PENTECOST SUNDAY – YEAR C
THE SPIRIT: HOPE OF A NEW WORLD
The natural phenomena that most captivate people's imaginations—fire, lightning, hurricanes, earthquakes, and thunder (Ex 19:16-19)—are portrayed in the Bible asmanifestations of God. The sacred authors employed vivid imagery to express the outpouring of the Spirit of the Lord. They depicted the Spirit as the breath of life (Gen 2:7), the rain that nourishes the earth and transforms the desert into a garden (Is 32:15; 44:3), the power that rejuvenates life (Eze 37:1-14), the roar from heaven, the mighty wind, the thunder, and the tongues of fire (Acts 2:1-3). These vibrant images evoke the concept of an unstoppable surge of strength.
Wherever the Spirit reaches, radical upheavals and transformations always occur: barriers fall, doors swing open, and all the towers built by human hands and designed by the wisdom of this world tremble. Fear, passivity, and quietism vanish; initiatives flourish, and courageous choices emerge. Those dissatisfied and seeking to renew the world and itspeople can rely on the Spirit: nothing resists his power.
One day, the prophet Jeremiah challenged himself: "Does an Ethiopian change his skin or a leopard change its spots? Likewise, will you, who are accustomed to doing evil, be able to do good?" (Jer 13:23). Yes—we can answer him—every miracle is possible where the Spirit of God intervenes.
"The Spirit of the Lord fills the earth and renews the face of the earth."
First Reading: Acts 2:1-11
Jesus promised the disciples that he would not leave them alone and that he would send the Spirit (Jn 14:16,26). Today, we celebrate the feast of this gift from the Risen One. As we read the passage from Acts, we are amazed by the many ‘prodigies’ occurring on Pentecost: thunder and strong winds, flames of fire descending from heaven, and the apostles speaking languages unfamiliar to them. Yet, we wonder why God waited fifty days before sending his Spirit upon the disciples.
To understand this page of theology (which is not a simple news report), we need to explore the author's symbolic language. Luke places the descent of the Spirit at Pentecost. Yet, in today’s Gospel, John tells us that Jesus imparted the Spirit on the day of the Resurrection (Jn 20:22). How can we reconcile this disagreement on the date?
We must say at the outset that the paschal mystery is unique. Death, Resurrection, Ascension, and the gift of the Spirit co-occurred at the moment of Jesus’ death. Recounting what happened on Calvary that Good Friday, John states: “he bowed his head, and Jesus gave up the Spirit” (Jn 19:30).
Why did Luke present this unique, sublime, and ineffable mystery of Easter as if it had occurred in three successive moments? He did this to help us grasp its many aspects. John places the outpouring of the Spirit on Easter to illustrate that the Spirit is the gift of the Risen One. Now, we explore why Luke locates it within the context of the Feast of Pentecost. Pentecost was an ancient Jewish holiday celebrated fifty days after Easter. It commemorated the arrival of the people of Israel at Mount Sinai. We all remember what happened in that place: Moses ascended the mountain; he encountered God and received the Law to be conveyed to his people.
The Israelites were immensely proud of this gift. They stated that before them, God had offered the Law to other peoples who had refused it, choosing instead to remain in their vices and excesses. To express their gratitude for this distinction, the Israelites initiated a feast called Pentecost. By stating that the Spirit descended upon the disciples on the day of Pentecost, Luke teaches that the Holy Spirit has replaced the old law and has become the new law for all Christians.
To clarify his point, we use an analogy from Jesus: One day, He asked, “Do you ever pick grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles?” (Mt 7:16). It would be foolish to believe that surrounding the bramble with attention, pruning it, and creating a milder climate would ever lead to grape production. However, if one could somehow transform it into a vine through the wonders of genetic engineering, no external intervention would be necessary. The bramble would spontaneously bear grapes.
Before receiving the outpouring of the Spirit, the world resembled a vast bramble. God had provided explicit directions—rules, precepts, and numerous recommendations. He anticipated fruits: the works of justice and love (Mt 21:18-19), but these had not materialized because the tree was rotten: “No healthy tree bears bad fruit … and the evil person draws evil things from the evil stored in his heart” (Lk 6:43,45).
What did God do then? He decided to change the hearts of people. With a new heart—he thought—they would no longer need an external law. They would do good by following the impulses that come from within them. Here is the law of the Spirit: it is the new heartand God’s life. When it enters a person, it transforms them, and from bramble, they become a fruitful tree, spontaneously producing the works of God.
When a person is filled with the Spirit, an extraordinary transformation occurs: he loves with the very love of God. From that moment, “he does not need someone to teach him” (1 Jn 2:27); he will not require another law. John even states that a man animated by the Spirit becomes incapable of sinning: “Those born of God do not sin, for the seed of God remains in them; they cannot sin because they are born of God” (1 Jn 3:9).
And what about the thunder, the wind, the fire? It is clear from what we observe in the book of Exodus regarding the phenomena that accompanied the gift of the Old Law: “On the morning of the third day, there was thunder and lightning, and a dense cloud over the mountain … All the people in the camp trembled” (Ex 19:16). “All the people witnessed the thunder and lightning, heard the blast of the trumpet, and saw the mountain smoking” (Ex 20:18).
The rabbis asserted that at Sinai, on the day of Pentecost, when God delivered the Law, His words manifested as seventy tongues of fire, signifying that the Torah was intended for all peoples (thought to number precisely seventy at that time). If the Old Law was revealedamid thunder, lightning, and flames, how could Luke convey the gift of the Spirit—the New Law- less dramatically? If he aimed to be understood, he had to use similar imagery.
And what about the many languages spoken by the apostles? Luke most likely refers to a common phenomenon in the early Church. After receiving the Spirit, the believers began to praise God in a state of exaltation. As if in ecstasy, they uttered unfamiliar words in variouslanguages.
Luke has employed this phenomenon symbolically to illustrate the universality of the Church. The Spirit is a gift intended for all individuals and all cultures. Confronted with this divine gift, all language, race, and ethnicity barriers disappear. On the day of Pentecost, the opposite of what transpired at Babel occurred (Gen 11:1-9). At Babel, people began to misunderstand and separate from one another. Here, the Spirit acts in reverse, uniting those who are dispersed.
Whoever allows themselves to be guided by the Word of the Gospel, and thus by the Spirit, speaks a language everyone understands, inviting all to join in: the language of love. The Spirit transforms humankind into one family where all understand and love one another.
Second Reading: Romans 8:8-17
The rabbis of Paul's time believed that humans are influenced by two inclinations pullingthem in opposite directions. The good inclination develops only at the age of thirteen; in contrast, the lousy inclination is present from conception and exerts its influence from theembryonic stage.
To counteract it, they suggested an antidote: engaging with the Torah, the Law of God. ‘If a despicable temptation comes to you,’ they taught the disciples, ‘bring it to the house where the Torah is studied, and it will be rendered harmless. ‘
Paul adopts a more pessimistic view. In the Letter to the Galatians, he presents a strikinglist of works arising from the impulse to evil, which he refers to as the flesh: "fornication, impurity, shamelessness, idol worship and sorcery, hatred, jealousy and violence, anger, ambition, division, factions, and envy, drunkenness, orgies” (Gal 5:19-21). He then diverges from the rabbis, believing that the drives of the flesh cannot be overcome or rendered harmless by the knowledge of the Torah.
Man finds himself in a desperate situation: "he does not do what he wants but instead the things he hates....” In his innermost self, he consents to the law of God, but in his limbs,he has another law that wages war against the law of his mind, making him a slave to the law of sin that resides in his body (Rom 7:14-23). In light of this inability to remain faithful to God, Paul exclaims, "Who will deliver me from this body of death?" (Rom 7:24).
Indeed, he replies that it is not the Law because, although it is holy, it does not grantman the inner strength to resist evil. It can be likened to road signs for someone driving a broken-down car without gas: they do not assist; they merely remind the unfortunate driver of his grim situation and the distance between him and his goal.
Only the gift of a divine force can radically change the situation. At this juncture, Paulintroduces the discourse of the Spirit, who penetrates the depths of humanity, transforms the heart, conveys the energy of life, and infuses the ability to be faithful to God. The consequence of this transformation is freedom from the bondage of sin.
In the first part of today's reading (vv. 8-10), the Apostle develops this thought and deduces its moral consequences. Now—he reminds the Christians in Rome—that you are no longer at the mercy of the flesh but are led by the Spirit of Christ. Those who close their hearts to the Spirit cannot please God and do not belong to Christ.
In the second part (v. 11), he emphasizes another extraordinary effect of the presence of the Spirit of Christ in humanity: the ultimate defeat of death. Biological life is indeeddestined to end one day, but this will not be the end of everything. The Spirit who raised Jesus and dwells within us will grant eternal life to our mortal bodies.
The Apostle provides a brief reminder of the moral consequences arising from the pristine condition of those who have received the Spirit of Christ (vv. 12-13). From the baptized—he states—we expect actions that align with the divine life within them. If they continue to "live according to the flesh," they would choose death. Then, with heartfeltwords, he reminds Christians that they are no longer mere creatures or enslaved peopleunder a master but sons, having received their own life from the Lord.
God has not only pitched His tent among us but has involved us in His life, as Peter explains to the Christians in his communities: "His divine power has granted us the gift of all good things. He gave us the great and precious promises so that you might become partakers of the divine nature" (2 Peter 1:4). The inner impulse of the Spirit causes the heart to overflow with uncontainable joy and to exclaim: "Abba, Father" (v. 15).
At this point, Paul needs to clarify the difference between the filiation of the Only Begotten, Christ, and ours (vv. 16-17). He does this by using the image of adoptive sonship, an institution unknown in Israel but widespread in the Greco-Roman world, where those adopted enjoyed the same rights as natural children, including participation in family inheritance. Similarly, or rather more accurately—Paul clarifies—God introduces man into his ‘family’: he is freely offered whole sonship and the same ‘inheritance,’ the same beatitude enjoyed by the Only Begotten Son of the Father.
The condition of God's children is terrific; however, as John reminds us in his letter, "We are already God's children, but what we will be has not yet been revealed. We know, however, that when he is manifested, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is" (1 John 3:2).
Gospel: John 14:15-16.23b-26
During the Last Supper, the disciples realize that Jesus is about to leave them. Their hearts are troubled; they feel sad and wonder what meaning their lives will have without him. Jesus reassures them by inviting them to remain faithful to his life proposal (v. 15). Love will sign that they are in tune with him. He promises not to leave them alone without protection and guidance. He will pray to the Father and ‘send another Paraclete’ who will remain with them forever (v. 16).
This represents the promise of the gift of the Spirit that Jesus possesses in fullness (Lk 4:1, 14, 18) and that will be poured out on the disciples. The Spirit is called the Comforter, but this term does not accurately translate the Greek ‘parákletos.’ Paraclete is a term derivedfrom forensic language, signifying the one called alongside the accused, the defender, and the rescuer of those in distress. In this context, Jesus is also a paraclete, as John reminds us in his first letter: "My children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin; but if anyone has sinned, we have an intercessor with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" (1 Jn 2:1).
Jesus is the paraclete because he is our advocate with the Father, not because he defends us from God's wrath; the Father is never against us but always on our side. Instead,Jesus protects us from our accuser, our adversary: sin. The enemy is sin, and Jesus knows how to render it powerless.
Now, he promises another Paraclete whose task is not to replace him but to fulfill his mission. The Spirit is a Paraclete because he comes to the aid of the disciples in their struggle against the world, namely, against the forces of evil (Jn 16:7-11). At this point, a question arises: if the Paraclete is such a powerful defender, why does evil continue to prevail over good, and why does sin so often dominate us? Even the Christians in the communities of Asia Minor at the end of the first century wondered why the new world did not impose itself immediately and in a remarkable way.
In response to these doubts and uncertainties, Jesus declares, "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him" (v. 23). Jesus intends to manifest himself, along with the Father, not through miracles but by choosing to dwell with his disciples. The Israelites believed that God's presence resided in the temple in Jerusalem. However, King Solomon had already ponderedwhether a house made by human hands could genuinely hold the Lord of the universe (1 Kgs8:27). Through the prophets, God promised he would come to dwell among his people: "Rejoice, daughter of Zion, for behold, I am coming to dwell in you" (Zech 2:14).
He was not referring to a physical sanctuary. In the man Jesus, God has fulfilled the promise and made Himself present (Jn 1:14). Now—Jesus assures us—God resides and becomes visible in the disciple who loves as He has loved. For this reason, it is not difficult to recognize when the evil one is present in a person and when Jesus and the Father are present and acting.
In the last verse, Jesus promises the Holy Spirit, "the Paraclete who will teach and remind" all He has said (v. 26). Jesus left nothing out; He revealed everything. Yet, the Spirit must continue to teach because He could not explicitly explain His message's consequences and concrete applications. Jesus knew that throughout history, the disciples would face new situations and questions and need to respond in the light of the Gospel.
Jesus assures them that if they remain attuned to the impulses of the Spirit within them, they will always find answers that align with his teaching. The Spirit may often call for unexpected and radical changes in direction, but he will not lead them in any way other than those indicated by Jesus. In light of Scripture, the verb’ to teach’ has a deeper meaning. The Spirit does not instruct as a professor does in school while explaining a lesson. He teaches dynamically, becoming an inner impulse, propelling us irresistibly in the right direction, encouraging us towards goodness, and guiding us to make choices following the Gospel.
"He will guide you into all truth," Jesus explains once again during the Last Supper (Jn 16:13). In his first letter, John clarifies, "You have received from him an anointing, and it remains in you, so you do not need anyone to teach you. His anointing teaches you everything; it speaks the truth and does not lie. Therefore, remain in him and hold on towhat he has taught you" (1 Jn 2:27-28).
The second task of the Spirit is to remind. Although present in the Gospels, many words of Jesus risk being overlooked or forgotten. This happens especially with difficult-to-assimilate teachings because they contradict the world’s ‘common sense.’ Such teachingsneed to be constantly recalled.
