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Time of Mercy Blog

 

Fullness of life, fullness of joy in the Holy Spirit!

The Descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles


Pentecost is one of the most important Christian Holidays in the entire liturgical year. We celebrate it fifty days after the Lord's Resurrection, so it is called Pentecost. The sending of the Holy Spirit finally completes the work of the Risen Savior, who not only founded the Church, but also entrusted it to the protection of the Spirit. After the decision of the Elvira Synod in 306, when a separate feast was introduced in the Church, the celebrations lasted not for two as it is today, but for as many as seven days.

The soul of the world

In theological reflection, meditations about the Holy Spirit are called "Pneumatology", from the Greek word "pneuma" - "spirit". And this is a special reflection, since the Synod of Sense already said in 1140 that "the Holy Spirit is the soul of the world".

In the Jewish tradition, the equivalent of Pentecost was the Feast of Weeks, a kind of "harvest festival", that is, a day of gratitude to the Creator for the harvested crops. The Israelites then offered the first fruits of bread to Yahweh. It was seven weeks after the Passover Day, and at some point was considered the anniversary of God's proclamation of the Decalogue to Moses on Mount Sinai - fifty days after the Exodus from Egyptian slavery.

The same Holy Spirit was given to the Apostles on the day of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus – the Gospel tells us - and fifty days later, on the day of Pentecost. Let us compare both events.

On the day of his resurrection, the Lord Jesus repeats the divine act of creation of man. We read in the Book of Genesis that when the Creator formed the body of the first man, He breathed a breath of life into it. Out of all earthly creatures, only man was distinguished by this divine gesture, because only man was endowed with an immortal soul, only in man He placed his image and likeness, and only man God wanted him to be His friend.

On the evening of the resurrection, the One who once created man comes to the Apostles. Now He is giving people not the ordinary breath of life, but the Holy Spirit himself, who will henceforth restore our humanity, deformed by sin. The Holy Spirit is the one and the same personal Love that the Father and the Son have for each other. By imparting to his disciples the Holy Spirit, who is true God, equal to the Father and the Son, the Son of God gives them the same Love with which He loves His Eternal Father and the same Love with which the Eternal Father loves Him. From now on, the Holy Spirit will not only purify us from sins and repair our humanity. He will also deify all those who have been baptized into Christ's death and resurrection by baptism. He will transform the next baptized into a new creation, giving each of us a share in God's nature.

Fifty days after the Lord Jesus' Resurrection, something new happened. On that day, the Holy Spirit united individual apostles reborn in Christ into one Church. Notice the evident references in this account of Pentecost to the building of the Tower of Babel and to the thunder and fire that accompanied the gift of the commandments at Mount Sinai.

Pentecost is the reverse of building the Tower of Babel. The church - unlike the Tower of Babel - is a structure that really reaches up to heaven. This is possible because God Himself is its builder. During the construction of the Tower of Babel, people mixed their tongues, but in the Holy Spirit a great interpersonal understanding was made. People who speak different languages ​​are now starting to understand each other and becoming close to each other. Because the Holy Spirit teaches us a new language, the language of love.

Moreover, Pentecost is the fulfillment of what happened on Mount Sinai, fifty days after the crossing of the Red Sea, when God gave His people the Ten Commandments. Now, fifty days after the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the Church receives more than the commandment of love: she receives the Uncreated Gift, the personal Divine Love, the Holy Spirit himself. The Holy Spirit himself - as many great teachers of faith reminded us - descends into our hearts as the Law to be followed by the Church. Therefore, in order for the meaning of today's celebration to be fulfilled, let us rejoice that God gives us such an incomprehensible gift. But let's not forget to ask ourselves whether the Holy Spirit really lives and works in our hearts.

Pentecost is still going on

"I have come to throw the fire on the earth, and how much I wish it would already be kindled" (Lk 12:49). This is one of those words of the Lord Jesus to which we often react with contraction of the heart. It is enough to recall the above events to be sure that the fire that the Lord Jesus came to throw to the earth is the same Holy Spirit that rested on the apostles in the form of fiery tongues on the day of Pentecost. Believers in Christ no longer offer animal sacrifices, but rather, we ourselves would like to become "a sacrifice pleasing to God, sanctified by the Holy Spirit" (cf. Romans 15:16; cf. 12: 1). It is He who makes us - many - one Body of Christ and He makes our deification.

On the day of Pentecost it happened in visible signs, but it is, after all, the everyday reality of our Christian life. The Lord Jesus baptized us - as the Gospel says - "with the Holy Spirit and with fire" (cf. Mt 3:11). Because it is exactly like this: the Holy Spirit himself is the Fire that transforms us, belonging to Christ, into a sacrifice pleasing to God and makes us ever more firmly in Christ and Christ in us.

"The wind blows where it wills” (cf. Jn 3:8). Nevertheless, every Holy Mass is a particularly privileged moment when the Holy Spirit descends upon us. After the consecration of the bread and wine, the celebrant begs God to impart the Holy Spirit to the assembled Church: "We humbly implore - this formula is found in the second Eucharistic prayer - that the Holy Spirit unite us all, who receive the Body and Blood of Christ."

Pentecost continues - 1 Cor 12: 7-10

Pentecost continues. The promise of the Spirit is for every baptized person. Everyone gets him. And everyone is a bit different! The diversity of the Church does not come only (or even above all!) from the diversity of its people. It does not follow that "pious [people] of all nations under the sun enter her: Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and the inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and Libya, and visitors from Rome, Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabs ... ”(cf. Acts 2: 5, 9-11). Nor is it born from the fact that among the baptized there are: "Greeks and barbarians, slaves and free men and women" (cf. 1 Cor 12:13; Gal 3:28). The variety and richness of the Church comes first and foremost from the variety and richness of the self-giving of the Spirit! It is He - one and the same Spirit - who causes in each of us what he wants and how he wants (1 Cor 12:11). He - the only Principle and Mover of the Church.

Let us pray

Holy Spirit - Lord and Giver of Life of the Church! You, who are Love, but also Freedom in the Mystery of the Trinity, I praise You for the measure and for the way in which You give me yourself. I am pleased with the place you have set for me in the Church. I want to multiply each of the gifts - charisms, talents - you have given me. I do not want to waste them - also by resentment and jealousy of those who received something else. I want to go deeper and deeper into what you have given me! With what I have received, I want to serve the whole Body of the Church. Amen.

Until Tomorrow

fr. george

George Bobowski