Pentecost

Do I believe in the Holy Spirit? You bet I do. Nothing else makes sense.
-Joan Chittister 

Dear Friends,

Pentecost is upon us, and with it an opportunity to confess our faith in the Holy Trinity anew, paying particular attention to the role of the Holy Spirit in our work and in our lives. In preparation for this blessed day, our Catechesis of the Good Shepherd children and their catechists have been exploring gifts of the Spirit in preparation for Sunday, when they will each choose a gift they would most like to receive during our Zoom Catechesis Pentecost Service this Sunday at 9AM.

Understanding, wisdom, knowledge, counsel, awe, fortitude, and piety. I wonder which of these speak to your heart? Which of these spiritual gifts would you most like to receive from the Holy Spirit? 

Because, my friends, the Holy Spirit remains with us, works in us, and continues to call to us in the ordinary and the extraordinary. Joan Chittister, a Benedictine Sister of Erie and a vocal advocate of justice, peace, and equality, writes,

The Spirit of God moves us to new heights of understanding, to new types of witness, to new dimensions of life needed in the here and now. The static dies under the impulse of the Spirit of a creating God. We do not live in the past. We are not bling beggars on a dark road groping our separate ways toward God. There is a magnet in each of us, a gift for God, that repels deceit and impels us toward good. The gifts are mutual, mitered to fit into one another for strength and surety. We are, in other words, in the most refreshingly trite, most obviously astounding way, all in this together. 

This Pentecost, let us sense the breath of the Holy Spirit within us and around us, inspiring us to align our lives and our work with the God who calls us chosen, who calls us beloved. As Chittister affirms, 

Conscious of the breath of God within us and around us, we can with confidence set out on the road to God knowing that it may be rocky but that it is at the same time well lit, brightly marked, wholly traversable because the Holy Spirit makes the path with us. We have not been left alone. Under the impulse of the Spirit, we are guided and safe. The Descent of the Holy Spirit is the call to be abandoned to the will of God. It is a call to risk the consequences of God’s love, here and now.

Faithfully, 

RevMo Crystal Hardin