The title for this weekend is Pentecost which literally means 50th and is a feast celebrated on the 50th day after the Passover feast by the Jews and a feast celebrated on the 50th day after the feast of the Resurrection of Jesus by Christians. The Jewish Pentecost was originally a post-harvest thanksgiving feast. Later, the Jews included in it the remembrance of God’s Covenants with Noah after the Deluge and with Moses at Mt. Sinai.
There are four important events that occurred on this Feast day. First The Holy Spirit descended upon the apostles and the Blessed Virgin Mary as fiery tongues. Next the frightened apostles were transformed into fiery preachers and evangelisers and were given the gift of tongues by a special anointing of the Holy Spirit. Third the listeners experienced a fresh anointing of the Holy Spirit through the apostles’ gift of tongues and they heard the Apostles speaking in their native languages. Fourthly the early Christians became powerful witnesses and brave martyrs for their Faith in Jesus.
The Holy Spirit has many roles in to play in our lives. 1) As an indwelling God, the Holy Spirit makes us His Living Temples (I Cor 3:16). 2) As a strengthening God, He strengthens us in our fight against temptations and in our mission of bearing witness to Christ through our Christian lives. 3) As a sanctifying God, He makes us holy through the Sacraments: a) Through Baptism He makes us children of God and heirs of Heaven. b) Through Confirmation, He makes us temples of God, warriors, and defenders of the Faith. c) Through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, He enables us to be reconciled with God by pardoning our sins. d) Through the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, He gives us spiritual nourishment by converting bread and wine into Jesus’ Body and Blood. e) Through the Sacraments of the priesthood and matrimony, He makes the Church community holy. 4) As a teaching and guiding God, He constantly reminds us of Christ’s teachings and guides the Church to teach Christ’s teachings correctly. 5) As a listening and speaking God, He listens to our prayers, enables us to pray, and speaks to us, mainly through the Bible. 6) As a Giver of gifts, He gives us His gifts, fruits, and charisms, thus enriching the Church.
Finally, there is this Pentecost story about Chippie from the Internet. It all happened in Galveston, Texas. A woman was cleaning the bottom of the cage of her parrot Chippie with the canister vacuum cleaner. She was not using an attachment on the tube. When the telephone rang, she turned her head to pick it up, continuing to vacuum the cage as she said, “Hello,” into the phone. Then she heard the horrible noise of Chippie being sucked into the vacuum. Immediately she put down the phone, ripped open the vacuum bag, and found Chippie in there, stunned but still alive. Since the bird was covered with dust and dirt, she grabbed it, ran it into the bathroom, turned on the faucet, and held the bird under the water to clean it off. When she finished that, she saw the hair dryer on the bathroom sink. She turned it on and held the bird in front of the blast of hot air to dry him off. A few weeks later, a reporter from the newspaper that originally published the story went out to the house to ask the woman, “How’s Chippie doing now?” She said, “He just sort of sits and stares. he doesn’t sing any more” Today’s Gospel tells us that it was what happened to the apostles. They all were traumatized by the arrest and crucifixion of their master and bewildered by his post-Resurrection appearances and his command to prepare for the coming of his Holy Spirit. Many of us can identify with Chippie and the apostles. Life has sucked us up, thrown cold water on us, and blown us away. Somewhere in the trauma, we have lost our song. Hence, we, too, need the daily anointing of the Holy Spirit to keep us singing songs of Christian witnessing. (biblestudyresources.com)