Pentecost is a feast that
speaks for itself. Its wind and fire, its colors and sounds, tell a
story that requires little, if any, commentary. But a little context can
always help.
Pentecost was a Jewish
festival long before it became a Christian one. For our Jewish brothers
and sisters, Pentecost, or the Feast of Weeks, celebrates God’s gift of
the Torah, the Law, to Moses and the chosen people.
Our Christian Pentecost
celebrates the gift of God’s Law, too, as St. John Chrysostom, bishop of
Constantinople, observed in a Pentecost homily over 1500 years ago. I
quote: “Pentecost marks the moment when the disciples of Jesus “emerged
from the Cenacle carrying within themselves the Law of the Spirit, a Law
written in their hearts. Each became a living Law, a living book
animated by the Holy Spirit.”
So, the gift of God’s
Law, the Law of the Spirit written in our hearts provides some of the
context for this feast. But there’s more. In the reading from Acts, Luke
connected the moment of Pentecost with the story of creation in the Book
of Genesis. The “strong, driving wind” that swept through the room where
the disciples were gathered brings to mind the Genesis moment when a
mighty wind swept over the waters of the abyss and God brought light out
of darkness. So, more context. Pentecost is creation. Think of it as the
New Creation.
And there is yet another
Genesis story that gives context for the Christian Pentecost - the story
of the Tower of Babel when people who spoke a common language decided to
build a city with a great tower that would reach into the heavens. They
did this, Genesis tells us, because “they wanted to make a name for
themselves” – which suggests that they were driven by pride and
ambition. If they could just build their tower high enough it would
pierce the heavens and they could steal God’s power and become more like
God than they already were. Of course, when the tower collapsed, they
ended up less like God, speaking a confusion of languages: divided,
dispirited, dispersed.
Pentecost reverses that
story. On the day of Pentecost there were many languages but, quite
amazingly, when people who were gathered in Jerusalem from all over the
Mediterranean world heard the preaching of the disciples, each was able
to hear them speaking in his or her own tongue. What should have been a
hopelessly divisive experience, became this amazing moment of unity when
the many and the diverse became one.
So, historical context
can definitely enhance our understanding of Pentecost. But Pentecost
also has a contemporary context because, my friends, like all our
feasts, Pentecost lives in the present as well as in the past. Pentecost
is happening right now. I trust we can see that in the Cathedral today
and feel that in this liturgy, and I hope we can know it every day.
Pope Francis, in one of
his off-the-cuff weekday homilies, spoke of how the Holy Spirit is with
us now, but how we are quite good at keeping the Spirit at a distance
from us, quite good at ‘taming’ the Holy Spirit. “If I may speak
plainly,” he said, “we want to tame the Holy Spirit because the Spirit
annoys us…the Spirit moves us, pushes us - pushes the Church - to move
forward, and too often we would prefer it if the Spirit would just keep
quiet and not bother us!” As an example, he spoke of the Second
Vatican Council, the “New Pentecost” of Pope John XXIII, and how some in
the Church seek to neutralize the Council by treating it as a museum
piece instead of as the living, dynamic, revolutionary call to action it
was. “That’s the sure way,” Pope Francis said, “to stifle the Holy
Spirit.
My friends, Pentecost is
about letting the Spirit bother us, annoy us, make us uncomfortable.
Pentecost is about daring to engage the world with all its destructive
divisions - personal, political, religious - seeing them for the dead
ends they are. How sad, then, if out of fear, we stand on the sidelines
clinging to our comfortable certainties, content to live in an echo
chamber, closed off to enter into dialogue with those whose views differ
from our own.
In his great Apostolic
Exhortation, Gaudete et Exultate, Pope Francis warns against allowing
ourselves to be paralyzed by fear and excessive caution, always hiding
in what he calls safe, closed spaces. “Closed spaces,” he says, “grow
musty and unhealthy, and the only antidote to them is a holy boldness,
the kind of boldness that sent the disciples to the streets on
Pentecost.” He concludes, “Let us ask for the apostolic boldness
to share the gospel with others and to stop making our Christian life a
museum of memories!”
“A museum of memories.”
That must not be the Church; it must not be our life! A museum of
memories is the very opposite of the New Creation that is Pentecost
because the Holy Spirit of Pentecost comes to us in fire to awaken and
embolden us – to make us eager to renew and repair relationships –
relationships within families and among friends, relationships between
peoples and nations, and, yes, our very relationship with the creation
around us.
My friends, may the
Spirit of Pentecost come to us now in this Eucharist. May the Spirit
annoy us, disturb us, prod us, push us out of this Cathedral and into
the streets, into our homes, our workplaces – into all those places
where faith and love, conviction and compassion, mercy and justice can
make a difference. “Lord, send out your Spirit and renew the face of the
earth!"
Father Michael G. Ryan
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