We Need a New Pentecost: Come Holy Spirit, Come With Your Fire!

"While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled through the interior of the country and came (down) to Ephesus where he found some disciples. He said to them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?" They answered him, "We have never even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." (Acts 19: 1, 2) Too often we live our lives like those disciples in Ephesus. We act as though we did not realize there even is a Holy Spirit, still at work, still pouring out gifts and still making it possible for us to bear spiritual fruit. However, the same Holy Spirit is still at work, changing each one of us, individually and collectively, into the Image of Jesus Christ. The same Holy Spirit is calling us to make disciples of all the Nations.

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P>VATICAN CITY (Catholic Online) - On Saturday, May 18, 2013, a conference entitled "I Believe! Increase our Fath" began with a pilgrimage to the tomb of St Peter. With this annual gathering on Pentecost weekend, Pope Francis continued the practice of Blessed John Paul and His Holiness Benedict XVI, of bring leaders of the ecclesial movements to the Holy City.

On Pentecost Sunday, Pope Francis will preside at Mass with all of the leaders of these movements present. You will be able to watch the Holy Mass and hear what is sure to be a very important homily from Pope Francis here. The Holy Father is clear in his teaching and his leadership, he is calling every believer to ask for an outpouring of the Holy Spirit, in our individual lives and families and in the whole Church. Do we need a New pentecost? Yes we do!

Over the years, the term ecclesial movements has become the term used to refer to the many movements within the Catholic Church which demonstrate that the Spirit of Pentecost is alive and well. Though each has a unique charism and mission, they all invite Christians to have a personal relationship, an encounter, with the Lord Jesus Christ. They proclaim that He has been raised from the dead and is alive in our midst in the Church. They call men and women to the encounter, to experience the Pentecost of the Holy Spirit He promised, right now.

This year, the registrations at the ecclesial movement conference ballooned to over 120,000 representatives. There are representatives from over 150 ecclesial movements in attendance. We regularly feature the ecclesial movements on Catholic Online.They are a work of the Holy Spirit for our time. They are a sign that the Holy Spirit continues to be poured out upon the Church; that Pentecost, and the grace which it brings to the whole Church, is still happening.

On that first Pentecost the early followers of Jesus gathered as their Lord commanded them, expecting the fulfillment of the promise he had made. We refer to Pentecost as the "birthday" of the missionary church. Their encounter with the Holy Spirit in the Upper Room changed them. They were filled with the same Spirit which raised Jesus from the dead. The Holy Spirit capacitated them to carry forward in time the ongoing mission of Jesus Christ until he returns to complete the work of redemption.

Every year, this celebration of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost is an invitation to us to have the same encounter. It is the Holy Spirit which makes it possible for us to live lives of sacrificial love, holiness and service in a world that God still loves - a world into which He still sends His Son, through the Body of Christ, the Church - of which we are all members.

We are commissioned to carry forward the very same mission of those first disciples who gathered with Mary the Mother of the Lord. Jesus promised his followers, "Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these, because I am going to the Father." (John 14:12)

In these in words recorded in that same chapter of John's Gospel he promised as well, "I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always, the Spirit of truth, which the world cannot accept, because it neither sees nor knows it. But you know it, because it remains with you, and will be in you. I will not leave you orphans; I will come to you. In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me, because I live and you will live. On that day you will realize that I am in my Father and you are in me and I in you."

Among the readings read at the Mass on Pentecost day is the account of that first Christian Pentecost: "When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled, they were all in one place together. And 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." (Acts 2)

There is little doubt from their actions following that event, they were different. They went forward and turned the entire world upside down with their preaching and the witness of their changed lives.  However, in many respects, the Holy Spirit, the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, seems mysterious to many Christians in our own day. When I consider this reality I am reminded of one of the many missionary stories recounted in the Acts of the Apostles.

Chapter 19 of the Acts of the Apostles begins with these words, "While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul traveled through the interior of the country and came (down) to Ephesus where he found some disciples. He said to them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?" They answered him, "We have never even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." (Acts 19: 1, 2)

Too often we live our lives like those disciples in Ephesus. We act as though we did not realize there even is a Holy Spirit, still at work, still pouring out gifts and still making it possible for us to bear spiritual fruit. The same Holy Spirit is still changing each one of us, individually and collectively, into the Image of Jesus Christ. The same Holy Spirit is calling us to make disciples of all the Nations.

An examination of the teaching of Jesus and the New Testament reveals the essential role of the Holy Spirit in the life and mission of the Church - and in the life and mission of every individual believer. A study of the Tradition, the magisterial teachings of the Church and the Catholic Catechism underscores that this reality is meant to continue.It was not a one time event.

The purpose of Pentecost was - and still is - the empowering of the Church with the same power that raised Christ Jesus from the dead! The Holy Spirit draws us into communion with the Lord and participation in His Divine Life and mission. That communion is lived in the Church. The Catholic Catechism, quoting St Augustine, affirms "What the soul is to the human body, the Holy Spirit is to the Body of Christ, which is the Church." (CCC # 797) 

I am one of countless thousands whose life was profoundly changed by an experience, an encounter, with the Holy Spirit decades ago. I am old enough to remember when we who had this encounter were called "Pentecostal Catholics". That was before the more refined term "charismatic" took prominence.

Frankly, I do not really care for any adjectival description before the noun "Catholic". I am a Christian, standing by choice in the heart of the Catholic Church which stretches back to the earthly ministry of Jesus and forward to His return. In fact, it was an encounter with the Holy Spirit so many years ago which led me back home to the Catholic Church into which I had been baptized as a child.

Sometimes, people ask me all these years later when they hear of my earlier identification with that movement, "What Happened to those Pentecostal/Charismatic Catholics?" I guess my life is one of many answers to that question. I give them the following answer.

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The Spirit continued to lead me into the heart of the Catholic Church. My hunger for more of God and my passionate love for the Word of God, led me to continued theological studies and to ordination as a member of the clergy, a deacon. My heart for evangelization led me to assist in the myriad of ministries, apostolates and works in which I have involved for decades.

Do I still believe that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are available for ordinary Christians? You bet I do! I also hope that they assist us all in growing in the fruits of the Spirit and manifesting the character of Jesus Christ through living lives of real holiness.

I do not identify with any particular ecclesial movement. Rather, I identify with the Jesus Christ who has been raised from the dead and still pours out His graces through the Church which is His Body. My experience all those years ago was not about a specific movement - but about a new way of living in the Lord by the Holy Spirit. That is what Pentecost was - and still is - about. 

Pentecost is not about a onetime experience but about a way of living in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. We are led by the Spirit to live in the Heart of the Church, for the sake of that world. The Church is meant to become the home of the whole human race. Within the communion of the Church we become  leaven and seed in the loaf of human culture, in order to lead the world into the "new world", which is the Church.
 
We are called to live a unity of life, where Christian faith is not compartmentalized but rather informs and permeates our daily life. We are called to love the Church, recognizing that she is "Some - One" not something - the Body of Christ continuing His redemptive mission on the earth until He returns. The missionary mandate extends to every state in life and every Christian vocation. They demonstrate that the gifts of the Holy Spirit are real and still available for all Christians.

The purpose of Pentecost is the birth - and continued rebirth - of the Church. The Church is "Plan A" and there is no "Plan B". The notion of a Christian group being "para" Church is far from the purpose of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit was not poured out on the disciples so that they could form movements outside of the Church, or compete with one another in movements within her. Rather, so that they could become full members of Christ's Church living His life within her bosom for the sake of the world.

Jesus told the disciples that He must ascend, to "my Father and your father, my God and your God" (John 20:17) because, in His own words "If I do not go I cannot send the comforter. And when he comes he will convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation: sin, because they do not believe in me; righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will no longer see me; condemnation, because the ruler of this world has been condemned."

And in the same Gospel "I have much more to tell you, but you cannot bear it now. But when he comes, the Spirit of truth, he will guide you to all truth. He will not speak on his own, but he will speak what he hears, and will declare to you the things that are coming." (John 16: 7-15)

The Church was empowered by the Holy Spirit to live differently in the midst of a world awaiting the fullness of redemption; to lead the world back to the Father, through the Son, in the Holy Spirit. Can we live this kind of transformed Christian life in the stuff of our own daily lives? Yes, by living them in the heart of the Church by the power of the Holy Spirit.

There is a lot of "bad news" in our contemporary culture. However, this culture is not all that different than the cultures into which the early Christians were sent on mission; cultures such as the one which the Christians in Ephesus confronted. They needed the Holy Spirit to do their work and so do we.

The answer for the malady of this age is the same as the answer of those early disciples, the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Like them we are called to present the new culture revealed in the heart of the Church through the power of the Holy Spirit to our own age. This is a new missionary age and we are called into the whole world to preach the Gospel in both word and deed.

The Second Vatican Council in the Catholic Church began with a prayer for a "New Pentecost." The Holy Spirit was poured out on Pentecost and continues to be poured out on, in and through the Church, for the sake of her mission in the world. Pentecost was and is the birthday of the Church. The Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church and the source of her power for mission.

We need to pray for a New Pentecost for the Church in this hour! We need more of the Holy Spirit for the work of the New Evangelization of the Church. We need to be Baptized afresh in the Spirit in order to take our role as a member of the Body of Christ in this new missionary age. The Church needs to rise up in this hour with the same power with which she transformed the world of the first centuries. She can...by the power of the Holy Spirit!

Whatever Happened to those Pentecostal/Charismatic Catholics? We are everywhere these days continuing to follow the guidance of the Holy Spirit by offering ourselves to the Lord in His Church and, through her, continuing the redemptive mission of the Lord until He returns. Amen, Come Lord Jesus!

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