CHRIST REVEALS HIMSELF TO EACH ONE OF US, NOT IN THE ABSTRACT, BUT THROUGH CONCRETE EXPERIENCES

THESE VIDEOS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND THE MIND OF THE POPE AND OUR VOCATION AS CHRISTIANS

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NEWS FROM ST ELIZABETH'S CONVENT

MINSK (Orth)

When I went to stay with the nuns of St Elizabeth's Monastery in Minsk, I was met at the airport by a  young man called Anton, one of the many people who serve God by working and praying with the nuns of Minsk.   All those I met were highly intelligent and delightful companions.   He wrote to me yesterday and, as you see, speaks and writes excellent English.   I think this letter gives us a feel of what it is like to Orthodox in Minsk at Pascha.

If anyone who reads this and lives in Canada, in Toronto, Ottawa or Montreal and would like to help, please get in touch with St Elizabeth,s Convent whose address can be found in their page above.  Here is the letter, minus personal details: 

Christ is Risen!

 As we are going through joyful Easter days we hope to keep this joy in our hearts. Easter celebrations were quite massive here - we had over a thousand people who took holy communion at the night Easter service only (and we had three more Liturgies in the morning!). Then we had our traditional Liturgies at the boarding homes and we also visited patients of different departments of the Hospital and celebrated Moleben (Paraklesis). To everyone's enjoyment we had a concert in the evening with music, poetry and singing involved (I participated with a couple of songs performed with a small band). A few days after a large group of sisters with Father Andrey in the lead visited The Holy Dormition Pskovo-Pechersky (Pskov-Caves) monastery and the Island of Zalit, which, as you definitely know, became known because of the holy life of Elder Nikolai Gurianov who lived there and helped many people who came to him for spiritual help and advice. By God's grace life goes on here in Minsk. The Convent is continuing to grow in numbers which is reflected in construction of new buildings and also many new projects. More importantly, the spiritual life here is not ceasing as well. The Convent had nine new monastic vocations this year - a fact that means much to us, and Father Andrey is putting much hope in it as he stresses its importance. We were also blessed by some remarkable visitors recently. I am going to visit Canada in Summer (Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal). We are looking for any opportunity to display our items: religious or secular events, festivals, street markets, fairs, street holidays and art exhibitions that are sometimes run by city authorities, Christian organizations (pilgrimages, conferences) or communities based on ethnicity (Russian, Belorussian, Ukrainian, Polish centers etc).

GOD IS FOUND, NOT SO MUCH IN BOOKS, AS IN MONASTERIES.

BECAUSE WE FIND GOD IN CONCRETE CIRCUMSTANCES & NOT IN ABSTRACT, WE SOMETIMES DO NOT RECOGNISE THE AUTHENTICITY OF THOSE WHO FIND GOD IN VERY DIFFERENT CIRCUMSTANCES

Some  pictures of Catholic Easter:

www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/.../world-pictures-april-1-2013-2492188 

Easter Vigil at Westminster Cathedral

Carrying in image of the "Resurrected Lord" on Easter Day, Ayacucho, Peru.

The Archbishop of Turin venerating the Shroud of Turin, amid claims that new research is in favour of its authenticity

HOW DOES PERU CELEBRATE EASTER? 

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters

my source: Yahoo Answers

The catholic religion is the foundation of most of the significant festivals in South America. Easter being the most prominent for many, however there are many others and for travellers heading to the region, you should have a look into seeing if any events will be on while you’re there. Carnival is most famously celebrated in Brazil, however it is also celebrated in various ways through the majority of South America. 

The weeklong hedonistic experience of Rio Carnival and all other carnivals in South America is actually a celebration of the beginning of Lent. The word ‘carnival’ is said to have originated from the Spanish word for meat (carne) and is a contraction of a phrase meaning ‘farewell to meat’. This is in reference to the preparation for the fasting period of Lent, where all meat and animal products such as eggs, butter and milk are used up. So those more familiar with making a few pancakes in honour of this time, Rio and other parts of Brazil offer a lively alternation. Other significant places to celebrate carnival include Salvador, also in Brazil, and Barranquilla in Colombia. When I was in Peru for Easter, I spent it at a slightly lower profile celebration in the Apurimac region of the southern Andes region. The events were very similar to other parts of the country in regards to the celebrations and processions. I’m not a religious person, but thought the celebrations very interesting, and found it impressive that nearly everyone in the town came together for it. On the night of Holy Friday everyone in the town stayed out all night in an area around the church. to keep them going through the night there was stalls set up selling a range of food a drink. Local Chicha beer (a week beer made from corn) together with besitos (small sweets traditionally taken at Easter time) where the most popular offerings. There was a long procession with effigies of Christ on the Cross and the Virgin Mary carried through the streets. The overall mood was very somber and serious as this was the part of the week where Christ's death was portrayed. Then very early Saturday morning, after a long church service is completed, everyone went to light a small white candle in the church. This itself took several hours due to the amount of people queuing at the doors of the church. It seemed as though everyone in the town was thee to pay their respects. After the night’s events, I went to catch up on some sleep and was awoken around 1pm on the Saturday to join the family with which I was staying for a traditional Easter meal. Throughout most of Peru the Easter feast is known as Doce Platos, which translates as twelve dishes, and is a particularly filling meal made up of 12 separate courses, many of which seemed to be full sized portions. Around half way through the meal nearly everyone begins to struggle, most of the remaining dishes are picked at and left half eaten. With this begins the celebration of the resurrection of Christ, and the remaining celebrations take on a more joyful air. (Peru Photos)

In Oruro, Bolivia, carnival celebrations happen around the same time of year, but take on a slightly darker theme. The indigenous populations in the area blended the catholic teachings of the Spanish, with their own pagan rituals. The Diablada (devil dance) is particular kind of devil worship, owing it’s origins to the mining community who used to perform sacrifices to the devil to protect the miners, in the belief that Satan was their protector when underground. The events in Oruro involve this devil dance as well as other processions decorated with colourful costumes and mask. This event has also influenced another festival the other side of the Andes in Chile. This festival takes place in the village of La Tirana, inland near the Bolivian border in northern Chile, and again takes on a seemingly contradictory blend of the catholic religion with some indigenous devil worshipping, with lots of colourful masks and costumes.

Whilst Catholicism is the dominant religion in South America, people there seemed to be very tolerant of other religions and religious conflict is extremely rare. As a result of this many of the festivals you will witness are in celebration of more than one set of beliefs and whilst often rooted in Catholicism, can also include evidence of their own indigenous cultures and traditions. This makes for some fascinating celebrations and a large degree of regional variety. So make sure you seek out these festivals on your travels, and if the better known events like Rio Carnival are not your thing, venturing of the beaten track at these times, and you’ll likely find some equally intriguing event.

Part of another answer on the same page:

Food is an important part of Easter, especially on Friday where eating meat is not allowed but people instead eat fish in a variety of preparations, my favourite used to be the typical Chupe de Viernes (Friday Soup) made with Crayfish, cheese, milk, potatoes and vegetables. People eat as well variety of desserts like Mazamorra Morada (Jelly made from starch and fruits and colured with purple corn) or rice pudding. On sunday it’s typical to eat in Arequipa the “caldo blanco or seven meats soup” made with beef, lamb, chicken, pork, charqui (dried meat), goats and potatoes and vegetables to celebrate that Jesus is alive again.

Very early on sunday morning the morning in my local square and in many parts across my city a puppet of Judas is burnt and he always makes a will that is usually very funny.

A TALE OF TWO LITURGISTS: DOM ODO CASEL O.S.B. & FATHER ALEXANDER SCHMEMANN

What I am going to discuss is the theology of the European Liturgical Movement and one of its greatest pioneers, a German Benedictine monk by the name of Dom Odo Casel. The present Pope (Benedict XVI) always found great inspiration in Casel’s ideas, calling them "perhaps the most fruitful theological idea of our century". This was one of the greatest steps in the development of sacramental theology since the Council of Trent, and this is one of the reasons we only find irrelevance in the typical criticisms “pure Anglicans” level at us.

Johannes Casel lived from 1886 until his death in 1948. He was born in Koblenz in the Rhineland, and read classics at Bonn University. He and a fellow student, Ildefons Herwegen, entered the Benedictine Abbey of Maria Laach, a community that had been suppressed in 1802 and restored by the Beuronese Congregation in 1892.

Ildefons Herwegen became Abbot of Maria Laach and made of this monastery one of the greatest liturgical and intellectual centres of German Catholicism. Casel entered the community in 1905 and was ordained a priest in 1911. Before his ordination, he obtained a doctorate on the eucharistic theology of Justin Martyr from Sant' Anselmo in Rome. On his return to Bonn University, he got a second doctorate, this time in classical antiquities and the Mystery Religions.

During his life as a monk, Dom Casel produced a phenomenal output of 309 major and minor works. In 1921, Abbot Herwegen asked Casel to edit the Jahrbuch für Liturgiewissenschaft (Yearbook for Liturgical Science), which is a monument for the intellectual revival in the German Church between the wars. It is amazing to think of this at a time when the Nazi barbarians were raping their country and throwing its cultural treasures on the fire at the auto da fes of Berlin! One thing that favoured Casel’s work, given the demanding routine of the traditional monastic timetable, was his being sent to be a chaplain to a small community of nuns.

He died from a stroke as he had just finished singing the Lumen Christi on Holy Saturday 1948. "Having just greeted the light of Christ in a clear voice and while preparing to celebrate the paschal praeconium, our beloved Father in Christ, liturgist of the sacred mystery and mystagogue, Odo Casel, monk of Maria Laach, having accomplished his holocaust and passing over with the Lord during the holy night, entered upon the beatific vision, being himself consummated in perfection by the mysteries of Easter which he had given to initiates. Thanks be to God".

It was certainly Casel’s spirituality that kept him going through the horrors of the Hitler regime and the utter defeat of Germany in 1945. He was far away and concerned with things other than politics. As a theologian, he evolved exactly the same way as men like Joseph Ratzinger, Karl Barth and so many others. He saw the deficiencies of neo-scholasticism and a narrow legalistic view of the liturgy and the Church. He must have been exasperated by the rotting remains of nineteenth century individual piety.

Would we Anglicans want to embrace that caricature of Catholicism? I have always felt a great affinity to this robust liturgical and theological German piety so well lived and taught by the present Pope. I spent time with German priests and students in Fribourg, and was considerably influenced by my liturgy professor, Fr Jakob Baumgartner and one of his pupils, Fr. Martin Reinecke, who had also studied with Monsignor Klaus Gamber. It is another vision altogether. It is my regret not to have made much progress in the German language, as most Germans speak English!

Casel’s most well-known book is Das Christliche Kultmysterium (The Mystery of Christian Worship) in which his deep knowledge of antiquity and the old mystery religions comes forth from its pages. His style (as I read it translated into English) is forceful and manly. Man is called to turn to the Mystery. As a Benedictine monk, he was totally immersed in the liturgy and lived it body and soul. The liturgical celebration is the concrete reality in which Christ's saving action in death and resurrection becomes present to us. Think about that idea for a couple of minutes! The liturgical vision is a view of the whole.

What is Christianity almost two thousand years since the death and disappearance from earth of Jesus Christ? Casel has the most convincing answer I know of. He brought us the word mystery, etymologically derived from both Greek and Latin. That is the heart of our faith, not a mere system of doctrinal facts and a code of moral conduct. It is much more than simply a spirituality that appealed to the Romantics and us post-moderns. This word Mystery is evident in the Epistles of Saint Paul – a deed by God, the working of the divine plan in eternity and its realisation in time, and which returns to God in eternity.

The Mystery is the person of the Saviour and the Mystical Body which is the Church. The term Mystical Body was particularly present in Pius XII’s encyclical Mystici corporis Christi of 1943, mostly written by the German theologian Fr. Sebastian Tromp. This identification of the Church with the Mystery brings a new dimension after centuries of Bellarmine’s “perfect society” analogy. This Mystery is Christ’s person, his incarnation, passion, death, resurrection, ascension and future coming. It is a whole and complete vision that does not reduce the liturgy to a sacrifice, but opens it to the wholeness of Christ. It is the very opposite from the narrow Nominalist mind of Protestantism and neo-scholasticism.

This kind of theology is not peculiar to Casel, as we see from reading Orthodox theologians like Schmemann, Bobrinskoy and Boulgakov among many others. The heart of faith is not simply doctrine and teachings but the acts by which we are sanctified and saved. Our salvation, liberation from sin and union with God are brought about by participation in the saving acts of Christ. This is not a system of morals or a doctrinal system, but the Mystery – God’s revelation to mankind through life-giving and salvific acts.

The Mystery has theological, Christological and sacramental-liturgical dimensions. God is transcendent and unknowable to man’s intellect and reasoning powers, but reveals himself to the humble. Man has always longed for union with the divine, and we see this through any number of temples and pyramids of the ancient world. God revealed himself more fully to the Jewish people, but Israel was no less a preparation for the fullness than any mystery religion of Greece of Egypt.

The deeds of his self-abasement, and above all his sacrificial death on the cross, are mysteries, because in them God reveals himself in a way that goes beyond all human standards of measurement. Above all, though, his resurrection and exaltation are mysteries, because in them divine glory was revealed in the man Jesus, and this in a form that is hidden from the world and only open to believers.

Mystery is necessarily hidden as well as revealed. We have so much difficulty in “getting it” because the Mystery can only be seen by faith and gnosis (yes, there is an orthodox gnosis, not only the heresies of Valentinus and New Age). This is knowledge that is above human learning and the simple use of acquiring information and reasoning.

It is a higher and deeper understanding of the notion of Tradition. The Mystery is not only a word, but also holy actions and deeds. Christ truly and really acts and works through the mysteries of worship and through the Sacraments. The Mystery, in Casel’s words is "a sacred ritual action, in which a past redemptive deed is made present in the form of a specific rite; the worshipping community, by accomplishing this sacred rite, participates in the redemptive act and thus obtains salvation".

In Casel and some of the forward-looking Russians I mentioned above, and others, we find a whole high view of the liturgy. Saint Leo the Great said in his sermon for the Ascension: "what was visible in our Redeemer has passed over into the mysteries". Thus, the liturgy is a Mystery, the Kultmysterium as Casel called it in German.

This is what distinguishes liturgy from ritualism, pageantry, folklore or theatre. It is not simply a collection of rubrics, formulae to say – something divorced from personal prayer and the Church’s humanitarian vocation. It is not the self-worshipping community or about “feeling good”. This is the presence and power of Christ doing his job. It is "the carrying out and realization of the new covenant's mystery of Christ in the whole Church through all the centuries, for her sanctification and glorification".

We are not talking of individualistic religion, but the whole Church. Christ and the Church live a true nuptial sacrament of the bridal chamber. Here we see reflections of Fr. Tromp’s theology and Pius XII’s encyclical. Without this mystery of Christ's liturgical presence, Christianity would be no more than a myth to be grown out of and spat upon by our new atheists! The Church cannot be reduced to liturgy, but the liturgy is "the central and essentially necessary activity of the Christian religion". Indeed, the great Saint Benedict laid down in the holy Rule that nothing was to be preferred to God’s Work.

The liturgy is the place of Christ’s real presence, which is the common teaching of the Church, especially since the Council of Trent. However, Casel arrives at the idea, not only of the presence of Christ’s body and blood in the sacred Elements, but also the whole saving deed of Christ. This is the basis of the expression Paschal Mystery that found its way into the teaching of Vatican II and Sacrosanctum Concilium. We are used to this kind of teaching, but Casel in the 1930’s and 40’s came up against considerable opposition for his ontologism, especially from the Jesuits of the time. There is a real ontological presence in the liturgy of both the person of Christ and his saving acts. In a way, the liturgy is like a “window” from time into eternity. Casel’s thought is eseentially founded on Plato’s theory of reality, as we will find with Eastern Orthodoxy and its theological tradition. Here is a realism that goes far beyond Saint Thomas Aquinas and the later scholastic tradition.

For Casel, this whole way of understanding the liturgy is summed up in the Secret Prayer of the 9th Sunday after Pentecost in the Roman missal:

Grant us, we beg thee, O Lord, that we may frequent these mysteries in a worthy way, for every time we celebrate the commemoration of this sacrifice, the work of our redemption is accomplished.

The words in Latin convey the meaning even more strongly: opus nostrae redemptionis exercetur.

This real representation of the saving deed cannot not be, because the saving acts of Christ are so necessary to the Christian that he cannot be a true Christian if he doesn't live them after Him and with Him. It is not the teaching of Christ which makes the Christian. It is not even the simple application of his grace. It is total identification with the person of Christ obtained by re-living His life.

This total identification is made possible by the liturgy.

Casel, as a Platonist, saw everything as a whole. All the sacramental rites and the Office are as much a place of the presence of the Mystery as the Eucharist. Casel’s notion of participation was the direct source of the participatio actuosa of Vatican II, the real participation of the faithful in the liturgy. But this was not a superficial idea of playing priests, handing out hosts, drawing attention to oneself and taking over the church. Participation is living the liturgy in such a way as each one of us can participate in Christ – it goes much deeper. It is being more than doing.

Casel’s work underpinned Pius XII's liturgical encyclical Mediator Dei of 1947 and Sacrosanctum Concilium of 1962. However, in spite of his Platonic metaphysics, Casel was not a systematic philosopher. His appeal to the antique mystery religions sounds dangerously close to the ideas expressed by contemporary atheists that Christ was just a copycat myth of ancient Egyptian and Greek myths of dying and rising gods and heros. This whole notion needs to be clarified and researched.

Father Louis Bouyer was a fan of Dom Casel and wrote that "the heart of the teaching on the liturgy in the conciliar Constitution is also the heart of Dom Casel's teaching". In particular, we read in article 10 that the "liturgy is simultaneously the summit towards which the activity of the Church is directed and the source from which all her power flows".

I do believe that much of our Anglican liturgical piety is often founded in a similar “high” vision as we had in medieval northern Catholicism. From Casel’s vision also came a thirst for liturgical reform, the use of the vernacular and participation by the laity. These were good and noble aims, but often implemented without understanding the foundation ideas profoundly enough. There is next to no mystagogy (liturgical catechesis) in the parishes or Casel’s ontological realism. Many contemporary Catholics are profoundly Nominalist in their metaphysics, and this is a major source of secularisation and desacralisation. Casel wanted the very opposite!
http://www.theanglocatholic.com/2010/06/odo-casel-and-liturgical-theology/

Death is Conquered, Glory Fills You”

The circumstances of the death of Odo Casel could not have been more fitting or remarkable. Casel, who had sought to give back to the church a belief that Christ in the paschal mystery was present in every liturgy, died as he proclaimed that resurrection. He had just intoned the Exsultet at the Easter Vigil liturgy at the convent at Herstelle. One commentator remarked that if such an event were recorded in a medieval biography of a saint, moderns would disregard it as pious fantasy. It was not.

It was in light of the wonder of Casel’s death that the sisters of Herstelle concluded the obituary of their mentor:

His whole life was beset with bodily suffering and given to untiring labor in sacred sciences; his passing over into the eternal Pentecost took place by the grace of God during the great night of the Pasch. Deo gratias.

 http://liturgicalleaders.blogspot.com/2011/10/odo-casel-osb.html

FATHER ALEXANDER SCHMEMANN

PENTECOST AT PACHACAMAC MONASTERY

We ran an experiment this Pentecost which didn't look as though it would be successful.   Up till now, we have received people for retreats and have allowed them to take the initiative.  We ask them what kind of retreat they want and then do our best to comply with their wishes.   Do they want talks?   We give them talks.   Do they only want to confess?   We arrange for confession.   Do they want to be left alone?   They are left alone.   Have they brought someone from outside to direct their retreat?   He  or she is offered hospitality.   This time, however, before anyone asked to stay here, we arranged the programme and then advertised.

At first, we had a great success: a group of forty said they would come.   As we don't have room for forty, they were going to bring camp beds for their children so that the adults could sleep on the available beds.   However, this offer fell through.   When they heard that we specialise with only silent retreats, they realised that this would be too much for the kids, and they withdrew their application, leaving us with only one firm person in our book.  This number grew to three in the next few days, and there it stayed.

"What will happen if we only have three retreatants?" asked one of the monks.

" We shall go ahead; and it will be so good that more people will come next year," I replied.

One of the monks phoned a friend of the monastery.   She is a charismatic and was going to go to a charismatic jamboree in another part of Lima.   She changed her plans and rounded up a group of her friends to support the monastery with their presence.   We ended up with twelve, just enough to use all our guestrooms; and about the same number came to join us for the Saturday.   It is, perhaps, the most successful retreat we have ever had, with everybody exhilerated at the end, and vowing to return at the next opportunity.   It was the combination of "charismatic" prayer with monastic silence and liturgy that made it unique in their experience.   I knew from having had a charismatic parish that even the most charismatic of people appreciate the Mass when it is properly celebrated.

It began on Friday evening with a "ceremony of light" in the monastic chapel.   This was presided over by Dom Percy who belonged to a charismatic family and to whom it comes as second nature.   There were four parts.   

The first was an explanation of the meaning of the ceremony.   Then, each person approached the paschal candle and lit a candle, saying out loud what experience in life had made him or her more aware of the activity of the Holy Spirit.   I chose monastic profession and ordination.   There were hymns and prayers of thankgivng for all we have received from God.

Then we all sat in our places in the nave and tried to identify the times when our behaviour has been most contrary to the graces we have received.   Each person blew out his or her candle when this had been done. We then made a resolution to do something in the Spirit that, perhaps, we have neglected to do, or something extra that we need to do.

Once more we went to the paschal candle, and, as each lit his or her candle, publicly promised before God to comply with his or her resolution, naming it in a prayer.   When all had lit our candles, we then exchanged them with everyone else, continuing to swop them until everybody had swopped with everybody, this to symbolise our need to share and participate for the building up of the body of Christ.   Then  Dom Percy brought the ceremony to en end with a prayer; but they went on praying and conversing with him after I left.

All the participants went to all the monks' Divine Office except for Matins.  They began with Lauds and Conventual Mass at 7.00am.   During the morning, I gave a talk on "The Holy Spirit and the Church" and Dom Juan gave a brief introduction and then prayed with them, using the "rosary of the Holy Spirit".   He and Brother Ascensio had made a rosary of the Holy Spirit for each person.   I am sorry I have no photos for that morning.  The photo above is of Dom Mario giving his talk on the "Holy Spirit in our personal life" in the afternoon.   

Again, no photos for Solemn Vespers with cope.   Our photo cover begins with the Vigil of Pentecost with Mass at 8.00pm.   There were four readings, each with its psalm and prayer, just as in the Paschal Vigil.

After the four lessons, we sang the Gloria (missa de Angeles viii) and Vigil became Eucharist.

The Vigil was quite a marathon, and we went to bed late.   After Lauds sung by the monks - the people had books and joined in at will - and a good breakfast, we ended the retreat with Solemn Mass, sung by Father Luis.

I preached:

And Fr Luis continued the Mass.  I had another later.

After the Mass, I anointed the sick who were present:

I have found that the combination of charismatic prayer and a liturgy that does not try to make the Mass as much like a prayer meeting as possible has real impact; and this was shown, once again, by the enthusiasm of the participants who repeatedly asked us, when all was over, to have more retreats like this one.   Such phrases as, "I thought I was in heaven!" and "God is in this place!" were said by several people at different times.

SUMMARY OF THE HOMILY FOR PENTECOST.

Today we celebrate the feast of Pentecost.   You all know the story, and we have just heard it in the readings, how, when the the apostles were sitting together, there was a great wind, and tongues of fire fell on each one of them, and the apostles and disciples of Christ became the Church of which we are all members today.   That is what we are celebrating.

But we are not merely celebrating an event that took place two thousand years ago.   For one thing, the Holy Spirit acts as a bridge over time and place, between events that the Church remembers in celebration and the Church that is celebrating.   This has the same effect as being placed in the room where Pentecost took place, and the Church - we ourselves - receive the blessings of Pentecost as though we were there.  

 Secondly, in the Eucharist we are celebrating, we are participating in an event that is in no way inferior to what took place in the Upper Room. In the Eucharistic Prayer, the prayer of the priest is the prayer of Christ to the Father, because the Holy Spirit acts as a bridge between the priest and Christ, making the priest's prayer a vehicle for Christ's prayer  In answer to this prayer the Father sends his Spirit on the bread and wine and on the people, making the bread and wine the body and blood of Christ, and making the people one body with Christ.  

This prayer, asking the Father to send his Spirit in Christ's name, is the most important of its kind, because the effect of this prayer is to make the Church what it is, the body of Christ.   All genuine experience of the Holy Spirit that Christians have, even  that of Christians who do not believe in the Mass, is really an effect of this prayer: it is enough that the Holy Spirit includes them as beneficiaries in the effects of this prayer.  This prayer brings about the full effect of Pentecost in the Church: the apostles didn't get anything better!

Here we are, celebrating an event that took place two thousand years ago in the Upper Room, when the Holy Spirit came upon the apostles.   As the Church remembers and celebrates, the same Holy Spirit bridges the gap between the Upper Room and us; and, through the celebration of the Eucharist, we are offered the same gifts that were offered to the apostles.   In answer to the prayer of Christ said by the priest, we receive nothing less than they did.

We know that the experience of Pentecost not only transformed a bunch of disciples into the Church, it also changed their behaviour.   There was a great burst of energy, and their apostolate became a real manifestation of God's loving power in the world.

We who are in the process of receiving the very gifts of Pentecost in this Mass, do we really want to receive the Spirit? Do we need to receive the Spirit?   Are we going to fall asleep, or are we going to open ourselves to the Spirit?   When we receive Christ's body and blood, are we going to forget about him only five minutes after receiving him, or are we going to remain in communion with him and allow him to accompany us into the world outside the Church.

We are going to leave this celebration of Pentecost filled with the Spirit, bearing Christ in our hearts.   It is our vocation each of us to be a monstrance.  You know that a monstrance of silver or gold exists to show the presence of the eucharistic Christ to the Church.   Each of us is called to so live that Christ's presence within us, the Christ we receive in holy communion, is manifested by our behaviour to the world.

The Holy Spirit is continuing to write the New Testament in the Book of Life, a continuation of the the Acts of the Apostles, a book that will only be finished at the end of the world.   If we have any place in the story will depend on how receive the Holy Spirit and how we react to having Christ within us.

What a great honour, a great joy and a great responsibility to be present at the miracle of Pentecost!!

Are we going to let this wonderful opportunity pass us by?

Or are we going to accept the Holy Spirit with all our heart and strength?

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of thy faithful, and kindle in them the fire of your Love. Amen.

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