The Feast of Pentecost

Fifty days after Easter, the Church approaches the last and great day of its annual liturgical calendar with its celebration of Whitsunday, the Feast of Pentecost. This year the date will be Sunday, May 23.

Pentecost is the celebration of the coming of the Holy Spirit, the living fountain of God’s love that is poured out upon Christ’s disciples and shed abroad upon the face of the earth. (Here is the account of Pentecost from Saint Luke's Acts of the Apostles.)

The gift of the Holy Spirit reveals the one truth toward which history points: the long-awaited fulfillment of God’s everlasting desire to renew all things in his love, to join all souls in the bond of union, and to fasten close the ties of peace that make us siblings in Christ and beloved children of God.

On Whitsunday, we celebrate the “birthday” of the Church. Gathered in love and transformed by the grace of the Holy Spirit, the people of God (we ourselves!) are made Christ’s body in the world, his hands and his feet, the sacrament of his abiding presence. By the life-giving gift of God’s Spirit, we are sent to serve and show forth in our generations the light of reconciliation and grace, of hope and joy. 

When we gather for worship to celebrate the feast of Pentecost on May 23, there will be a deep sense that the joy of Easter has been fulfilled. Together we will turn our hearts towards the good works that God has set before us to do. 

And come what may, we will know that God is with us to strengthen and shepherd our hearts every step of the way. 

An ancient vesper hymn for Whitsunday, by Rabanus Maurus, Archbishop of Mainz (d. 856), so wonderfully proclaims the joy of the feast:  

O come Creator Spirit come, visit the minds of thy people, and fill with thy celestial grace, O Lord, the souls thou didst create. 

Thou who art called the Paraclete, the gift of God, of the most high, living fountain, fire, charity, the souls anointing from above. 

Thou who art sevenfold in gift, the finger thou of God's right hand, solemn promise of the father, giving to tongues the gift to speech.

Enkindle light in every sense, and pour thy love into our hearts, our bodily infirmities with might perpetual strengthening.  

Drive far away the enemy and thine abiding peace bestow; so lead thyself preceding us that we may flee from every harm. 

The Father may we know through thee, and through thee may we know the Son, thee Spirit sent from the Father may we believe throughout all time. 

Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost: as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.