The Pontifical North American College
Solemnity of Pentecost
“We hear them speaking of the mighty
acts of God.”
June 9, 2019
We just heard in the reading
from The Acts of the Apostles, at the
very end of the reading—devout Jews from every nation under heaven saying: We hear them speaking in our own tongues of the mighty acts of God.
I have a confession to make:—I
absolutely love Pentecost.
For over 40 years now, I have
included the Sequence for Pentecost
as part of my thanksgiving every day after Mass.
I love Pentecost because I
love and I am indescribably grateful for the mighty acts of God. I give
thanks for them with a gratitude that is beyond words, and I can never even
begin to fathom the depths of them.
The mighty acts of God—or as they are known in theology, the magnalia
Dei—the marvelous works of God
continue to astound all who bear the name of Christian.
Sometimes Pentecost is quite
unfairly depicted as the feast of the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the
Blessed Trinity—as if we needed a feast for the Father, a feast for the Son,
and a feast of the Holy Spirit—it is hardly that.
Just as we do not have a
feast of God the Father, nor could we point to a specific feast that we would
call the feast of the Son, neither do we have a feast of the Holy Spirit. If
you are already a divine person, you do not worry a whole lot about having your
own feast. What we celebrate today is
not the Holy Spirit, but the sending
of the Spirit in light of the marvelous works of God in the
context of the whole of Christ’s Paschal Mystery.
What is not important is that
people heard the disciples speaking different languages—what is important is
that the confusion at the tower of Babel and the dispersion of peoples that it
caused—is overcome and that peoples of every land and every tongue hear of the marvelous
works of God.
When the sacred liturgy was
renewed after the Second Vatican Council, the octave of Pentecost was
suppressed—because Pentecost is the conclusion of something—the celebration of
the mysteries of the mission of the Son—and nothing less than the capstone of the
celebration of the Paschal Mystery.
What does it mean for the days of Pentecost to be fulfilled—dum
complerentur dies Pentecostes?
Pentecost is the fulfillment
of the whole of the Paschal Mystery of Christ—moving through the Annunciation
to the Sending of the Spirit—or as we will pray in a few minutes in the Preface
of Pentecost: For, bringing your Paschal Mystery to completion, you bestowed the Holy Spirit on those you
made your adopted children by uniting them to your Only Begotten Son.
For, bringing your Paschal Mystery to
completion, you bestowed the Holy Spirit on those you made your
adopted children by uniting them to your Only Begotten Son:
The marvelous works of God
mean nothing less than the re-creation of the whole world—that re-creation—for
our salvation—which was begun at the Annunciation—and carried through to the
Ascension and the sending of the Spirit.
To recall just some of the magnalia
Dei of divine redemption in the Paschal Mystery that we celebrate as a
Church today, we commemorate:
- The marvelous works of God at the
Annunciation—when for the sake of our salvation the Divine Word took upon
himself our human nature, so in need of redemption—we read:
- The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a virgin whose
name was Mary—hail full of grace—you will conceive in your womb and bear a son,
and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the
Most High.
- And the marvelous works of God at Christmas—exactly
nine months later when the Son of God who is also the Son of Mary is born for
us—we read:
- She gave birth to her firstborn son—and the angel
appeared to the shepherds saying: “Do not be afraid; I proclaim to you good
news of great joy—a savior has been born for you who is Christ the Lord.
- And the marvelous works of God at the
Epiphany as the Lord is revealed as the light of revelation to the Gentiles and
the glory of God’s people Israel—we read:
- You shall be radiant at what you see, your heart shall
throb and overflow—and the Magi were overjoyed at seeing the star—and they
prostrated themselves, did him homage, opened their treasures, and offered him
gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
- And the marvelous works of God at the
Baptism of the Lord at the beginning of his public ministry—we read:
- After Jesus was baptized, he came up from the water
and behold, the heavens were opened for him, and John saw the Spirit of God
descending like a dove and coming upon him—as a voice sounded from the heavens,
saying, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”
- And the marvelous works of God on Palm
Sunday—we read:
- They proclaimed: “Blessed is the king who comes in the
name of the Lord. Peace in heaven and glory in the highest.”
- And the marvelous works of God on Holy
Thursday when Christ washed the apostles’ feet and said:
- “Do you realize what I have done for you—if I,
therefore, the master and teacher have washed your feet, you ought to wash one
another’s feet.”
- And the marvelous works of God on Good
Friday—we read:
- Christ became obedient to the point of death, even
death on a cross. Because of this, God greatly exalted him and bestowed on him
the name which is above every other name.
- And the marvelous works of God on Holy
Saturday, as we hear in the Office of
Readings—Christ saying to Adam as he and his descendants are held in the
prison of the underworld:
- Rise, let us leave this place. The enemy led you out
of the earthly paradise. I will not
restore you to that paradise, but I will enthrone you in heaven—I appointed cherubim to guard you as slaves
are guarded, but now I make them worship you as God—the bridal chamber is
adorned, the banquet is ready—the
kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity.
- And the marvelous works of God on Easter
Sunday—we read:
- They found the stone rolled away from the tomb—they
did not find the body of the Lord Jesus—they sought the living one among the
dead.
- And the marvelous works of God throughout
the Easter Season when:
- The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
- And our hearts burned within us while he spoke to us
on the way and opened the Scriptures to us.
- And when Jesus
tells Mary Magdalen not to cling to him—because
he has to be free to go to the Father and send the Spirit upon us.
- And when He says
that if we loved him, we would rejoice to have him go to the Father.
- And where he
tells the apostles that it is better for them
if he goes, because if he does not go, the Advocate will not come to them.
- And the marvelous works of God at the Ascension—when
we read:
- Behold, I am with you always, until the end of the
age.”
Today, on the feast of
Pentecost, we meet again the marvelous works of God when, in the
final act of the Paschal Mystery, the Spirit—the Consoler and the Advocate
is sent from the Father.
In baptism we have received
the Spirit of adoption by which we cry out Abba—Father—and
God dwells in us as truly as he dwells in the tabernacle—Head and Members are
one in the Mystical Body—Christ is the vine and we are united to him as the
branches—and we are pruned—that we might bear fruit in plenty. We have become
sharers in the divine nature, and, by grace, divine blood courses through our very
bodies.
God never rations the gift of
the Spirit—and for us—because of the great Paschal Mystery—life is not
transformed but transfigured. The Father speaks, and we hear: “You are my
beloved son/you are my beloved daughter,” and today new wine is poured into new
wineskins—because as St. John says: We
have come to know and to believe in the love that God has for us. God is love.
And as one of the Entrance
Antiphons for today says: The love of God
has been poured into our hearts through the Spirit of God dwelling within us,
alleluia. And as we will sing again and again today in the Communion
Antiphon: They were all filled with the
Holy Spirit and spoke of the marvels of
God, alleluia.
We have heard and we celebrate
the
mighty acts of God—they animate every fiber of our being—and like the
devout Jews gathered in Jerusalem at Pentecost, we can only be astounded and
amazed—and grateful beyond words—at the mighty acts of God—all that God in his mercy has done for us.
Glory be to him now and forever. Amen.