PENTECOST AND COMMUNITY

A week has passed since we celebrated Pentecost Sunday. The church was awash in red appropriately. It is the tradition that this is the Church's birthday celebration. Yet we often celebrate at different times such important days so I hope you will grant me that latitude. The gift of the Spirit as the New Testament witnesses is not always at the same occasion. In fact the lectionary passages for Pentecost this year reflected that difference. John's Gospel tells of gentler arrival of the Spirit some time earlier.

I think it is important to think of those times when the Spirit seems truly apparent in a group. Sometimes it is Sunday morning in worship. The fiery tongues do land among us and we are equipped to preach to the masses who understand many different languages. Sometimes the Spirit seems to waffle through a committee struggling to solve the insoluble. Insight, agreement, new ways enwrap the whole. At times the nature of our surroundings pull us from various points on the circumference into a common center and we know the oneness only God's Spirit can bring.

In most cases however the Spirit arrives to make community, a community dedicated to knowing God. Enriched by the unseen yet truly felt movement the Holy Spirit seems to draw us in ways of gentleness, joy, oneness. When it happens we know and are changed. God's Spirit like God of course is beyond our control, but are there ways we can be available, are there communities we can form, are there attitudes and behaviors we can adopt, so when God chooses to be present in the moving way of the Spirit we will be caught in the glory?

A blog is in a way a community. Right now this blog seems to be more a community of one which limits the voice of the Spirit. How can it become a way for God's Spirit to meet with us, guide us, and make us whole? That is my desire. So I pray "Come Holy Spirit, come!"

How can this blog be a community through which the Spirit of Pentecost can blow?

ASCENSION OF JESUS

Waiting--that is what we must do. Jesus ascended, left his disciples and told them to wait for the coming of the spirit and power. That then is our task this week. In the church calendar Jesus' ascension was forty days after the resurrection and Pentecost, the time the spirit came to the waiting community, is fifty days after Passover. Now of course one can argue about the validity of the timing but perhaps it is valuable to have some time of waiting, of transitioning. Jesus' resurrection, what we celebrate in Eastertide, is certainly glorious and cause for rejoicing. The living Jesus met the disciples where they were. But now he leaves--to go to the Father. A bittersweet experience I imagine for them. Again they must accept that Jesus is not with them as they have known him. They must wait for the spirit, his new way of being present with them. Sadness and joy, excitement and fear, remembering and anticipating--a multitude of emotions must have been their lot those days. Imagine, feel with them.

When have you felt such mixtures of joy and sadness? When have you waited not knowing what would come but expecting? For those in the school system this time of the year, graduation, is always filled with these feelings. Other times of waiting may come to mind--pregnancy, engagement, job review, retirement. Change seems to produce this mixture--letting go so the new can come tugs at our souls.

The spiritual journey is often about these times. We're asked to move forward without seeing clearly the way. We're asked to trust that what we leave behind will be replaced by something deeper. The old must die so the new can be born. Nothing about the journey eliminates the pain of letting go. Yet we are called to move on--to keep walking. Sometimes we take notes and they give us or others guidance as we confront the next steps, "footnotes". Sometimes we wait alone or together until we it is time to let go and move on, making "footprints".

What memories do you have of letting go and finding the new? What is God saying to you as you watch Jesus ascend and wait for the coming of the Spirit?

FRANCISCAN PRAYER

Most of us remember St. Francis as the one who loved the birds and animals. He is most often pictured with robins on his shoulders and and rabbits in his arms wandering down an idyllic natural path. And indeed St. Francis was connected to the natural world in a unique way. But he was also the saint who was deeply concerned with humans who were in need. In fact his act of kissing the leper, the most disgusting outcast of his day, defines who he was in a real sense. The God he knew demanded that he give up the life of luxury his inherited wealth entitled him to and that he live a life of poverty, begging for his daily food. The order founded by his followers is a mendicant order. In the early days they wandered around the countryside doing good and depending on the love and generosity of those they met for sustenance.

Franciscan style prayer thus is active and outside. And it sees the Savior in all around. So it seems to be an appropriate prayer style for Eastertide. As we wander our streets, probably in a vehicle powered by gasoline, we too can perhaps see Christ around us--not only in the beauty of the spring wildflowers but also in the beggar along the road, not only in the freshness of a cool, sunny day, but also in the pain of the ill, not only in the joy of springtime courting of every species of bird but also in the need of children abused. If we pray as Francis did we will become one with the natural order and particularly with those who suffer. We will do what we can; we will be one with them; we will see Christ in each and every one.

Will you join in praying this way? Will you share what you see and do?

Note: I will try to be more regular in my posts and do look for your comments--Sorry I was late this week; I'll try to get a post online by Sunday afternoon.