A Renewing Spirit

Preachers and writers carry upcoming festivals in their minds and hearts. Sometimes for days and weeks scriptures are read and mulled over before they become part of a homily or a written piece. As Pentecost approached, this writer had been accompanied by the scriptures in his daily life and ministry.

At the beginning of this final week of the Easter Season, I had occasion to celebrate the Rites of Christian Burial at Sterling Cemetery. As my usual custom, when celebrating these rites, I spent a little time before and after the rituals in reading the headstones and remembering people in my prayers. As I read the names and dates, I first noticed how the little cemetery in Sterling had filled up over my twenty-one years at Christ the Redeemer. I, however, had what I thought was a quirky thought. After noticing the growth in the number of beloved dead buried there and remembering personally parishioners who I had buried in this quiet spot in Sterling, I was struck by the ethnic diversity of the names on the stones.

The cemetery was like the play Our Town, where the story of the town could be recounted by the gathering of the townsfolk at the cemetery. Recorded on the grave markers were people from long ago in the late twenties but they had been joined by newcomers with names, dates, and scripts, not only in English, but in Spanish, Farsi, and many other languages. “Our Town” and “Our Church” was clearly diverse in its changes. Maybe not so strangely, I thought this was like Pentecost!

Dry Bones
The Spirit moves in wonderful ways. On my return to the Church, I checked out the readings surrounding Pentecost. A suggested reading for the Vigil of Pentecost was one from the prophet Ezekial (37:1-14). Here the post-exile prophet is “led...out in the spirit of the Lord” to the valley of the dry bones. The prophet walks in every direction and notices how many are the dead and how dry the bones. He is directed to prophesy over the dry bones. “Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord!” The bones rattle together, but life does not come.

Directed again, the prophet is told to “Prophesy to the spirit… From the four winds come, O Spirit, and breathe into these slain that they may come to life. The story ends with God’s promise to put his spirit in them so they can live. “I will settle you upon your land; thus you shall know that I am the Lord.” From the four directions of the earth, which is to say, from everywhere, the Lord gathers People to new life.

Perhaps, my thoughts at the cemetery were not without reason. The Spirit of God is, as the Creed reminds us, “the Lord and Giver of life.” And this Easter Season comes to fullness at Pentecost with new life.

A New Pentecost
The first reading of Pentecost ends with a listing of who was there at the Spirit-event in the life of the Church: “We are Parthians, Medes, Elamites, inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene, as well as travelers from Rome, both Jews and converts to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs…” Amazingly “… we hear them speaking in our own tongues of the mighty acts of God.” The Church from the beginning was for all people and in every land.

Often enough at Pentecost we focus on the wind and the storm and the fiery tongues as the Spirit filled each person. What we might think about in our times is that the gospel was preached in different tongues and understood in the language of each people. Prior to Pentecost, the apostles were afraid, which we read in the Acts of the Apostles and in John’s Gospel read at Pentecost. Their empowerment in faith was manifest in their inclusivity of all people in their preaching and in the giving of the invitation to conversion and baptism to all the peoples of the earth.

Church and Today's Pentecost
On this Pentecost, I think back to Sterling Cemetery. I look out from the Lord’s Table over a parish, which is increasingly diverse and wonderful in the manifestation of the Spirit among us. We read in the news about how the immigrant groups, both in the Catholic Church and in Protestant mainline Churches, are enlivening the faith life and practice in these communities. Are we open to this new Pentecost?

Like the Apostles we are called out of our isolation and fear by the action of the Spirit. Filled with the Spirit, we are greeted with culturally, ethnically, and linguistically diverse brothers and sisters in the faith. On this Pentecost we can only pray that the Spirit of God be poured out on all of us and that we embrace the Spirit-life which is given us in full measure.

In our world and local communities, we see the largest number of migrants in history. Is this movement something to be feared? Or is it the work of the Spirit challenging us new life and hope?

CDH