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Pentecost

Pentecost was originally a Jewish feast, one of the three major feasts of the Jewish Year. For this feast Jews who were scattered throughout the Mediterranean world, returned to celebrate the feast at Jerusalem. And these weren't recent emigrants. They were all now speaking to language of their adopted countries, cities, or regions. So they were second or third generation Jews. According to Luke, this mixed crowd is a providential preparation for the beginning of the Church's mission. This is seen universally as 'the birth of the Church'. These emigrants will carry the gospel first heard at Jerusalem back to the ends of the earth from whence they came. And, so powerful and uniting is the message of Jesus that the barriers of culture and language are no longer relevant. The language of loving service is universal.

We are talking here about the transformation of the hearts of the apostles in the wake of the execution of Jesus. It is an internal transformation. Men and women who ran scared into hiding are transformed into bold preachers of the gospel. This wonderful transformation had been brought about by the Holy Spirit, the community believed. Paul reminds the Romans in our second reading today that the agent of this transformation was the Holy Spirit: "The Spirit you received is not the spirit of slaves bringing fear into your lives again." The community used a very symbolic language to convey the nature of this transformation:

• a strong, driving wind,
• tongues of fire,
• being filled with the Holy Spirit, and
• speaking in different languages

These are all agents of energy and enthusiasm. The church we inhabit today is so different from that early church that we have problems coming to grips with their experience.

Comfortable and secure in a hierarchical, office-dominated model of Church leadership, it's difficult for modern Catholics to locate themselves in the early Christian community, where leadership was more charismatic - Spirit-filled and Spirit-led.

In the young church, the Holy Spirit wasn't just the Trinity's third person, someone to whom students prayed during exams. The Spirit was the force that guided the early Christian community in all it did, opening doors and pointing its members into the directions the risen Jesus wished it to go.

As we hear in Sunday's second reading (I Cor 12: 3-7, 12-13), the Spirit wasn't a nebulous power reserved only for the Church's elite. The Holy Spirit empowered everyone who attempted to imitate the life death and resurrection of Jesus. The Holy Spirit was a gift given to every Christian. Yet, at the same time the Spirit was also drawing all these specially gifted individuals into one body.

Paul describes the process: "There are different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Spirit; different forms of service but the same Lord; different workings but the same God who produces all of them in everyone. To each individual, the manifestation of the Spirit is given for some benefit."

Then the Apostle goes on to describe how each Christian unites with other Christians to form the body of Christ.

Our different biblical authors revel in the many facets of the Spirit. That's why they provide different times for the Spirit's initial descent into the Christian community. Luke obviously opts for a single energising moment, Pentecost. But, in the case of other authors, the spirit is often given in the individual meetings with the Risen Jesus in the days immediately following on his resurrection.

As we have already hinted, Luke has his own unique concerns: No matter how diverse their background, all Christians can proclaim, "We hear the disciples of Jesus speaking in our own tongues of the mighty acts of God."

John, on the other hand, locates the sending of the Spirit on Easter Sunday night. The Spirit isn't given exclusively to the Twelve, 'the Leaders', but to the 'followers'. The most lowly, insignificant Christian participates equally in the same gift.

Last, from John's point of view, the principal function of the Holy Spirit is to create a community of forgiveness. "Receive the Holy Spirit," Jesus proclaims. "Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained." As a 'forgiving community' the mission of the Church is to be a healing agent in the world.

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