(El Greco)
"Receive the Holy Spirit"
Acts 2: 1-11
1 Cor 12: 3b – 7, 1
Jn 20: 19-23
Come, Holy Spirit, come!
And from your celestial home
Shed a ray of light divine!
Everything
that is big begins very small.
Everything from mountains, to plants, to animals, to a distant sound
that grows in intensity as it approaches, to we humans. Trees begins as seeds, animals and humans
begin as a very tiny cluster of living cells that grow exponentially over time
into a small baby that will continue its growth towards maturity. Even ideas often begin very simple and once
implemented they become far more complex.
So
the same principal is true with the Church.
Before Pentecost, the most loyal followers of Jesus could fit inside one
room. Today, Christians count in the billions and the Catholic Church alone is
about 1.5 billion members across the globe.
Anywhere you go in the world today, you will find a Catholic Church and
other sects of Christians established worldwide. But the explosion of worldwide
Christianity over the last twenty centuries has been born of what the world
would not consider the formula for success.
Unlike
what we hear from our culture as the sign of a successful life: a life filled
with no pain, with material comfort, with physical beauty, with no sadness or challenges,
the message of the Gospel through the words of Jesus call us to: take up our
cross, to accept some level of persecution for what we believe, to control our
desires and impulses, to serve our neighbor with a generous heart, to forgive
our enemies, to gather regularly with our fellow brothers and sisters in the
faith, and to follow Christ up a steep and narrow path. Did you ever hear this
coming from a New York advertising agency?
If
we relied merely on human intellect and ability alone, trusting in our own
talent and genius, the Christian message would have disappeared centuries
ago. We would be reading about the
Christian faith in history books as a well-intentioned but failed effort to
bring goodness to humanity. So, we might safely say that something more could be
attributed to the endurance of the Christian faith. That could only be because
of the Feast we celebrate today – that constant abiding and living presence of
the Holy Spirit which gives the Church its life and preserves it in truth and
charity. This faith is of divine origin and the gift of the Holy Spirit is that
of God himself, which sustains this life and preserves it from age to age.
The
Holy Spirit reveals the constant intent of Jesus for the world and in
particular for those who claim to follow him.
The Church has become the way in which the message of salvation is
always made present for each generation.
This faith has become not just another philosophy to follow or a moral
code to be formed by. This faith has
become a way to live based upon the message of a person who is recognized as
the Word of God among us. So, today we mark the birthday of the Church born
from the Spirit in our time and space.
We
see in this “birth” the very mission of the Church. The Apostles were changed by that Spirit,
which also has the power to reform every one of us who are called to be loyal
followers of Jesus in this time we find ourselves.
Before
that first Pentecost, the Apostles were fearful, confused, disorganized, and in
hiding. After the Spirit came with wind,
fire and language (Acts 2: 1-11), they became bold, courageous, and on fire for
the Lord and his message. Like an electric
cable joined to a battery waiting to be recharged, the Spirit gave this power
boost to the beginning age of Christianity. The Apostles needed that surge of
courage and conviction to go out and share the good news as Jesus had
commissioned them.
Peace
and forgiveness is the gift Jesus gave in the Gospel today: “Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.
And when he said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive
the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you
retain are retained.” (Jn 20: 21-23). The
mission of reconciliation with God and others given to a broken world is the
gift of the Holy Spirit which Jesus has breathed upon us.
Where
can we find this gift? In sacraments of healing and reconciliation but where else have you seen it?
What can we do to bring that healing to others and how courageous can we
be in the face of contrary messages today?
O most blessed
light divine,Shine within these hearts of yours,
And our inmost being fill! . . .
Heal our wounds, our strength renew;
On our dryness pour your dew . . .
Guide the steps that go astray . . .
(From
the Sequence for Pentecost)
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