Pentecost: Why We Need the Holy Spirit More Than Ever

Although we think of Pentecost as the Christian celebration of the coming of the Holy Spirit and the birthday of the Church, the Jewish feast of Pentecost predates Christianity by many centuries.  Referred to as Shavu’ot, it is celebrated 50 days after Passover and commemorates the giving of the Torah to Moses at Mt. Sinai.  The Torah is comprised of the first five books of the Bible, or the books of Moses, also called the Pentatuch.   To this day, Shavu’ot is celebrated 50 days after Passover, signifying spiritual redemption from the bondage of idolatry and sin, through the law as given to Moses.   And of course Christians celebrate Pentecost 50 days after Easter, commemorating the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles, marking the birth of the fledgling Church.

Throughout salvation history, ancient events and celebrations served as precursors to the coming of Christ and of the Holy Spirit.  The Passover prefigured Jesus’ passing over death and brining about our salvation, and Shavu’ot anticipated the coming of the Holy Spirit, not only fulfilling the law but taking our spirituality to a higher plane by strengthening our soul with the gifts of the Holy Spirit.  Whereas the Mosaic law set down guidelines for specifically how to live a moral life, Jesus calls us to go beyond the letter of the law, to love even our enemies, and forgive over and over again.  Living up to this higher standard set by Jesus is only possible because He sent us the Holy Spirit to strengthen and embolden us with the spiritual gifts necessary to live and love as closely as possible to the way God loves us.  On our own, it would be impossible to love one another the way God loves us, but with the aid of the Holy Spirit we can come much closer.

In the weeks leading up to Pentecost, Jesus told His disciples over and over again that the Holy Spirit would come, calling Him the “Advocate” (John 15:26), and “The Spirit of Truth” (John 16:12).  Catholic doctrine counts seven gifts of the Holy Spirit which are: Wisdom, Understanding, Counsel, Fortitude, Knowledge, Piety and Fear of the Lord.  Briefly, Wisdom is considered the first and highest gift because it enables us to recognize the Truths of our faith as being more important than the things of this world. Understanding helps us grasp the meaning of the Truths of our faith.  Counsel helps us make good prudential judgments in the light of the Truths of our faith.  Fortitude, sometimes called courage, helps us follow through on our judgments.  Knowledge helps us see the circumstances of our life, the way God sees them, putting things in perspective.  Piety gives us the willingness to serve God, rather than only our selfish desires. Finally, Fear of the Lord gives us the desire not to offend God, and to be mindful of the consequences of our actions, out of love for God, not just a sense of duty.

Notice how the Gifts of the Holy Spirit all revolve about acceptance of the Truths of our faith?  Perhaps this is why Jesus referred to the Holy Spirit as “The Spirit of Truth.”  During the time between His Resurrection and Ascension into heaven, Jesus commanded His disciples to love one another as He loves us.  And how much did He love us?  One look at a crucifix says it all.  He loved us even to the point of sacrificing His life for our salvation.  If we are to follow His command to love one another with self-sacrificing love, we need the help and the gifts of the Holy Spirit, to enable us to love even when we don’t feel like loving or forgiving.  When we react to our circumstances and the disappointments of life, purely on the basis of human emotion, we are bound to fail, disappoint and frustrate ourselves, and those around us.  On the other hand, when we are mindful of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and call on them to guide our reactions and our judgments, we are much more likely to succeed in loving and forgiving one another. 

The Wisdom of God far exceeds the conventional wisdom of the world because it is rooted in Truth, as revealed in scripture and in nature (His creation) itself.  In our increasingly secular society, what goes for spirituality is often nothing more than feel-good psychology.  Any worldview based primarily on individual freedom and personal fulfillment is merely idolatry of the self.  When the Truths of faith are ignored, downplayed, or out rightly denigrated, the consequences are severe.  One of the worst case examples of this occurred in Nazi Germany after World War I.   Germany was still recovering from a devastating defeat and  Hundreds of thousands of Germans starved to death in the aftermath of the war which included a blockade, preventing food from being shipped into war-ravaged Germany.  According to the Treaty of Versailles, Germany was forced to accept responsibility for starting the war and required to pay economic reparation, to the tune of $132 Billion Marks.  They resorted to printing money.  This led to hyper-inflation and eventually the default of the government while people were starving because the cost of food had become prohibitive.  Unable to respond, Germany’s borders were altered and they were forced to cede land to Poland, France and Czechoslovakia, as well as give up their colonies in Africa to the Allies.  The general consensus by the German people was that the treaty was unfair, and this was the primary thrust of Hitler’s rise to power.  He and the Nazi party decried the unfairness of the treaty and he was democratically elected to right those wrongs.  (This is probably the best example of democracy without morality resulting in mob rule.   The people were anxious to recover and assert themselves and their nation as a world power, and in the process they fell victim to the appeal of the Nazi propaganda.  Hitler convinced his people that they could perfect humanity and enhance their nation by culling out undersireables, and taking back what they lost after World War I.  This rapidly escalated from limiting the rights of Jews, to segregating them, outlawing them, and finally murdering them in a holocaust that took 11 million lives.  How did Hitler manage to persuade people to follow his malicious lead?  He took over the media and education in order to indoctrinate people on the importance of nationalism, while appealing to their sense of pride in their race.

So what, you may ask does any of this history have to do with Pentecost?  It is my perception that our own government is trending down this same path, lured by the appeal of secular values in which the Truths of faith are increasingly considered “unfair” in that they impinge on personal freedom.  Even our president has stated that he would not want his daughter “punished with a baby” if she made a mistake.  The value of human life has been degraded as lower than the value of personal convenience.  Religious convictions are ignored and demeaned by our government which requires everyone to pay up (tax dollars and insurance premiums) for contraceptives and abortion.  Like the German Jews of the 1930s, Christian’s rights are being limited and our beliefs outlawed.   Expressing religious convictions about abortion and marriage is now considered tantamount to violating civil rights.  Pro-Life groups have been singled out by the IRS for audits and prevented from receiving non-profit status.  Christian employers are being fined exorbitantly for failure to violate their convictions.  Similar to post WWI Germany, America is racking up debt at an unprecedented rate.  And finally, our government, which seems to have control over the media, is trying to take over education and health care.  In short, the Truths of our faith are under attack and religious freedom is being abrogated.

It is up to Christians to uphold the Truths of our faith.  For this we need the gifts of the Holy Spirit to contend with an increasingly secular society and government that is attacking the tenets of our faith, levying taxes and penalties on people of religious conviction who disagree with the government over the issues of abortion and marriage.  The Supreme Court is scheduled to announce a verdict on the HHS mandate this month, but even if the high court’s decision upholds religious freedom and overturns the mandate, our faith is still under attack on many fronts.  We need the Holy Spirit more than ever.