20-second Summary
On Pentecost Sunday two thousand years ago, the Apostles received an amazing gift – the Holy Spirit. Jesus kept His promise and sent the Advocate and amazing works have been done ever since through Him. How He works in our lives is just as important as how He worked in the lives of the Apostles. And the gift and work is all connected to the Sacraments.
Pentecost Sunday is so important, the Church uses the same readings every year. And we celebrate her birthday today, too!
This Week’s Mass Warm-Up!
Catechesis At Home – Pentecost Sunday – Years A, B, and C
Pentecost Sunday – Receive the Holy Spirit
Pentecost Sunday occurs 50 days after the Resurrection. It is a time of great celebration in the Church because it is considered the birthday of the Church. The Holy Spirit came upon the Apostles, the Virgin Mary, and about one hundred other disciples in the upper room that day (Acts 1:15). We hear the story in Acts of the Apostles 2:1-11 each year on Pentecost Sunday. This is an important point because:
The Sunday cycle is divided into three years, labeled A, B, and C. 2020 was Year A. 2021 was Year B, 2022 was Year C, etc. During Year A, we read mostly from the Gospel of Matthew, Year B, we read the Gospel of Mark and chapter 6 of the Gospel of John; In Year C, we read the Gospel of Luke. The Gospel of John is read during the Easter season in all three years. (http://www.usccb.org/bible/liturgy/index.cfm)
So, to hear the same readings every year makes it really, really special. And that is one way we know that this feast is really, really special.
First Reading
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.
Now there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven
staying in Jerusalem.
At this sound, they gathered in a large crowd,
but they were confused
because each one heard them speaking in his own language.
They were astounded, and in amazement they asked,
“Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans?
Then how does each of us hear them in his native language?
We are Parthians, Medes, and Elamites,
inhabitants of Mesopotamia, Judea and Cappadocia,
Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia,
Egypt and the districts of Libya near Cyrene,
as well as travelers from Rome,
both Jews and converts to Judaism, Cretans and Arabs,
yet we hear them speaking in our own tongues
of the mighty acts of God.”
Responsorial Psalm
R (cf. 30) Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.
or:
R Alleluia.
Bless the LORD, O my soul!
O LORD, my God, you are great indeed!
How manifold are your works, O LORD!
the earth is full of your creatures;
R Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.
or:
R Alleluia.
May the glory of the LORD endure forever;
may the LORD be glad in his works!
Pleasing to him be my theme;
I will be glad in the LORD.
R Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.
or:
R Alleluia.
If you take away their breath, they perish
and return to their dust.
When you send forth your spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the earth.
R Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.
or:
R Alleluia.
Second Reading
Brothers and sisters:
No one can say, “Jesus is Lord,” except by the Holy Spirit.
There are different kinds of spiritual gifts but the same Spirit;
there are different forms of service but the same Lord;
there are different workings but the same God
who produces all of them in everyone.
To each individual the manifestation of the Spirit
is given for some benefit.
As a body is one though it has many parts,
and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body,
so also Christ.
For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body,
whether Jews or Greeks, slaves or free persons,
and we were all given to drink of one Spirit.
OR: [YEAR C ONLY]
Brothers and sisters:
Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
But you are not in the flesh;
on the contrary, you are in the spirit,
if only the Spirit of God dwells in you.
Whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.
But if Christ is in you,
although the body is dead because of sin,
the spirit is alive because of righteousness.
If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,
the one who raised Christ from the dead
will give life to your mortal bodies also,
through his Spirit that dwells in you.
Consequently, brothers and sisters,
we are not debtors to the flesh,
to live according to the flesh.
For if you live according to the flesh, you will die,
but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body,
you will live.
For those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.
For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear,
but you received a Spirit of adoption,
through whom we cry, “Abba, Father!”
The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit
that we are children of God,
and if children, then heirs,
heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ,
if only we suffer with him
so that we may also be glorified with him.
OR: [YEAR B ONLY]
Brothers and sisters, live by the Spirit
and you will certainly not gratify the desire of the flesh.
For the flesh has desires against the Spirit,
and the Spirit against the flesh;
these are opposed to each other,
so that you may not do what you want.
But if you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law.
Now the works of the flesh are obvious:
immorality, impurity, lust, idolatry,
sorcery, hatreds, rivalry, jealousy,
outbursts of fury, acts of selfishness,
dissensions, factions, occasions of envy,
drinking bouts, orgies, and the like.
I warn you, as I warned you before,
that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.
In contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace,
patience, kindness, generosity,
faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.
Against such there is no law.
Now those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified their flesh
with its passions and desires.
If we live in the Spirit, let us also follow the Spirit.
Sequence
Come, Holy Spirit, come!
And from your celestial home
Shed a ray of light divine!
Come, Father of the poor!
Come, source of all our store!
Come, within our bosoms shine.
You, of comforters the best;
You, the soul’s most welcome guest;
Sweet refreshment here below;
In our labor, rest most sweet;
Grateful coolness in the heat;
Solace in the midst of woe.
O most blessed Light divine,
Shine within these hearts of yours,
And our inmost being fill!
Where you are not, we have naught,
Nothing good in deed or thought,
Nothing free from taint of ill.
Heal our wounds, our strength renew;
On our dryness pour your dew;
Wash the stains of guilt away:
Bend the stubborn heart and will;
Melt the frozen, warm the chill;
Guide the steps that go astray.
On the faithful, who adore
And confess you, evermore
In your sevenfold gift descend;
Give them virtue’s sure reward;
Give them your salvation, Lord;
Give them joys that never end. Amen.
Alleluia.
Gospel Reading
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful
and kindle in them the fire of your love.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
On the evening of that first day of the week,
when the doors were locked, where the disciples were,
for fear of the Jews,
Jesus came and stood in their midst
and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.
The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them,
“Receive the Holy Spirit.
Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them,
and whose sins you retain are retained.”
OR [YEAR B ONLY]:
whom I will send you from the Father,
the Spirit of truth that proceeds from the Father, he
will testify to me.
because you have been with me from the beginning
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.
He will glorify me, because he will take from what is mine
and declare it to you.
Everything that the Father has is mine;
for this reason I told you that he will take from what is mine
and declare it to you.
OR [YEAR C ONLY]:
Jesus said to his disciples:
“If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
And I will ask the Father,
and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always.
“Whoever loves me will keep my word,
and my Father will love him,
and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him.
Those who do not love me do not keep my words;
yet the word you hear is not mine
but that of the Father who sent me.
“I have told you this while I am with you.
The Advocate, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name,
will teach you everything
and remind you of all that I told you.”
Pentecost Sunday – Receive the Holy Spirit
REFLECTION – Pentecost Sunday and Sacrament
Pentecost Sunday – the Birthday of the Church! We are all pretty familiar with the story of how the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles in the upper room on that Sunday, ten days after the Ascension. We’ve all seen the artwork depicting the tongues of fire hovering over their heads. The phenomenon of the rushing wind, the Apostles’ preaching in different languages, and the conversion of over 3,000 people on that day is a familiar story.
What many people forget is that Jesus gave His Apostles the Holy Spirit prior to this. Maybe not fully, but initially, on Easter Sunday, when He appeared to the Apostles in the locked room, “he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit.’” And yet, He told them to wait after His Ascension in order to receive the Spirit. Why?
Let us remember that we receive the Holy Spirit in our Baptism first, then the fullness in our Confirmation. Pentecost was the Apostles’ “Confirmation”. The Holy Spirit was already in them, but at Pentecost He was awakened and fulfilled in a new way in each of them. This is why we have both Sacraments – Baptism and Confirmation. And why they are linked.
DISCUSSION – Pentecost Sunday and the Life of the Holy Spirit
The Holy Spirit is the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity. He LIVES in us when we receive the Sacraments. That is an amazing and awesome truth. Contemplate that for a while, what does it mean to have God IN YOU? How does that make you feel? Can you allow Him in? Can you allow Him to work through you? How do you receive Him? With joy? With trepidation? With humility? All three?
Are We Receiving the Holy Spirit?
A more in-depth or secondary discussion that you might use as an activity would be the following, involving reading the Scripture from Acts in our first reading.
Before reading the Scripture passage, have everyone gather together and sit comfortably but in a way that they will be attentive. Have everyone close their eyes and sit in silence for a minute or two. If you have little children, it may only be possible to hold silence for 30 seconds. Give them a challenge to help them stay silent.
Regardless of how long you can sit in silence, after that time is up, have everyone open their eyes and starting with the youngest, ask them what they heard.
There may have been traffic going past, or birds chirping, or somebody sneezed. They may say they could hear their breath or heartbeat.
After everyone has had a chance to say what they heard during the silence, ask them when they have been in a situation where the noise was so loud it startled them or they had to cover their ears. If they have trouble remembering a time, you might give them suggestions. Some of our suggestions would be the Monster Truck rally we attended a couple of times, or a really loud thunderstorm, or a construction site.
Remind your family of how it usually is at Mass when everyone is praying quietly.Read or paraphrase or story-tell the following in your style.
This is probably what the Upper Room was like, the Apostles were praying with a group of about 100 people. So, it wasn’t silent necessarily, like an empty chapel; it was like the Church when there are people praying, some are moving around a little, others might be whispering their prayers, others might even be visiting quietly with someone. As they spent nine days together, there would have been breaks for meals and sleeping, too.
Now, think about the loudest noise you can – maybe a freight train going past, or that very loud thunderstorm – and tell your family that the noise of the Holy Spirit was so loud that the whole house shook! That would be pretty scary wouldn’t it?
Then, to top that off, fire appeared in the air over their heads!
What?!?!? THAT IS AMAZING!!!! And then what happened next is even MORE AMAZING, they all started speaking in languages they had never spoken before!
Read the Scripture passage now (Acts of the Apostles 2:1-11).
After reading the passage, begin the discussion with the following, or similar: Put yourself in the shoes of either an Apostle or one of the Jews in town for the feast. What would you think?
ACTIVITY – Pentecost Sunday and the Gift of the Holy Spirit
Think about and discuss what it means to receive something. Use a physical example – hand your child a piece of fruit or treat they enjoy. Tell them they can have it, but not until later. (Maybe hand it to them after breakfast and tell them they can have it at lunch, or hand it to them after lunch and they can have it at dinner or for afternoon snack.) After they have enjoyed their treat later, discuss what it was like to have something but not be able to use it or enjoy it beyond looking at it, longing for it.
Learning How to Receive the Holy Spirit
When we receive a gift, it doesn’t do us much good to just set it aside and not open it or use it, does it? The same is true of the gift of the Holy Spirit. We have to USE the gift in order to receive the fullness of it. All the grace the Holy Spirit has for us is more than we can imagine, and yet, we don’t always allow the grace to flow into us. Talk about ways to open ourselves to the grace and peace of the Holy Spirit that Jesus wants us to receive: How can our family help each other open up and use this amazing gift – the gift of God Himself in us?
Celebrate the Feast of Pentecost with “Pentecost Sundaes”
Ingredients:
Vanilla Ice Cream (White to symbolize the purity and divinity of the Holy Spirit)
Strawberry Syrup (Red is the most common color associated with the Holy Spirit)
Whipped Topping (White again)
Fireball candies (No cherry on this sundae! Fireballs to represent the tongues of fire, you can also use Red Hots.)
Dove Chocolate Candies, or dove shaped candies from the wedding section of your favorite craft store (The dove is a very common symbol of the Holy Spirit, because when Jesus was Baptized the Holy Spirit descended “like a dove” to rest upon Him.)
You can even sing “Happy Birthday” to the Church!
SOMETHING TO KNOW – Why were all those Jews in Jerusalem on Pentecost?
The feast of Shavuot (shah-voo-OH-t) is a Jewish festival of the harvest AND commemorates the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai (Exodus 20). It is also called Pentecost (from the Greek word meaning 50) because it occurs 50 days after Passover. It is a “pilgrim” festival because all Jewish males were required to celebrate it in the Temple in Jerusalem. And that is why all those Jews who spoke different languages were in Jerusalem at Pentecost.
DIG DEEPER – Other Pentecost Sunday – Receive the Holy Spirit resources from Holy Owned and Operated:
Page: Easter Resources
TWMWU: The Holy Spirit, Our Advocate
TWMWU: Filled With the Holy Spirit
TWMWU: Receive The Holy Spirit
TWMWU: The Central Mystery: Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity
TWMWU: What is Marriage?
Podcast Episode: Pentecost – Episode 44
Podcast Episode: The Ascension – Episode 96
Video: What is Pentecost?
How does Pentecost Sunday remind you to Receive the Holy Spirit?
by Beth & Kristofer Cowles
HOO™ Co-Founders
Other Help on HOO
Being On The Road To Perfection – Episode 166
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 24:32 — 22.6MB)
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We are called to be perfect, as we discussed last week.
So, what does being on the road to perfection look like?
If Jesus was “finished” and his ministry was “completed,” as it means when He said, “It is done,” by saying, “It is perfected” just before He died on the Cross, He must have walked a road to perfection.
And so must we.
In this episode we discuss that concept, in terms of what we are doing and how we respond to the call for our life.
It’s a simple concept, and a difficult task, but we have the example of Our Lord which, from the proper perspective, is not an impossible example to follow and exemplify.
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