Living amid war, daily air-raid alarms, and human suffering, Sr. Maria Marta Przywara, SSpS, shares her personal relationship with the Holy Spirit as a close Person, Comforter, Guide, and source of peace. In this heartfelt testimony, she reveals how the Holy Spirit leads her through religious life, prayer, ministry, and the experience of war in Ukraine, teaching her trust, courage, and a love stronger than fear.

For me, a Missionary Sister Servant of the Holy Spirit, the Feast of Pentecost is one of the most beautiful celebrations of the year. It is also the patronal feast of our Congregation, and therefore our shared name day celebration. I am grateful to the Holy Spirit for calling me to a Congregation that bears His name, and that it was here that I was able to come to know Him more deeply and draw closer to Him. However, the foundation of my life of faith was laid much earlier. I thank God for my family, who passed the faith on to me, and for the parish where I grew up and where that faith took root.

As a child, I learned to pray to God as Father. Later, as a teenager, I began to enter into a relationship with Jesus as Brother and Friend. But the Third Person of the Holy Trinity remained unknown to me, mysterious, and even inaccessible.

Now, after 37 years of life in a Congregation where the Holy Spirit is especially honored and loved, I experience His presence as that of a living and close Person, Someone whom I can trust completely and with whom I desire to live every moment of the day.

The Holy Spirit is the One with whom I rise each morning. During the first years of formation, we had a custom that one of the Sisters would wake us up and, while turning on the light, would say: “Holy Spirit, God” — and we, still sleepy, would respond: “Everything out of love for You.” This formed in our hearts the desire not only to get out of bed out of love for Him, but to live the entire day in love for the Holy Spirit, with everything that it may bring.

I begin each day with meditation on the Word of God. Before opening the Bible, I always pray to the Holy Spirit that He, who is its principal Author, may allow me to understand what God is saying in His Word, and I ask Him to open my heart to receive that Word.

During the day, I often recall the words of our co-foundress, Mother Josepha, who said that the very breath of a Missionary Sister Servant of the Holy Spirit should be the invocation: “Come, Holy Spirit.” I believe that the thousands of SSpS sisters who lived and served in this way are now rejoicing in the fullness of union with the Holy Spirit in heaven.

The Holy Spirit is the One to whom I turn during spiritual discernment. I often ask Him for light and wisdom in making decisions. When I meet people who are suffering, I ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen and console them, for He is the Comforter. During my evening examination of conscience, I place myself in the presence of the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Truth, asking Him to show me the truth about myself — not only my sins, but also how God loves me and how I allow myself to be loved by Him, and to what extent my likeness to Him was revealed throughout the day.

My relationship with the Holy Spirit deepened during the years when I was involved in ministry at a charismatic school of evangelization called Mary’s School. More than once, I witnessed the great miracles the Holy Spirit worked in the hearts and lives of people who invoked Him with faith and entrusted themselves to Him.

For many years I have been formed and have ministered through the path of lectio divina, and here too I deeply experience the close presence of the Holy Spirit. When, as a 19-year-old girl, I entered the Missionary Congregation, I initially struggled to share my life and the Word of God in a Bible-sharing group. At that time, I could not have foreseen that years later God would send me to share my faith in many places and in various ways — including on Radio Maryja in Kyiv, as well as through leading retreats and accompanying people in spiritual conversations during retreats.

I believe that in this way the Holy Spirit desires to reveal Himself in my life. Time and again, I have experienced — and continue to experience — that the Holy Spirit uses me, weak and sinful as I am, in order to manifest the power of the Word of God.

We, the Missionary Sisters Servants of the Holy Spirit, wear a ring engraved with the symbol of the Holy Spirit. It is an outward sign of what is invisible. The ring silently proclaims that I am consecrated to the Holy Spirit. In reality, it is not I who do something for the Lord by making religious vows. Rather, it is the Holy Spirit who accepts me as I am and makes me capable of receiving God’s love and responding to that love by loving God and other people. And this is the path to happiness and the fullness of life.

I am deeply grateful to Saint Arnold Janssen for remaining open to the Holy Spirit and allowing himself to be guided by Him, and for leaving to his spiritual daughters and sons a great love for the Holy Spirit as their inheritance.

According to the testament of our Founder, every day in community we begin by singing the hymn “Come, Creator Spirit”, asking that through the grace of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Trinity may live in our hearts and in the hearts of all people. During midday prayers, the Sequence to the Holy Spirit often resounds in our convents, through which together we entrust to God the matters of the Church and of those who ask us for prayer. At present, every day we pray for peace in Ukraine and everywhere wars are taking place.

Having lived for more than four years in a country engulfed by war, I clearly see that the battle is being fought on two fronts: in the spiritual world and in the material world. As for the battle in the material world (on the front lines and in the skies), together with the Sisters we participate in it by doing good for those who need help and support. For the battle in the spiritual realm, God arms us with His Word, nourishes us with His Body, and sends His Spirit through whom He strengthens and consoles us.

Throughout Ukraine, we live amid frequent alarms warning us of real danger caused by hundreds of drones and dozens of missiles flying toward us. Such situations move me to invoke the Holy Spirit with even greater fervor and trust. The Holy Spirit is the One who fills me with inner peace of heart when I cannot find peace outside. The Holy Spirit comes with the gift of fortitude when I feel fear during explosions. The Holy Spirit grants strength to accompany those who lose their loved ones and their homes. In these situations, which often seem humanly overwhelming, I experience all the more the close presence and guidance of God’s Holy Spirit. In moments of danger, my faith and my inner conviction grow stronger that “God is actually not far from each one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:27–28).

United in our longing for the Holy Spirit, let us often pray for one another and for others: “Father, in the name of Your Son Jesus, I ask for the gift of the Holy Spirit.”

Dear friends, I wish for each person that the Holy Spirit — our common Friend and Bridegroom — may lead us on the path of holiness, filling our hearts with pure love, deep peace, and the joy that flows from faith.

The Word of God encourages us: “Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thessalonians 5:16–18). Only the Holy Spirit can enable us to live such a life of faith; therefore, let us breathe with His presence, calling out: “COME, HOLY SPIRIT.”

Sr. Maria Marta Przywara, SSpS