think one thing and do the exact opposite.

However, Jesus prays for us and calls us to seek out perfection by loving and serving others, living a life of goodness and sacrifice.

He calls us to nothing less than the same truth he lived during his earthly life. Humanly speaking this perfection is beyond us and is unobtainable.

For the disciple of Jesus, the same holds true when we seek to find this treasure under our own steam.

The Christian life is not simply adhering to a set of rules but allowing God to enter into our hearts and spirits.

This supernatural reality is the gift of grace that makes it possible to attain the highest degrees of generosity and love because it is Jesus working in and through us.

That is the gift laid before us by Christ.