Descent of the Holy Spirit. Holy and Glorious Pentecost.
Acts 2:1-11. John 7:37-52. 8:12.
Read Acts 2:1-11
Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory for ever!
There is an ongoing interplay between our internal and external lives which we sometimes experience as a flow, other times as a tension. As individuals we must attend to our own wellbeing, but our own wellbeing depends upon relationships with others. As families and communities, we must attend to our own cohesion but that also depends upon our openness to the variety of people among us, which we are also called to extend in hospitality to the variety of others beyond.
This is a feature of our lives, not a glitch, and it features prominently in the life of our parishes. At various times, for various reasons, internal matters of parish life – griefs, losses, and conflicts; joys, growth, and connection – necessarily predominate. But if we are not attentive to again turning to relating outwardly, we can get stuck. Pentecost divinely points us toward getting unstuck.
The Descent of the Holy Spirit is a reversal of the severe grace at the Tower of Babel of limiting the cohesion of a humanity committed to independence from God – those who could no longer understand each other now can. It begins with the Apostles and disciples “all with one accord in one place” and it culminates in people “from every nation under heaven…hear(ing) them speaking in (their) own tongues the wonderful works of God”.
We too are called together with one accord around the apostolic teaching; we too are called to have others hear from us, in ways that they can understand, the wonderful works of God. We are called to understand our faith. We are called to understand people to whom we communicate our faith. This is an ongoing process that, as we grow by the grace of the Holy Spirit, we and others can experience more as flow than tension.