-
Our celebration of the Feast of Pentecost draws to a close — or, rather, a fulfillment of— what we identify as The Paschal Mystery. This is the mystery of Redemption which is played out in a number of key events which include:
+the Lord’s Passion and Death
+the Resurrection
+the Ascension
+the Sending of the Holy Spirit.
We not only celebrate these events during Holy Week and Eastertide, but the very celebration draws us close to the mystery, and we can, in a spiritual manner, participate in the deeper meaning of these events. So, looking back at them we see…
In the Lord’s Passion and Death, the unimaginable love that God has for us. The Lord’s Teaching had shown us the way beyond sin to holiness of life. His death, however, showed us that love is stronger than sin, and that love is stronger even than death.
2) In Our Lord’s Resurrection, we see the power of God active, not only in the moment of Resurrection, but also God’s continual power to raise us from the death of sin and to give us hope for eternal life.
3) In the Lord’s Ascension, we come to know the Father’s ultimate plan for each of us. As the Lord said to His disciples before His departure, “I will not leave you orphans,” God’s plan is that we will be with Him in Heaven for all eternity, with, perhaps, a brief pit-stop in Purgatory for those of us who need it. This hope alone could cajole the sinner into repentance.
4) And now we come to the Giving of the Holy Spirit. The Third Person of the Holy Trinity seems perpetually active, lessening the distance between Heaven and Earth — that is — between God the Father and the Souls He created. Modern Man, however, reflecting Adam’s Original Sin of wanting to become God’s equal, no longer wants to see himself as created in the image and likeness of God, but in the image of himself: autonomous, free, adult.
This reveals an inauthentic relationship with God, not unlike the Prodigal Son who thought he could only find himself by distancing himself from his father. Here is where we hear the oft-repeated phrase, “I’m spiritual, but not religious.” However, one cannot be spiritual without the Holy Spirit because spiritual life is nothing else but the penetration of the soul by the divine fire of the Holy Spirit.
The “strong, driving wind” we heard about today brings to mind the air that distinguishes our planet from others, and permits us to live here. What air is for biological life, the Holy Spirit is for spiritual life. The Holy Spirit as gift was not given as a memento to compensate for the physical absence of Christ, but as a gift of His continued Presence, though now in the spiritual realm rather than the corporeal.
The Lord had promised His Apostles that His Spirit would abide with them forever as a Consoler or Comforter. He was, Himself, their comfort and consolation while He walked the Earth; now His Spirit would be their comfort and consolation. Thus the Holy Spirit would not be a substitute for Christ, but would make Christ more real than ever, dwelling within us by the Spirit’s power.
No longer physically present as one man in one location, the Lord has become, with the Holy Spirit, the indwelling life of each soul that makes up the Church. His physical presence has passed into the Sacraments where the Holy Spirit grants us the graces needed for the Living Christ to remain among us. So we have a certain advantage over those who lived in His day: while they had the good fortune of His personhood, we have the greater gift of His Spirit. By this I mean that they knew the man, but we know the God-made-man, aware of His divinity as well as His humanity.
Finally, we learn that the Coming of the Holy Spirit will bring peace. The Lord says this not once, but twice in our Gospel today, each time accompanied with a gesture: first showing the wounds in His hands and side, then breathing upon them.
The first utterance connects peace with release from fear. The Apostles were locked in the Upper Room for fear that the next martyrdom would be theirs. (Little did they know that every one of them, except Saint John, would die a martyr’s death.) But showing them the sacred wounds released them from fear of death, freeing them to go forward into the world.
When He next said, “Peace be with you,” He breathed on them: not quite the “strong, driving wind,” but a living sign of the imparting of the Holy Spirit. In this, He connects His Passion with absolution from sin. So, release from fear as well as release from sin will be the hallmark of the Holy Spirit as Saint John presents it. When we bring our fears, anxieties and worries, our failures, disappointments and even our sins to the Lord, He will send the Spirit’s gift of Peace, fulfilling once again the Paschal Mystery, which brings joy to our observance of Pentecost.