COUNCIL, GIFT OF — One of the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. It is classed among the intellectual gifts, inasmuch as it enlightens the intellect. It is that gift which “perfects the virtue of prudence, enabling us to judge promptly and surely, by a kind of supernatural intuition, what is fitting to be done, especially in difficult cases” (A. Tanquerey, n. 1331).
Since the gifts of the Holy Spirit, as St Thomas teaches, are dispositions by which the soul is made docile and movable by the Holy Spirit (S. Th., II-II, q. 52, a. 1), and since the virtue of prudence, whether acquired or infused, is “that which directs man to seek, through careful examination and accurate reflection upon past examples and present circumstances, the means to attain a proposed end,” the gift of counsel perfects prudence to the highest degree “inasmuch as it is regulated and moved by the Holy Spirit” (S. Th., II-II, q. 52, a. 2). The gift of counsel makes known in particular the best means to attain the end, “and even where prudence would remain hesitant, it shows what we ought to say or be silent about, what we must undertake and abandon” (R. Garrigou-Lagrange, p. 330). Hence, as St Thomas notes, “the gift of counsel brings certitude from the Holy Spirit concerning those things which eubulia inquires and conjectures” (S. Th., II-II, q. 51, a. 1).
The gift of counsel guides us in all things ordered to eternal life, and, as Denis the Carthusian observes (Treatise on the Gifts of the Holy Spirit, in Opera omnia, XXXV, Tournai, pp. 157-260, tr. 3, a. 7), in the first degree it directs us in matters of strict obligation, in the second it inclines us to the generous practice of the evangelical counsels, and in the third it enables us to undertake holy works with a truly heroic perfection.
It corresponds, as St Thomas notes (S. Th., II-II, q. 52, a. 4), to the beatitude of mercy, for only the merciful know how to give good counsel.
The gift of counsel may be considered “passively,” as a gift existing in all who are in a state of grace, or “actively,” inasmuch as it is operative, and in that case it belongs to the order of gratis gifts (S. Th., II-II, q. 47, a. 14, ad 2; q. 51, a. 1, ad 3).
The proper object of the gift of counsel is the direction of particular actions, whereas the gifts of knowledge and understanding give us general principles.
This gift is necessary for all in certain more important and difficult cases, especially when eternal salvation and personal sanctification are at stake, for example, in the case of a vocation or in certain occasions of sin encountered in the exercise of one’s office, since “in the gift of counsel the Christian soul has the sure discernment of means, sees its own path, and follows it intrepidly, however arduous and repugnant it may be” (M. Landrieux, Le Divin Méconnu, Paris 1921, p. 163).
The gift of counsel is especially necessary for priests who are spiritual directors and for superiors, so that they may rightly combine severity and kindness, not multiplying precepts but rather moving souls through love rather than fear.
As Fr. Saint-Jure observes (La vie spirituelle, I, Paris 1889, part 1, ch. 4 § 7, pp. 495-514), the lack of such a gift in the soul “renders one confused in thought, blind in design, precipitate in decision, imprudent in speech, and rash in action.”
In the history of mysticism, many saints are noted for the particular and characteristic exercise of this gift. It suffices to recall St Antoninus of Florence for the sagacity of his counsels, known as “Antoninus consiliorum,” St Catherine of Siena, St Angela of Foligno, St Margaret of Cortona, and, among the unlettered, St Felix of Cantalice and the Bl. Francis Mary of Camporosso, Capuchin lay brothers.