The Holy Spirit’s Raising Us From the Dead, Pentecost Vigil, May 14, 2016

Fr. Roger J. Landry
Church of the Holy Family, Manhattan
Vigil of Pentecost
May 14, 2016
Gen 11:1-9, Ps 33, Ex 19:3-8.16-20, Ps 19: 8-11, Ezek 37:1-14, Ps 107, Joel 3:1-5, Ps 104, Rom 8:22-27, Jn 7:37-39

To listen to an audio recording of tonight’s homily, please click below: 

The following text guided tonight’s homily: 

The Difference the Holy Spirit Makes

53 days ago, the apostles were all gathered together in the Upper Room. Jesus washed their feet and instructed them about true service. He gave them his body and blood for the first time. He ordained them priests so that through them, he could give us that same body and blood. He prayed for them to His Father, that they might be one, that the Father would protect them from the Evil one, that they might be consecrated in the truth, and that all those who would hear the Gospel through their lips might be one, too (Cf. Jn 17). But what happened when they left the room? They all went out and abandoned the Lord — right after Mass, right after receiving the Lord Jesus within, right after their priestly ordination! Judas sold Jesus, valuing him less than 30 pieces of silver. All 11 of the other apostles ran away from the garden terrified. Peter, for whom the Lord had prayed personally that his faith would not fail (Lk 22:32), denied three times even knowing Jesus (Mk 14:71). All but St. John were still hiding the next day as Love personified was being tortured and killed upon a Cross. Jesus had prepared them for three years about what would happen to Him and what they were called to do, but none of that preparation, none of Jesus’ prayers, not even the sacrament of the Eucharist, sufficed to keep them faithful. Something was missing.

Today we see the Apostles return to the same Upper Room. Jesus has ascended to heaven, and so the apostles huddle around his mother not for a holy hour, not for a day, not for a long-weekend, but for four, five, six, seven, eight, nine and ten days — not knowing how long they’d be there — in order to learn from her about Jesus, to learn from her how to pray, to learn from her how to say yes to God. This time they leave the Upper Room and begin to preach the Gospel fearlessly. An astonishing three thousand people were converted that first day. The same apostles who had scattered like frightened children in the Garden were now gathering God’s children together for Christ. The same Peter who denied even knowing Jesus in order to keep himself warm by the courtyard fire, was now on fire confessing that Jesus was the long-awaited Messiah, the Son of the Living God. The disciples who were too ashamed to appear at the foot of the Cross now boldly and proudly proclaimed God’s love seen by Christ’s death on that Cross. What was different? Surely Mary’s example had helped them. Doubtless the resurrection of Jesus from the dead had filled them with joy and given them profound confidence. But what could have made these men turn from chickens to shepherds, from cowards to courageous martyrs, from apostates to apostles, so soon? The answer is what and whom we celebrate today: the Holy Spirit.

The Moral Miracle the Holy Spirit Did and Wants to Repeat

On Pentecost Sunday, the Holy Spirit worked a miracle in each of the apostles, and through them, in the whole Church. As the apostles were gathered around Mary in the Upper Room, during what I like to call the “Advent of the Advocate,” suddenly from heaven there was the sound like the rush of a driving wind that filled the entire upper room. Tongues of fire came down and rested upon each of them and all were filled with the Holy Spirit. This was the difference. They received the Holy Spirit’s help boldly to proclaim Jesus. The Holy Spirit came down upon them as tongues of fire — tongues because they were to speak, fire because they were to speak with the passion of burning love. And they responded. Jesus had promised that the Holy Spirit he would send would teach them all things, lead them to all truth, remind them of everything he had taught them, and prove the world wrong about sin, holiness and judgment. Then, helped in this way by the Holy Spirit, they began to fulfill this mission. The Acts of the Apostles had begun. The Church was born.

Well, the Church is still alive and the Acts of the Apostles continues down to our own day. God wants to write new chapters, with each of us — all of us — playing an important role. The wind is still blowing. The fire of the Holy Spirit still burns. Each of us, however, needs to let the Holy Spirit in to do his work. Each of us has to allow the Holy Spirit to bring about a similar miracle in us. Too often we are more like the Apostles on Holy Thursday than on Pentecost Sunday. We come to Mass, Jesus prays for us, he feeds us with his flesh and blood, but when we leave the Upper Room, many of us basically leave Him behind, giving in to various denials, perhaps for comfort like Peter, perhaps out of fear like all the rest. We know what our mission is — to give witness to the whole world that Jesus is the Savior, that Jesus is alive, that he is the truth worth living for and worth dying for, that he is the pearl of great price worth selling everything else to obtain, that he is the one thing necessary and we’re called to choose the better part — but many of us do not come anywhere close to giving 100 percent to fulfilling that mission. Proclaiming the Gospel today is surely not easy; so many do not accept Christ and his counter-cultural teachings and the Church he founded. But when we look back to what the first disciples encountered — when first the Jewish leaders and eventually the Roman authorities were trying to do to them what they had previously done to Jesus (crucify them!) for proclaiming the Gospel, and when the culture was even more imbued by practices contrary to the Gospel than it is now — we find great reason for hope. For if the Holy Spirit could work such wonders with those coarse fishermen and tax collectors, then surely he can do similarly great things through us if we allow him. We have so many more advantages than they did in terms of education, in terms of social communications, in terms of travel, in terms of grace, since many of us, unlike them, have been Christian from just after birth. If by the grace of the Holy Spirit, they were able to leave the Upper Room on Pentecost differently than they did on Holy Thursday, then, with the help of the Holy Spirit, we, too, can turn from cowards to heroes, from apostates to apostles, from sinners to saints. The key is allowing the Holy Spirit to act.

The Great Unknown

One of the problems we face is that many of us totally neglect the Holy Spirit. That’s shown in the way most Catholics approach Pentecost. With Christmas and Easter, Pentecost is one of the three most important celebrations of the Year, but most of us don’t prepare for Pentecost the way we get ready for Christmas or Easter. We generally treat it just like any other Sunday. That’s because, when we come right down it, most of us don’t grasp the importance of this feast for our life, for the life of the Church, for our salvation and the salvation of the world.

The most shocking phrase in all of Sacred Scripture, I believe, occurs during the Last Supper when Jesus says, “I tell you the truth. It is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you.” Jesus swears an oath basically saying that if we have a choice between keeping him and going without the Holy Spirit, or letting Jesus depart and receiving the Holy Spirit, it’s better for us to have the Holy Spirit. If Jesus didn’t himself say it, it would be hard to believe, but he is essentially saying that the Holy Spirit is even more important for us than He is. Most Catholics, however, don’t treat the Holy Spirit this way. We often treat him as a lesser known nobody included in a package deal with God the Father and God the Son. The Holy Spirit remains for so many — including Confirmation candidates, highly dedicated laity even priests and religious — just a strange white bird, or mysterious descending flame, or howling wind of Biblical history. Rather than a personal, vital “helper and guide” — as the Confirmation Rite begs the Father that he will become for us — he remains the great Unknown. And our Christian life, and the whole mission of the Church, suffers from this lack of relationship with the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit’s Work in Raising Us to Share Jesus’ Risen Life

What’s the Holy Spirit want to do in us? He wants to raise us from the dead! St. Paul in his Letter to the Romans tells us, “If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also, through his spirit that dwells in you.” The Holy Spirit wants us to experience the fullness of Jesus’ Risen life to which we’re capable, even now, here in this world. That’s one of the reasons why Pentecost is the end of the Easter season, because it is the dramatic exclamation point on Easter. Jesus suffered, died, rose and ascended in order that we in him, through the power of the Holy Spirit, might experience his risen life. But that life comes from what St. Paul calls living according to the Holy Spirit, setting our minds on the things of the Spirit, and putting to death in us the things of the flesh, world and the devil. The stakes are between life and death, St. Paul says. “For if you live according to the flesh, you will die, but if by the Spirit, you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.” Therefore, the most important reality about the feast of Pentecost is that each of us make a resolution to allow the Holy Spirit to do in us what he did in the early Church, to help us experience within Jesus’ risen life, with all the consequences that come from it. What are the ways in which the Holy Spirit wants to raise us from the dead and help us to live in communion with Jesus?

• The first way is through our prayer. We need help to pray, to unite our prayer to Jesus’, and the Holy Spirit is the answer to that need. St. Paul tells us, “The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought.” The Holy Spirit teaches us how to pray. He does this principally not by putting words on our lips, but changing who we are as we pray, helping us to be conscious of our reality as beloved sons and daughters. He helps us confidently to cry out, “Abba, Father!,” knowing that if we know how to give good things to our kids, so much more will our Father in Heaven give the Holy Spirit to us no matter what we ask for.
• The second way the Holy Spirit wants to raise us from the dead is in our daily life, so that our whole life might be a Holy Communion with Jesus. Through baptism, we have become the temple of his holy presence, and that reality should change us and make us different from the rest. Pope Francis has said that the worst evil that can affect us and the Church is “spiritual worldliness,” allowing ourselves to be corrupted and live according to the world, putting our faith, hope and love in money, or possessions, or pleasure, or power. We are called to live full-time in communion with Jesus and one who is truly “spiritual” lives a charismatic life by the power of the Holy Spirit in things big and small.
• The third way the Holy Spirit wants to raise us up to be a full-fledged active members of Christ’s mystical body the Church. In his first letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul tells us that the Holy Spirit has given each of us a “manifestation of the Spirit” for the benefit of the whole. He has given each of us “spiritual gifts” so that we may carry out the “different forms of service” and “different workings” necessary to make the Church strong. He wants to help us to recognize what our gifts are and, just as importantly, to use them to build up our family, to build up parish, to build up the Church as a whole and help it fulfill its mission in the world. The mission of the Church is not just for ordained or consecrated “specialists.” We’re all called to be contributors rather than consumers, givers rather than takers, co-responsible participants rather than seated spectators. Our roles will vary — just as an eye is not the same thing as a foot — but all our roles are important. We’re not alive in Jesus if we’re passing the buck of responsibility for sharing in his mission of the salvation of the world. If we think the mission of the Church is someone else’s concern, the Holy Spirit wants to raise us from the dead and unite us to Jesus’ mission.
• Finally, the Holy Spirit wants to fill us with a fire to light the world ablaze with the Gospel. The Holy Spirit came down on Pentecost as tongues of fire — rather than ice-cold, quivering lips! —for a reason. It was a sacramental sign effecting what it signified: that those who receive the Holy Spirit are equipped and emboldened to proclaim the Gospel with ardor. We see how the Holy Spirit helped simple fisherman speak powerfully and effectively in front of vast crowds. He can do the same with us, beginning by strengthening us to proclaim the truth of the faith before our family members, friends, coworkers, fellow students, and more. On Pentecost, each of us is called to ask, “Who is the last person that I tried to bring to faith in Jesus?” “When was the last time I invited someone to Church with me?” “To whom can I speak this week to try to bring them to experience Jesus’ risen life, Jesus’ joy, Jesus’ love by the power of the Holy Spirit.” As the Holy Spirit comes down as fire, too many Catholics remain wrapped in spiritual asbestos. By Baptism and Confirmation, we’ve all received the same Holy Spirit that the apostles received on Pentecost. We just need to cooperate as much as they did and spread the faith more charismatically, as joint witnesses with the Holy Spirit, that Christ is alive and wants to raise not only the dead but the living!

St. Paul begged the early Christians not to “quench” or “grieve” the Spirit of God. He wanted them — and us —to give the Spirit full reign, by allowing him to work in us the same moral miracles he worked in the apostles and members of the early Church. One of the reasons why so many individuals are lost, why so many parishes are struggling, consolidating and closing, why the Church as a whole in many places has undergone various recent crises is because we have, in fact, been stifling the Holy Spirit’s work, either trying to do it on our own, or not doing anything at all. This feast of Pentecost, the birthday of the Church, is a true God-send, on which the Holy Spirit wants to give us all a true spiritual rebirth, so that we might pray, live, build up and preach together with Jesus.

Pentecost of Pentecosts

The Holy Spirit whom we and the whole Church needs so much in each of these ways comes to us new at every Mass. Just as he overshadowed Mary at the Annunciation, so he will overshadow this altar and me at the consecration to transform bread and wine into the eternal Son of God incarnate, and so he will overshadow all of us to make us one body, one Spirit in Christ. It’s here in the same upper room in which Jesus gives his body and blood that the Holy Spirit comes. Benedict XVI said eight years ago in Australia, “The Eucharist is a ‘perpetual Pentecost’ since every time we celebrate Mass we receive the Holy Spirit who unites us more deeply with Christ and transforms us into Him.” Today, on this Pentecost of Pentecosts, the Holy Spirit wants to fill us with fire, a fire that will overflow into all parts of our life. He wants to change us the way he changed the apostles on that first Pentecost. And so, at the end of this “”Advent of the Advocate,” we pray, “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and enkindle in us the fire of your love!” “Come, Holy Spirit, renew us and through us renew the face of the earth!” Amen!

The readings for tonight’s Mass were: