Born anew

The narrative in Acts of what actually happened on Pentecost day is so rich in symbolism that that there is much one can read between the lines. It speaks of 'a powerful wind from heaven', something that appeared like 'tongues of fire', and 'the gift of speech' and the overcoming of all linguistic and cultural boundaries.

All this narrates to us the workings of the spirit in the Church and in each individual alike. It happens like the sudden appearance of Jesus to his disciples when they were behind closed doors for fear of the Jews. The point of Pentecost is not to make us dream of better future worlds, but rather to awaken us to the present hour, to the silent energy of divine goodness.

In reality, the Holy Spirit is largely the opposite of all that we expect in life. The Spirit makes us restless with our possessions, our comfort, and our respect, which is so often based on dubious compromises. The Spirit is a tempest that does not let us settle down in our comfort. The Spirit gives birth to new things. At the same time, the Spirit continues the work of Jesus, seeking to implement the kingdom of God on earth. The Spirit motivates us to live like Jesus, to serve, and to forgive, to die to all that is not a source of truth and life.

The Holy Spirit will lead those who are willing to live in the kingdom and to participate in God's mission through the proclamation of the gospel until Christ returns. As Paul writes to the Corinthians in today's second reading:

No one can say 'Jesus is Lord' unless he is under the influence of the Holy Spirit. Because calling Jesus 'Lord' at that time was inherently political. It was dangerous, proposing an alternative social order, challenging the power of those in authority. It then dethroned the emperor. And it continues even today to call for radical choices on the individual level and on that of society in general. Confronted with the demands of today's culture, or of the powers that condition us, the Spirit heals us from all inferiority complexes, because, as Paul says elsewhere, we did not receive a Spirit of fear but of strength.

As on Pentecost day, when Jesus came and stood amid his disciples despite the doors being closed, even now we need to let him breathe again his Spirit on us. We need to once again rediscover the kingdom perspective which is so contrary to much of our current understandings of Church, where the feeling is similar to that of Sisyphus pushing his rock uphill, only to see it crash back down again. Speaking of Pentecost, we need not antagonise the wind, breath, and spirit with the institution's rigidity.

The Spirit has no boundaries, be they linguistic, cultural, or religious. The wind blows where it wills. You can only hear it. But you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. That is the reason why talk about the Holy Spirit is often talk about 'rebirth' or a 'being born anew'. This suggests an image for the Holy Spirit which was quite familiar in the early years of Christianity, especially in Syria, but got lost in the patriarchal empire of Rome: the image of the mother.

If believers are born of the Holy Spirit, then we have to think of the Spirit as the 'mother' of believers, and in this sense as a feminine Spirit.

The people who cry out for Spirit to come open themselves for what they expect. For Augustine, prayer is always a yearning, a desire, the heart's longing for God.

Yet, as Frances Young writes in Brokenness and Blessings, one needs some knowledge of the object of one's desire in order to desire it, and that is the gift of the Holy Spirit.