Friends
Peace be with you.
In a previous assignment that I’ve talked about a couple of times in my homilies, I was the pastor of six parishes in six small towns in two counties in north central Iowa. It was a challenging assignment for many reasons, not the least of which were the expectations with which I walked into the assignment. I had been taking a Catholic leadership training course for pastors called Good Leaders, Good Shepherds that was all about building unity around common purpose and setting forth a vision of leadership. I walked in believing that my goal was to get these six parishes to work together, to move towards being a cluster rather than a loose grouping of six parishes, and possibly one day to even get them to a point where they would agree to being one corporate parish with multiple church buildings in multiple towns. It sounded great in my mind but not so much in other people’s minds. There was a great deal of resistance to this change that I hoped would decrease over time and that we would be able to work together. We made it to the point of officially being a cluster but, even when that process was finished, I could see the dream of being one parish with multiple church buildings was going to remain just that; a dream. When I was reassigned, I found some time to reflect upon the experience and I realized something that may sound rather shocking to you all: throughout the whole experience I really don’t think I asked God if that type of unity was his will. I asked for help in accomplishing what I wanted to get done and I asked for forgiveness and healing for those who were struggling to accept the changes that were happening but I don’t remember asking what God’s will was.
Today is Pentecost. Both the first reading and the gospel describe an imparting of the Holy Spirit on the apostles. And both have fascinating details surrounding that imparting. However, they also have messages that I think may help us today, given the community division that was, once again, laid open this past week between our two schools. I want to admit my own part in this division. Recently I made some remarks in a homily that were hurtful and divisive and I am sorry for them. I am sorry for the people directly affected by them and the people indirectly affected by them. They are my own fault and no explanation or excuses can undo the hurt or harm they have caused. It was foolish and all I can do is say I’m sorry.
As I was reading the readings for today, there were two interrelated messages that kept jumping out at me. The first has to do with what is traditionally acknowledged as the Pentecost event described in the first reading. As you may remember from last week, the disciples were locked in a room awaiting power from on high from the Holy Spirit. When it comes, there are tongues as of fire above them and they are filled with the Holy Spirit. What was the first thing that the Holy Spirit did? She gave them the power to communicate to people in their own language. If you have ever had an experience of being the only person who speaks English in a situation where you need help, you know how important a common language is. It’s easy to be suspicious of people if they are speaking a different language that you don’t understand. Had the Apostles gone running to the Parthians and started speaking in Aramaic, the Parthians probably wouldn’t have understood. But, because of the Holy Spirit, the apostles are given the ability to speak Parthian to them. You see, it had to be God in the third person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit, giving them a common language to speak to each other that caused a kind of reconciliation of evangelization. Had they tried five minutes before to evangelize the people, it wouldn’t have worked. God had to do the work, and when he does it’s so much better than anything they would have asked for or imagined. They didn’t come up with the SMART Goals to learn multiple languages. God gave the gift of communication that allowed them to bridge the divisions.
The other message that came through to me was when Jesus gave them the Holy Spirit on Easter. Now, you may ask why the Holy Spirit came to them on Pentecost when Jesus had breathed on them and said “Receive the Holy Spirit” on Easter. From the context of passages, it appears that the Holy Spirit was breathed out to the Apostles on Easter for the specific purpose to that specific group of people who can offer the forgiveness of sins. Whereas, at Pentecost, the Spirit is given to everyone to empower us all to evangelize. So, focusing on the gift of the Holy Spirit at Easter, for the forgiveness of sins, most people see this as the beginning and empowerment of priests and bishops for the sacramental forgiveness of sins in Reconciliation. However, something stuck out to me. Jesus contrasts forgiveness with retention. He says “Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them and whose sins you retain are retained.” The opposite of forgiveness is retention. We have all probably said we have forgiven someone but retained a lot of hatred toward them. Sometimes this is more of a survival mechanism built into us to protect us from being hurt again. The survivors of clergy sexual abuse say they will probably never forget what happened to them. They want to forgive the person because they know that the hatred and anger they are holding onto is just hurting them and not the person who abused them. But, they were hurt and that is never easy to let go. In small towns, there are a lot of hurts. Between the schools, there are a lot of hurts. In our families, there are a lot of hurts. In our workplaces, there are a lot of hurts. Even in our church, there is a lot of hurt. On this Pentecost, please pray with me that the Holy Spirit empowers us to do what we can’t do on our own: to stop retaining the hurt so that we can be a people of reconciled diverse unity.
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