From the Cross to Pentecost

“Suddenly, there came from the sky, a noise like a strong driving wind. And it filled the entire house in which they were. Then there appeared to them tongues as of fire, which parted and came to rest on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak in different tongues, as the spirit enabled them to proclaim.”   This is that moment in which the outpouring of the Holy Spirit fills the apostles, with this bold courage to go, evangelize, proclaim that Jesus is risen, that Jesus is Lord, and stand up to the powers that be and say, we must obey God rather than men.  And this great divine fire with the Holy Spirit, this great divine fire, they begin to spread throughout the whole world.  Does that sound like your experience, in the past year?  Has this past year been a great Pentecost year?  What I’ve been hearing from so many people is very much the contrary.  People discouraged, anxious, fearful, how many divisions have been created, in this past year with all the confusion about what we’re supposed to do.  And so, it also certainly affected people, shut in, not able to get together.  And some people too together, right, not able to get out.  And so, it’s been difficult for families, it’s been difficult for marriages.  It’s been a difficult year for our country.  And I’ve been hearing from a lot of people who are very discouraged about what they see in the Church and on the part of the Church leaders, discouraged, hurt, angry.  The Church has often seemed weak, confused, compromised, corrupted.  It doesn’t sound so much like Pentecost. It sounds like the cross, the Church at the cross, the apostles at the cross.  At that moment in which the leaders of God’s people were betraying Jesus, denying Jesus, abandoning Jesus.  This Church that Jesus was forming seemed so weak, so sinful, so crushed, humiliated, dying, destroyed.   The Church at the cross seemed so far from the Church at Pentecost. And I think that today, in many ways, what we’re living is like the cross, maybe even like the agony.  To so many people, the Church seems weak, corrupted, dying.   How many people do we know who no longer believe in Jesus, or who no longer believe the Catholic faith, who have left the Church, all of us know many, and sometimes it seems like it’s hard to blame them.  So, our experience might seem very far from the experience of Pentecost, like the cross is far from Pentecost.  But what I want to focus on today is how the cross is actually very close to Pentecost, because Pentecost, the outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, Pentecost comes from the cross, and Pentecost goes to the cross.  There’s the two points, Pentecost comes from the cross, and Pentecost goes to the cross.  And by God’s providence, we have here the relic of the True Cross, on this Feast of Pentecost, reminding us.   What I want to share with you today, a lot of it comes from St. John Paul.  He wrote an encyclical on the Holy Spirit, the Lord and giver of life, and these points are emphasized by him.  So, the first point, this grace, that we want this grace of evangelization for the Church, this great grace of an outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  That’s been the charismatic movement in particular, has wanted to renew in the Church, this experience of Pentecost.  But it’s important to realize where does Pentecost come from?  Where does the outpouring of the Holy Spirit come from?  It doesn’t just come from lively music and clapping hands.  Where does the Holy Spirit come from?  And so, St. John Paul, gives several passages from Scripture, I’ll just share a few with you to show how the outpouring of the Holy Spirit comes from the cross.  Jesus Himself at the Last Supper said, “I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away.”  When Jesus saying go away, what does He mean?  He means He’s going to be crucified. That’s what He means and just a few hours, that’s what He means when He says, “Go away, it is to your advantage that I go away. For if I do not go away, the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, will not come to you. But if I go,” that is, if I sacrifice Myself on the cross, “I will send Him to you.”  So, Jesus is clearly saying that the gift of the Holy Spirit comes from His sacrifice.  And the pope quotes another passage in scripture which says, When Jesus died on the cross, when Jesus had received the vinegar, He said, “It is finished,” and He bowed His head, and gave up His spirit.  And gave up a spirit, we can just think, well, that’s Jesus dying, that it is Jesus dying, but it’s also giving, Jesus is giving his Holy Spirit at the cross, Jesus is dying, to give His Holy Spirit.  And so, the gospel we just heard today, the gospel which takes place two days after the cross, Jesus appears to His apostles, and He shows them His hands and His feet.  And what do His hands and His feet have?  They have the wounds of His sacrifice, like we see in the image of Divine Mercy.  So, He’s showing them the proof of His sacrifice, and then what does He say?  It says, “He breathed on them,” the Hebrew word for breath is the same word for spirit.  He breathes on them and says, “receive the Holy Spirit.”   So, it’s Jesus crucified, by the power of His sacrifice, who gives the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is coming from the sacrifice of Jesus.  And so, this is the power of sacrifice, because what is sacrifice?  What is Jesus sacrifice, it’s love, it’s an extreme act of Divine Love, of true love.  So, from Jesus extreme act of love, that’s where the spirit of love, of Divine Love comes from, Jesus great act of love.  And with His sacrifice, there is also the sacrifice of His mother, united to Him, sharing in His sacrifice, sacrificing with Him.  And with His mother, a few others, not a lot, but a few others, like Saint Mary Magdalene, and a few others.  And with them is the sacrifice, our sacrifice.  Our sacrifice too, can be part of this outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  And so, I don’t mean that you have to go add more sacrifices, a lot of you have a lot of sacrifices already in your life, right?  You have sometimes more than you can handle.   I’m not saying you have to go find more sacrifices, I’m saying, let’s use the sacrifice, even the sacrifices of this past year, some things which have made us upset, sad, angry, fearful.  We can take all those sacrifices, because this year has been a year full of sacrifices, so many sacrifices, people not able to be with their loved ones when they were dying, so many sacrifices.  So many gatherings that weren’t able to be had, so many painful sacrifices.  And some of the sacrifices caused by evil, like the cross of Jesus was caused by evil.  But Jesus turned evil and the plans of Satan and evil, there’s a lot of Satan working today in what’s going on in the world.  But Jesus change that by His sacrifice, His sacrifice changes the poison of evil into the power of the Holy Spirit of divine love.  And so that’s what we’re called to do, in this Mass, we’re called to bring our sacrifices and unite them with Him, to prepare a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit, because that’s what God wants.  As Saint John Paul said, “a new Pentecost, for our time, a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit.”  So that’s the first point, that the Holy Spirit comes from the cross.  And now the second point, where does the Holy Spirit go to?  That is, what draws the Holy Spirit?  He comes from the sacrifice, but what pulls the Holy Spirit, what draws the Holy Spirit?  We have a great example in our Blessed Mother, we have here the image, Our Lady of Guadalupe, basically, at that age, because what happens is she had the great outpouring of the Holy Spirit at the Annunciation.  And then, just a few days later, when she chants her canticle of praise, what does she say?  The Almighty has looked upon my what?  She doesn’t say my holiness, she doesn’t say, my purity, she doesn’t say my virtue, though all of those were true.  She had all of those, but she says, “The Almighty has looked upon my lowliness,” my lowliness, my need, my poverty, my humility.  And so, the Holy Spirit was able to give Himself to her, like to no one, because of her lowliness, of her humility, of her openness.  And she is the great example, she’s with the apostles, drawing the Holy Spirit.   It’s not by chance at Pentecost, she is the one around whom the apostles are gathered, she is the one drawing the Holy Spirit to them, because of her lowliness, of her simplicity.  Lowliness, lowliness, humility, doesn’t mean putting ourselves down, it simply means recognizing the truth about ourselves, recognizing our weakness, our sinfulness, our need for God, our spiritual poverty.  Blessed are the poor in spirit. And so the apostles who have been chosen by Jesus, you’re going to be My followers, you’re going to be the ones who continue My mission, you’re the chosen ones, you’re going to have special powers, you’re going to have special authority, you’re going to be with Me and learn from Me, you’re going to be the closest to Me, and learn all My teaching and see all My miracles.  What is the danger, when God gives us a gift?  That begins to go to our head, it begins to swell our head, because that’s the way we are.  And Satan always uses that, it causes pride, it causes arrogance.  Our ego is always ready to feed on it.  And so, what had to happen?  What did the Holy Spirit have to do?  He had to break their pride because their pride, their arrogance is a barrier to the Holy Spirit.  And so, He had to break through that.  So, He had to permit them to experience their weakness, their sinfulness, their unworthiness, their poverty.  He had to crush them.  The apostles were crushed at the cross, even if they weren’t physically at the cross, that crushed them.  Saint Peter, where he wasn’t yet a saint, he was crushed by what he did, his denial.  Their egos were broken.  They had to be broken so they could receive the Holy Spirit.  That’s why Jesus, two days later can say, “receive the Holy Spirit.”  Because, and He says, “Who sins you forgive.”  And now when they saw Jesus hands and feet, what did that say to them?  That also reminded them of their weakness, of their sinfulness, of their abandonment.  And they needed to experience that to be open to the Holy Spirit.  As Saint John Paul says that there’s this double work of the Holy Spirit.  Because St. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, he goes out and he begins to proclaim to the crowd that’s gathered, he proclaims to them their sins, you crucified Jesus.  Because Jesus said at the Last Supper, He said the Holy Spirit that I will send, will convict the world of sin.  Convince, convict the world of sin.  And that’s what happened to the apostles at the cross. And what Saint Peter did on the day of Pentecost?  He began convicting the world of sin.  He said, you did this, you crucified Jesus.  That’s part of the work of the Holy Spirit, He’s the spirit of truth, and He shows us our sins, and it’s painful, but it’s necessary.  Like a doctor who has to give, if a person has cancer, and the doctor says, you’re fine, there’s nothing wrong with you. That doesn’t help.  The doctor needs to give a true diagnosis. And the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. He shows us the truth of our sins, like to the apostles, He was showing them the truth of their pride, of their self-sufficiency and arrogance at the cross.  But He does that, not to destroy us, not to crush us in guilt, but to open us to God’s mercy, to God’s graces.  And so, the pope Saint John Paul says that this double work of the Holy Spirit, to convict us of sin, but not to discourage us, but so with humility, we can open ourselves to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  And so that’s what St. Peter said, first of all, he convicts them of sin, and then He manifests the desire of God, to give to them also the Holy Spirit.  And so that’s the second part.  So, the Holy Spirit comes from the sacrifice of the cross, but the Holy Spirit is also drawn to the cross, that is drawn to those who are suffering, and to those who in their suffering, respond with humility, those who are maybe crushed, and maybe feel themselves so sinful, as Jesus says, the greater the sin, the greater the right to My mercy.  And so, the Holy Spirit is drawn to the cross when we’re living a cross, when we’re experiencing our sinfulness, our painful, weak humanity, which is always falling and falling and falling.  If we turn to the Holy Spirit, with humility, and with trust, He can come.  And that especially when He can come, when we feel less worthy, when we feel more unworthy.  It was when the apostles felt more unworthy than ever before, that’s when Jesus said, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”  It wasn’t when they felt worthy, we’re going to be the great followers and continuous of Jesus, that’s not when they could receive the Holy Spirit, is when they felt so unworthy. That’s when Jesus could give them the Holy Spirit. And so, what’s been happening this past year, many of us are, and I’ve heard a lot of confessions, people saying, people are feeling anxious, people feeling afraid, people feel angry.  People feeling so sinful, because we’ve been put in difficult situations, and that makes us feel our unworthiness, our sinfulness even more.  And so, we feel so far from God, so far from the Holy Spirit.  But it’s precisely at those moments, that that’s what’s preparing the coming of the Holy Spirit, is precisely that, awareness of our sinfulness and our weakness, which opens us to the Holy Spirit.  And so that’s why the Holy Spirit also is drawn to the cross, when we’re experiencing the cross.  Maybe we’re experiencing the agony and painful interior suffering, maybe a dryness, maybe a desolation, maybe a darkness, maybe a great interior struggle. That’s when the Holy Spirit can come, that draws the Holy Spirit to our humility, to our poverty, to our lowliness.  What does Saint Paul say about Jesus?  When Saint Paul says, “Have the mind of Jesus,” what does he say about Jesus?  You know, so much of the world is about filling ourselves.  And he says, “Jesus emptied Himself,” Jesus emptied Himself.  What was happening at the cross, the apostles were being emptied of their ego, of their sense that they knew everything, that they could handle things. They woke up that they weren’t in control, they had to be emptied of that, so that they could receive the Spirit of Jesus Christ.  So, we are living now the cross, and it seems so far from Pentecost, but it’s precisely from the cross that the Holy Spirit comes, from the sacrifices that we, and unite to the sacrifice of Jesus in love, and an act of will.  And it’s also in this cross, in this agony maybe that we are living now, that draws the Holy Spirit.  So, this Mass is an opportunity to bring to the Lord, the sacrifices that we’ve been experiencing, to unite them to Him, and to bring to Him our sense of unworthiness, our lowliness, because that draws the Holy Spirit.  So, we are in this difficult time, but with hope, because we are preparing a new Pentecost, a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  And so, I want to just end with the Pentecost sequence.  Sister Amapola is going to chant the canticle sequence at the offertory, but I’ll read it now.  And if you want, you can close your eyes.  “Come Holy Spirit and send from on high a ray of Your light. Come, Father of the poor, come, Giver of gifts.  Come Light of our hearts. Supreme Consoler, sweetest Guest of our souls, soothing Freshness.  At work, be our rest, in fever, be our coolness, in tears, be our comfort.  Oh, blessed Light fill to the brim, the hearts of your faithful.  Without Your divine power, there is nothing in us, that is not perverted.  Wash what is dirtied, bathe what is arid, heal what is wounded.  Bend what is rigid, warm what is cold, straighten what is twisted.  To the faithful who confide in You, give your seven-fold gifts, give merit and virtue, give final salvation, give joy without end.  Come Holy Spirit.”  Amen.