Pentecost

            Christmas lets us know Christ in his humanity. Epiphany lets us know Christ better in his divinity. The grace of Holy Week lets us know Christ in his suffering and death, while Easter lets us know him in is triumph over sin and death. The grace of the Ascension is to know him as the Cosmic Christ. What about Pentecost? “Receive the Holy Spirit.” Jesus said this to his apostles. The bishop said this to you when you were confirmed. The Spirit, then, is not given only once. The Spirit is an ongoing promise that is always being fulfilled, because the Spirit is infinite and boundless and can never be fully plumbed. The Spirit is all gift, all ours when we give Him away. It is the Spirit who makes us one with God and in God. The Spirit is the gift of God welling up in the Trinity from the common heart of the Father and the Son. The Spirit is the overflow of the divine life into the sacred humanity of Jesus, and then into us.