Pentecost
8 June 2025
Pentecost is the Birthday of the Church, and the Gospel setting is the Cenacle, the Upper Room in Jerusalem, the place where the Church was born, the focus of Christian history from the Last Supper to Pentecost. For the Apostles that was the room where frequent memories of Jesus continued to come alive, encouraging them, but also embarrassing them, and even chastising them.
Slightly more than seven weeks before Pentecost, Jesus gathered the Apostles for the Last Supper. He gave them His final instructions. He celebrated the first Eucharist, and He gave them the mandatum, the new commandment to “Love one another as I have loved you.”
The Cenacle is a room of love, but also a room of sadness, betrayal, and parting. This is the room from which Judas left to betray – and to which the others returned to hide and to pray. From this room the Apostles heard the shouts on Friday morning, “Crucify Him!” But also in this room the Apostles heard, on the evening of that first Easter, Jesus’ words of forgiveness: “Peace be with you!” There the cowering Apostles saw and heard the incredible: “Why are you disturbed? Look at my hands and my feet; it is really I.” And a week later Thomas heard, "Put your finger here and see my hands."
Even after the Ascension they were once more huddled and confused in that room – and the Holy Spirit comes upon them that first Pentecost. That finally changes everything: they understood! They now leave that “room of memories” with new courage – and with the gifts of the Holy Spirit – to do what The Master had done: to preach, to teach, to heal. To spread the Gospel; to spread the Church; to spread the Kingdom of God.
The Apostles became New Creations: Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit upon them, as the Father breathed into inert clay to create man in the beginning. St. Paul tells us that we are Temples of the Holy Spirit. We are meant to be “inhabited” by God, always “reminded” of God, always in God's presence. Because we, too, have received the seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit: wisdom (highest knowledge); understanding (intimate knowledge); knowledge (most basic of the three levels of knowledge); fortitude (firmness of spirit; steadiness despite difficulties); counsel (discernment about the right choice); piety (honor; reverence); fear of the Lord (an attitude of respect, awe, and dread of offending God).
We, like the Apostles, inspired by the Holy Spirit, are to leave the Cenacle, our Upper Room of memories and fear and confusion, going forth and reminding our world of the truth of God’s presence. On this Pentecost, the “Birthday of the Church,” may God give us the graces we need, the courage and perseverance we need, to witness to a frequently unbelieving world – the miracles of the Upper Room, the miracles of our Church, the miracles our True Faith.
Fr. Don Saunders, SJ
No comments:
Post a Comment