Pentecost - A Refection by Fr. Leo
Jesus asks that we love him by living in the same Christ consciousness that united him with the Father and the Holy Spirit. To love Christ is to love the Father and to love the Father is to love the Son. It is the Holy Spirit that proceeds from them both, that makes this trinity of love present to us and invites us to live in the fullness of God. God shares his divinity with us through the gift of the Holy Spirit. To love Christ is to love the Spirit within us that is our deepest, truest self.
Worship is our ritual way of expressing our love for God through Christ in the Holy Spirit. Our love for God is not to turn Jesus into an idol to be worshiped, but to unite us with a living God whose love we share. Jesus actually wants to step aside if you will, so that the Holy Spirit can unite us with the Father as he was united to the Father. Jesus wants to stand as an example of what it means for us to live in the fullness of the Spirit. He does not want our worship to idolize him in a way that blocks our own growth in the Holy Spirit.
In the gospel today, it seems that Jesus wants to step aside so that we can have the same direct relationship with God he had in the Holy Spirit. Here it may be helpful to make a distinction between Jesus as a historical person and “The Christ”, who was the Spirit-God who dwelt in Jesus, but who existed before Jesus and after Jesus’ death in the infinite-eternity of God.
As the Holy Spirit enlivened the disciples in our first reading, so are we to be enlivened to be God’s Word as Jesus was. We are now to be Christ to the world. Here is where we want to become like St. Paul who says, “It is not I who lives, but Christ who lives in me.”
Let us pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit. Let us ask God to send his Holy Spirit upon us that we may be Christ today, and in that loving union with God, fulfill our call to love Christ in all things as Jesus did in his time among us.
Lord Jesus Christ, intercede for us. Ask the Father to send the Holy Spirit upon us that we may be one with you, sharing in the fullness of God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.