Acts
2: 1 – 2, 4
When
the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And
suddenly there came from heaven a noise like a violent rushing wind, and it
filled the whole house where they were sitting. . . And they were all filled
with the Holy Spirit.
*
Michael Jackson gave us one of his best songs
many years before his death:
We
are the World,
We
are the Children,
We
are the ones to make a brighter day.
That song is fitting as we prepare
ourselves for the feast of Pentecost because, by virtue of our Baptism, each
one of us can paraphrase Michael Jackson and say,
We
are the Church,
We
are the Body of Christ,
We
are the ones to build the Kingdom of God.
Pentecost is the day we celebrate the
birthday of the Church, but not everyone will be coming to the party happy.
Many don’t even show up anymore. For some the Church has changed too much and
too quickly; for others, the change hasn’t been fast enough. Many are angry and
hurt and disillusioned with the institutional Church.
In
times of frustration it’s tempting to think of the Church as something out
there — some monolithic superstructure over which we have little control. But the Church is not some abstract reality
that lives behind Vatican walls. The Church is you and the Church is me
struggling to follow as the Holy Spirit guides us through history. And the
Church of the 21st and the 25th centuries will be the
beneficiary of what we do in our lifetimes to help it grow.
As a child I listened with awe to the
story of Pentecost: the Apostles huddled in fear in the upper room; the doors
fly open; the Holy Spirit appears; tongues of fire descend upon the Apostles
turning their fear to courage. They take to the streets, shouting for joy for the
entire world to hear, “Jesus Christ is Lord. He has risen!” And so the Church
was born.
The child in me that listened with awe to
this wonderful story grew up believing that the Apostles and the Church they
created were perfect — incapable of human weakness, of discord, controversy, or
sin. But with maturity has come an understanding that the Church didn’t land in
the streets of Jerusalem on Pentecost Day as a perfect, finished product. The Holy
Spirit is guiding the Church through history. But the operative word is ‘guiding’
— not dragging, not coercing.
As such, the Church is like a flower or a
human being — it is a living, growing organism. And, like each of us, it is
called to wholeness but is capable of weakness and failure along the way. But
like us, it is called to get back up on its collective feet each time that it
falls; and to never give up on becoming all that it is called to be.
We
are the Church,
We
are the Body of Christ,
We
are the ones to build the Kingdom of God.
The Apostles didn’t ride off into the
sunset on Pentecost to live perfectly harmonious and stress-free lives. The
Church in those early days was very much like the Church of today. There was
tremendous faith and love, but there was also controversy and human weakness
and sin; and differences of opinion and struggle for growth. Saint James headed
the first Christian community in Jerusalem. It consisted of Jewish followers of
the Gospel who continued to observe strict kosher dietary laws. Eventually
Gentiles joined the community. They came from all parts of the Mediterranean
and all cultures. Being Gentiles, they did not follow kosher restrictions as to
what they could eat.
In
this first Christian parish, the Eucharist was celebrated at the end of a
common meal. Preparing the menu for this meal presented political problems for
the community. The Jewish members, who were in the majority, wanted to stick
with tradition and serve only kosher food. The Gentiles didn’t want to abandon
their ethnic eating customs for fear of losing their cultural identity.
Both groups lobbied Saint Peter, our
first pope, but he was evasive and indecisive. He wanted to welcome the Gentiles
to share the Eucharist without dietary restrictions, but he feared the backlash
from the Jewish members. So he just stopped eating with the Gentiles. This
caused tremendous hurt, and created tension between the two groups.
To avert the breakdown of the community,
the Council of Jerusalem — our very first Church Council — was called. Saint
Paul argued powerfully against Saint James while Saint Peter sat in
arbitration. The elders of the community accepted Paul’s position, and the Gentiles
were no longer required to observe the kosher dietary laws. The community could
henceforth celebrate the Eucharist together. By this decision the Church became
truly universal — no longer tied exclusively to the Jewish traditions.
Of course, this could have had a
different ending. James or Paul or the Gentiles could have turned their backs
on the community, and gone off to do their own thing. But they didn’t; they let
the Holy Spirit guide them through the storm. And, as a result, here we are,
2,000 years later — one culturally diverse worldwide community, celebrating the
Eucharist together, somewhere every minute of every hour of every day.
We
are the Church,
We
are the Body of Christ,
We
are the ones to build the Kingdom of God.
The Church of the 14th century
got into a real mess. The pope moved from Rome to Avignon, France and then back
to Rome again. But the French Cardinals didn’t want to go back to Rome — so
they elected their own pope. The two popes excommunicated each other. The
Christian world was polarized, and torn by politics and confusion.
Saint Catherine of Sienna, a great doctor
of the Church, argued forcefully in defense of the Italian pope against Saint
Vincent Ferrer, a gifted Dominican preacher, who strongly supported the pope in
Avignon. Catherine prevailed and won Vincent over to her position. The French pope
fled into the night, thereby averting a permanent split in the Church. Of
course, this could have had a different ending: Catherine or Vincent could have
turned their backs and walked away disillusioned with the Church. But they
didn’t. They let the Holy Spirit guide them through the storm and, as a result,
here we sit 700 years later — one community.
We
are the Church,
We
are the Body of Christ,
We
are the ones to build the Kingdom of God.
Vatican II in the 1960s was a wonderful
movement of the Holy Spirit. But some have walked away. Some because the movement
was too fast: too much change too quickly; they long for the security of
tradition — the Latin Mass, meatless Fridays. Others have walked away because
the movement was too slow: too little change, too long to wait.
This latter group almost included me. In
1987, I dropped out of the formation program for deacons. I long for the day
when all my sisters around the world, my daughters, and my wife are invited to
participate in ordained ministry. Church history was moving too slowly for me
on this issue. Not only did I withdraw from the diaconate program but for many
months I struggled with the question of whether I could remain a member of the
Church. But then I remembered Paul, James and the Gentiles, Catherine of Sienna
and Vincent Ferrer; and I realized that for change and growth to happen, I couldn’t walk away — I had to be here to be part of the
process. I let the Holy Spirit guide me through my storm; and here I am,
twenty-four years later, sharing my hopes and dreams for the future of our Church.
We
are the Church,
We
are the Body of Christ,
We
are the ones to build the Kingdom of God.
The Church isn’t out there; it’s all
around us. It’s you and it’s me; it’s our Sunday school teachers and our pastor;
it’s the baby we baptized last week; the nuns and the pope, and the bishops;
it’s my friend Bob, with whom I shared the Eucharist many times in his hospital
room before he died of AIDS; it’s the young mother from New Jersey who lost her
baby, her family and her home to a heroin addiction, and sits begging for food
in the Port Authority Bus Terminal.
The Church is you and the Church is me.
For change and growth to happen, we need to be here — to use our gifts and our
talents to help move the institutional church wherever it is that the Holy
Spirit is leading us.
We are members of the Body of Christ; but
each and every one of us IS the Body of Christ. We are Eucharist to each other
and to the world. We are the world; we are the Church; we are the future.
……………………………………………………………………………………..
Readers
of this blog might enjoy these books by Deacon Lex. Both are available on
Amazon.com:
Just
to Follow My Friend: Experiencing God’s Presence in Everyday Life
Synchronicity
as the Work of the Holy Spirit: Jungian Insights for Spiritual Direction and
Pastoral Ministry
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