Dear Brothers and Sisters,
With today’s feast we end the season of Easter, which is the most important event of the year. It is so important to us that we do not live it only the whole night with a vigil, but it lasts for fifty days, and it ends with the feast of Pentecost and the Easter candle is extinguished. The Easter candle will not be lit until Easter of next year, except for funerals and baptisms. The candle has been lit for these fifty days symbolizing the love of God for us and for our lives.
The Holy Spirit comes today and if you are baptized you already have him. The Holy Spirit is in me even when I sin and he helps me not so much to not sin, but he helps me realize that I have sinned and I need to confess. He helps me to see that I love myself and I do not love the other. The Holy Spirit helps me when he hear those words of absolution: God, the Father of mercy, through the death and resurrection of your Son has reconciled the world to himself and poured out the Holy Spirit for the forgiveness of sins. Through the mystery of the Church may God grant you pardon and peace, and I absolve you from your sins, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
When I hear these words in the sacrament of Reconciliation, I feel like a new person. People sometimes say, Father, do I owe you something for this confession? I say, no, nothing! It is a free gift of God. The Holy Spirit seals you and makes it known that you have been forgiven. How wonderful that is. The Protestants confess at home in their bedroom, and I am sure that God forgives them, but how do they know that? God forgives us all, but when you confess in the sacrament the sense of being forgiven stays with you. This is what I have experienced when I go to the sacrament of Reconciliation. Never have I met a priest that gives me a beating and there were times when I could have used one. There was always a wise piece of advice, maybe a little slap. I always felt forgiven, and it helped me to know myself better.
The Holy Spirit is like a little dove, not a silly pigeon like the ones on the streets of NYC. It is not some glass thing that can easily break if we sin. The Holy Spirit was sent to the disciples when they were locked up in fear of the Jews, in fear of their sins, not wanting to mention the name of Jesus. They were closed in on themselves, stuck in a deep selfishness, as you are today, perhaps. You are locked inside yourself, out of fear of dying, unable to love the other, because loving the other means I may die. He might kill me or because his personality is so difficult or so contrary to mine. You do the same thing with your spouse, and you try to impose your way of thinking on her. No one approaches you because you are arrogant. Pride repels and humility attracts. If you are humble people will come to you, and they will even prostrate themselves before you. The one who wants to be first will be the last and servant of all.
The greatest fruit of the Holy Spirit is to love. This is the most important thing. From love the other fruits of the Spirit will follow joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, etc. But the greatest fruit is Love. Love is not possible if the Holy Spirit does not give it to you. All these gifts cannot be earned. You do not have to do anything to attain them. It is a gift that God gives to the one who wants and asks repeatedly for him. There are seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. They are wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety and fear of the Lord. These seven gifts sprout from Baptism since we receive the Holy Spirit in Baptism. He is not a silly pigeon. His fundamental mission to love and to teach us to love. We heard today that no one can say Jesus is Lord, unless he has the Holy Spirit.
This is the only mission the Holy Spirit has in your life. I don’t know if he has already fulfilled this mission in your life. It is not to just say the words that Jesus is my Lord, but to say it by the way you live your life. Are you saying with your actions that Jesus is your Lord? Does it mean that he dominates your life, that he is alive and has power over you, that he is risen and is the only one who can bring you out of your slaveries? These are things that can only be done by the Lord. He can do them because he has defeated death, has dominion over your sorrows, your selfishness, your idols. Jesus Christ has this power because he is the Lord. This is the fundamental work that Jesus does with all of us.
Jesus also says to his apostles, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” He says this to the apostles and disciples because they are bishops or priests, and they will be able sacramentally to forgive sins. He says this also to you: you can forgive sins, yes, yes. Have you forgiven your husband, your father-in-law, your wife? Have you forgiven those who have not forgiven you? Have you forgiven your father? Who do you withhold forgiveness from?
It is the Holy Spirit that gives us the power to forgive sins so that you know what you have received today. The Lord wants you to forgive the sins that tie you up. In another passage he says what you bind on earth will be bound in heaven; what you untie on earth will be untied in heaven. Untie the anger that you have today; your judgements, the one you wronged, etc.
I see sad faces today, sad faces, hard, afflicted, as hard as those dry bones we heard about from Ezekiel. Is there something else that is as lifeless as a dry bone? The Lord can give them life. He preached over them. The bones came together, the sinews and the flesh came upon them, then the muscles and the skin covered them. The dry bones can even talk so if today you are dry because of your sins for this is what our sins do; they dry up our life. Brothers and sisters, if you are listening to the Word of God, to the preaching, it is shaping you, waking you, giving you tendons. This is not a show or something magical. No, no, today the Holy Spirit descends. Let us ask repeatedly for the Spirit to come, come, come and help me.
Somehow the Holy Spirit helped me to return to the Church almost fifty years ago. I was not asking for anything, but I met a group of young me who had a great zeal and I never saw this before. I made a commitment soon after that to stay single and serve the Lord. My family thought I was nuts. They did not understand anything.
The Holy Spirit is here today. Let’s see who gets it, who wants it. Allow the Spirit to rest upon you as it rested upon Jesus at his baptism. The Holy Spirit is amazing because he is the interior master that leads us when we least expect it. He will guide you and gives you the certainty of God’s love. He gives you an impressive joy and you are in wonder where it came from. Why do I have this joy today? Yesterday I felt alone, old and sick and today I am filled with joy. He draws out of us but doesn’t take anything from us. He works calmly, normally and with simplicity.
He is like the gentle breeze where Elijah heard Yahweh at Mount Horeb. He didn’t hear him in the earthquake or the hurricane or the fire. He heard him in the gentle breeze, a soft wind, almost imperceptible. There he found the Lord. What is gentle breeze that we have here today? It is the Eucharist. It is so sweet so suave that God is using to save us today from the darkness of the world. God is here giving life to all men and where are those men? You are here in this imperceptible breeze.
Courage, brothers, I wish the Lord will transform us with the help of the Holy Spirit because without that help we cannot do anything. The Holy Spirit is the love between the Father and the Son. The creed says it proceeds from the Father and the Son. It is the marvelous love between the Father and the Son that gives rise to the Holy Spirit. Let us forgive today and love one another as Christ has loved us. May we experience today this power that comes from the Lord.