PENTECOST

9 JUNE 2019

          During these past ninety days, we reflected in very particular ways on the central Mystery of our faith.  During the forty days of Lent, we embraced the disciplines of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving to acknowledge that we have not always lived our Baptismal promises and prepare for the Sacred Paschal Triduum.  During those three intense days, we focused on the suffering, death, and resurrection of the Lord.  For the past fifty days, we have been celebrating the Lord’s Resurrection, listening to him speak to us in the Word and realizing his risen presence in the Sacramental Life of the Church, especially in this Eucharist.

            Today, we bring to completion these intense days of reflecting on our faith.  On this Solemnity of Pentecost, Saint Luke tells us in the Acts of the Apostles how the Holy Spirit literally blew the Apostles out of their comfort zone to share the Good News of the Paschal Mystery with everyone.  The Holy Spirit reverses the confusion of languages at the Tower of Babel.  In doing so, the Holy Spirit enables them to speak clearly and effectively to the diverse crowd of pilgrims who had gathered in Jerusalem for the Jewish Feast of Pentecost.

            That same Holy Spirit is given to us and blows us out of our comfort zones to proclaim the truth and the power of the Paschal Mystery.  We cannot accomplish the mission on our own without the power of the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit strengthens us in three ways.  The Spirit strengthens our relationship with Jesus Christ.  The Spirit strengthens our passion to defend the faith we have celebrated.  The Spirit strengthens us to spread the faith as effectively as possible.  The Holy Spirit gives us the same gifts given to the Apostles.  They are the gifts that we drill into the memories of our eighth graders when Bishop Rhoades quizzes them at Confirmation Mass. 

We need the gifts of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding, if we intend to understand the faith that helps us grow in a deeper relationship with Jesus Christ.  As we implement our Strategic Plan in the fall, be sure to check out the many offerings designed to help our adult understanding of the faith.  We are also looking for sponsors in the RCIA this August.  The gifts of fortitude and courage will help us to defend the faith, especially when others challenge us or question what we are doing.  If we accept the gift of piety and fear of the Lord, we will know the strength to spread the faith, more by our actions than by our words.  Piety is a gift that helps us express our faith in healthy ways.  Fear of the Lord does not make us afraid of the Lord, but more rooted in the awe-filled sense of wonder at his presence in our lives.

In his Letter to the Romans, Saint Paul distinguishes between those who are in the flesh and those who are in the spirit.  In using these terms, he outlines two ways in which people relate to God and to the world.  Those in the flesh are earthbound.  They can only think of success in terms of what we can conceive in our world.  Those in the flesh are driven to be successful in business or power or fame or wealth.  They cannot see any reality beyond these.  Those in the spirit are immersed in the person of Jesus Christ.  They too value the measures of success in this world.  But they also understand that these values are not permanent and cannot last beyond the grave.  They understand that being immersed in Jesus Christ will last forever.

We were introduced into living in the spirit when we were baptized.  That is why we have been sprinkling the assembly every Sunday since Easter.  As people living in the spirit, we accept the gifts of the Holy Spirit to strengthen our relationship with Jesus Christ, to defend our faith, and to do everything we can to spread it.  We are cooperating with the Holy Spirit in bringing unity and peace and respect, instead of hatred, division, and fear.

THE ASCENSION OF THE LORD

2 JUNE 2019

          When we entered into this Liturgical Year on the First Sunday of Advent, we began hearing from the Gospel according to Luke.  We were told to wait.  The Angel had announced to a young virgin that she would be the mother of God.  As Mary accepted this invitation and became the Handmaid of the Lord, we waited for four weeks to hear the angels announce that the Lord had been born in Bethlehem.  Today, we hear from Luke’s second volume, the Acts of the Apostles.  He tells us that it has been 40 days since the two men dressed in white had told the women at the tomb that the Lord had been raised from the dead.  During those 40 days, the risen Lord had revealed the Paschal Mystery to his disciples.  They began to understand that Christ had to suffer and be raised from the dead on the third day.  They realized that the promised kingdom of God had been fulfilled in Jesus Christ.  They embraced his message that they must preach repentance, if the kingdom would become a reality in their lives.

            Today they listen to that same risen Lord, as he tells them that he will depart from them and return to the right hand of the Father.  Using the language of the Letter to the Hebrews, he will enter heaven, the sanctuary not made by human hands.  Unlike the high priest who entered the sanctuary of the Temple to offer sacrifice for the sins of his people, Jesus has been both the priest and the sacrifice.  His gift of total self-love will never need to be repeated.  Instead of sending them on their mission immediately, he tells them to stay in Jerusalem and wait.  Then those two men dressed in white repeat the Lord’s message.  They must stop looking up to the sky and wait in Jerusalem.

            We celebrate the Solemnity of the Ascension, because it is integral to our understanding of the Paschal Mystery.  The Ascension heralds a new era.  The era of the earthly ministry of Jesus of Nazareth has come to an end.  Now a new era is about to begin.  As the disciples wait in Jerusalem, they have no idea of how long that wait will last.  But because we have read the story of the new era of the Church from Luke’s second volume, we know that their waiting ended when the Holy Spirit broke through the doors, just as the risen Lord had broken through the doors of their locked room on the day of the Resurrection.  They could not begin their work of preaching the Kingdom of God until they had received the Holy Spirit.  Filled with the Holy
Spirit, those first disciples continued the work of Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen Messiah.

            We are waiting to celebrate the giving of the Holy Spirit next Sunday on the Solemnity of Pentecost.  With the gift of the Holy Spirit, we are given the same mission of proclaiming the kingdom of God and embracing the need for our own conversion – our own turning more completely to that kingdom already in our midst.  The Ascension reminds us that the risen Lord is not absent, but more present than we can ever imagine.  Through the power of the Holy Spirit, he is present in the Sacramental life of the Church, especially in this Eucharist under the forms of bread and wine.  He is present in our darkest hours, when we face those dark holes of loss and pain and death.  He is present whenever two or more gather in his name.

            We are also waiting for him to come again in glory.  We have no idea how long it will take until he comes again.  But we know that in the meantime, we cannot stand around and look up into the sky.  Through the power of the Holy Spirit, we reflect his presence in the way we treat each other with love and respect.  Nourished by the Eucharist, we can obey his command to love as he has loved us, to wash each other’s feet, and to give ourselves in loving service.  We are part of this era of the Church, and the Mystery is entrusted to us.