A central doctrine of Christianity is that God exists as three persons; the Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, who are all eternal and of the same substance. Now, we all have an image of God the Father, the bearded old man sitting in the clouds, and images of Jesus, the Son, are legion, but the Holy Spirit? That’s tricky. He is the bond of love between the Father and Son. He’s described in the Bible as appearing in the form of a wind, a flame, a cloud, and a dove, but never in any form that remotely resembles a human being.

To complicate matters, the Bible tells us that as well as the Holy Spirit there are also some very unholy spirits around! So how can we spot the Holy Spirit? Well, I suggest we take our lead from Jesus who, in Matthew’s Gospel, points out that “by their fruits shall you know them”. In other words you can work out if he is there or not by people’s actions or behaviour.

The fruits of the Holy Spirit are enjoyed by many, many people, not all of whom profess a belief in God by any means. St Paul, in his letter to the Galatians, lists them as: love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness (i.e. loyalty and trustworthiness), gentleness and self-control. We all know people who display these fruits. They are not just people who have a vocation to the caring professions and charitable work (including donating and raising money). They are people who try to make life easier for everybody.

But, the Holy Spirit is not the only spirit around, there are also evil spirits, including the spirit of jealousy, the spirit of lying, the spirit of perversity, the spirit of despair, the spirit of fear, the spirit of pride. Again, by their fruits shall we know them. These are the spirits who drive those who live for their own ends, galvanised by bigoted prejudice, who try to dominate by spreading lies, fear, despair and division. We all know people like this, and not all of them deny the existence of God either!

So, whether you believe in God or not, to make our world a better place, let’s make the fruits of the Holy Spirit part of our ‘five a day’, and encourage those who don’t to do the same.