Tag Archives: Pentecost

Pentecost and the Three Conversions

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The first Christian Pentecost was a feast of fulfillment.  It was, in a very real sense, a graduation ceremony in which twelve simple men from various walks of life became prophets, preachers, priest, prodigies, and polygots.  A feast of fulfillment because they became what they were destined to be.  Removed some 2000 years from Pentecost, it is, for us, a feast of possibility.  The Holy Spirit is ever ready to pour out His power on each and every believer.  The problem though is that the average believer is not ready to receive His power.  Part of the reason for this is that we view Pentecost as an isolated event; a miracle for sure but not magical.  The Apostles were ready to receive the fullness of the Holy Spirit and in so doing, left for us a model of preparation that we need to follow.

Protestants would have us to believe that union with the Holy Spirit comes about through faith, that is, by a single moment of conversion.  Sacred Scripture and the Mystical Doctors of the Church teach otherwise.  They teach, each in his or her own way, that three conversions are necessary for union with the Holy Spirit.  One of them, St. Catherine of Siena, shows how the Spiritual life of the Apostles reveals the content of these three conversions which culminate in the fullness of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost.

As in all activity, our spiritual lives are marked by three levels of maturity—beginners, proficients, and perfected.  These three stages are clearly delineated in the Scriptural account of the lives of the Apostles and therefore serve as a model for each of us.  St. Catherine in her Dialogue traces each of the three conversions of St. Peter and enables us to see some of the qualities of each in order to facilitate our own growth towards union with God.

St. Peter and the Three Conversions

The first conversion happens when St. Peter acknowledges he is “a sinful man” and Our Lord promises to make him a “fisher of men”.  From that point forward, St. Peter set out on what St. John of the Cross calls the Purgative Way.  This is the most active of the stages in that we must, under the instigation of actual grace, remove all the obstacles to true growth.  For St. Peter, this purgative stage lasts almost the entirety of the pre-Passion and Resurrection accounts in the gospels.  It also helps to explain why St. Peter shows such incredible flashes of sanctity while also being called “Satan”.  St. Peter will remain in this stage until he is no longer scandalized by suffering and is willing to mortify himself completely.  Even during the Trial of Jesus, he keeps the suffering Christ at a distance and therefore fails to admit to even knowing Him.  He loves Jesus, but not more than he loves himself. 

It is just after the three-fold denial that St. Peter experiences his second conversion.  When Our Lord gazes upon Him just after his third denial, He receives the grace of deep sorrow for his sin.  St. Peter’s second conversion occurs when he has him “come to Jesus” with Our Lord on the shore of the Sea of Galilea with his three-fold affirmation of his love for Jesus.  In loving Our Lord “more than these” St. Peter is no longer deterred nor scandalized by the fact that he will have to suffer.  Each of his affirmations, according to Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange, marks each of the three distinct motives for the second conversion.  We find the juxtaposition of the two Greek words for love—love of friendship (philia) and love of God (agape)—in the dialogue to mark the rooting out of all traces of self-love by a desire for Divine friendship and filial love of God.  Secondly, Peter is aware of the great price of Christ’s Blood.  Third is the love of souls that need to be saved in his desire to “feed my sheep.” 

Furthermore, he must first go through the Night of the Spirit where he no longer is aware of Christ’s continual presence.  He only “feels” His presence on a few occasions and loses it completely when Our Lord ascends into Heaven.  Just as in the transition from the first conversion to the second there must be a purgation of the sense, a purgation of the spirit must be undergone in order to pave the way for the third conversion.  It would seem that the Apostles were on the fast track in that they only had to endure the Night of the Spirit for 50 days, until we put ourselves in their sandals and realize how painful it must have been for them.  They had spent three and a half years, day in and day out, with the constant awareness of God’s physical presence.

All of this leads up to the third conversion on the day of Pentecost.  Our Lord had meticulously been leading St. Peter to this moment when he would be united to God in the fullest sense possible on Earth.  He still was not perfected, but he was closely yoked to God in the Unitive Stage.  What we need to focus on is that Pentecost was not just an isolated event in their spiritual journey but the culmination of it.  He, along with the other Apostles, received the Holy Spirit because they were ready for it. 

All of this talk of the need for a “New Pentecost” is really a call for more saints who have the courage to set out through the Dark Nights and to be so purified as to become completely united to the Holy Spirit.  Without the proper preparation work this “New Pentecost” will never happen.  With the path of the threefold conversion the Apostles have left us along with the instructions of the great Mystical Doctors of the Church, we “shall renew the face of the earth”  and share in the fruits of the same Pentecost that marked the birth of the Church.

Restoring the Kingdom

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Just prior to Our Lord’s Ascension, the disciples ask Him about the coming of the Messianic Kingdom; “Lord, will you at this time restore the Kingdom to Israel?” He responds rather cryptically, saying “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samar′ia and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:7-8).  Many people read this answer as a non-answer, a dismissal of sorts because the Apostles were asking the wrong question.  It is usually followed up by a comment as to just how clueless the Apostles still were even after spending their 40-day bonus round with Our Lord.  But it is not the Apostles that were clueless, but us.

Notice first, that the Apostles were expecting Jesus to restore the kingdom to Israel.  Having had “their minds opened to understand the Scriptures,” (Luke 24:45) the Apostles understood that the Christ would restore the kingdom to Israel.  Their question is not if, but when.  This is no dodge or redirection, but about the most direct answer He can give.  The restoration of the kingdom to Israel will occur when they “receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” that is, on Pentecost.

The Meaning of Pentecost

For us to grasp this, we need to first understand the meaning of the Jewish feast of Pentecost.  Fifty days after the first Passover, the People of Israel “came into the wilderness of Sinai” (Ex 19:1).  It was there that Moses ascended Mt Sinai and brought the Torah to the people.  This giving of the law that governs Israel marks the birth of Israel as a People.  The Feast of Weeks, as it was known, was instituted to mark this event and was one of the three great Jewish feasts, when “all males shall appear in the sight of almighty God” (Ex 34:23).  This feast was also known by its Greek name, Pentecost.  This is what St. Luke was referring to when he mentions that the disciples were all gathered in one place “When the day of Pentecost had come” this is the feast that he is referring to” (Luke 2:1). 

The Feast of Weeks was also the Feast of Reaping (c.f. Deut 16:9-11) to offer to God the first fruits of the Wheat Harvest.  This helps to explain the abundant harvest of the 3000 souls that the Apostles reaped on that day, 50 days after the Divine grain of wheat became standing grain (c.f. Deut 16:9).  The harvest of 3000 souls also ties back to those who, while God was giving Moses the Law, worshipped the Golden Calf and were punished by death (Exodus 32:28). 

Pentecost then is the “time the Father has fixed” for the restoration of the kingdom to Israel.  This restoration occurs when the Jewish Feast of Weeks finds its fulfillment in the Christian Pentecost.  Jesus, the New Moses, ascended to Mount Zion, and God gives the New Law.  This New Law is not written on stone, but on our hearts by the Finger of God’s Right Hand (i.e. the Holy Spirit, c.f. Veni Creator Spiritus).  Just as in the giving of the Law to Moses, it is accompanied by a mighty wind and flashes of fire (c.f. Ex 19:18 and Acts 2:2-3). 

Because the Jews were obligated by Divine precept to travel to Jerusalem for the Feast of Weeks, “there were devout Jews from every nation” (Acts 2:5) to show the universality of the restored Kingdom.  But it also has unity as reflected by the fact that all present heard Peter in their own tongue.  God undoes the disunity that was created at Babel by uniting all mankind under the Tower of Peter, the house built upon the Rock.  This restored Kingdom then bears four marks: Unity, Holiness, Catholicity, and Apostolicity.

Therefore, Just as the People of Israel found its birth at Sinai on the 50th day after Passover, the People of the New Israel finds its birth on Pentecost, on the 50th day after the new Passover.  Our Lord restored the Kingdom to Israel on that day, the same day that we celebrate the birth of the Church.  This link created by Our Lord in his response to the Apostles’ question between the Ascension and Pentecost helps to maintain the inseparable link between Israel and the Church.  The new Israel formed from a remnant of the Israel of Old (c.f. Is 10:20-22) will be gathered together by the Messiah.  All such promises made to Israel are taken up and fulfilled in the Church.  This connection also maintains the necessity that the Church be both universal (catholic) and united from within a visible structure.   

The Power of Pentecost

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Within the Jewish Liturgical Year, there were seven major feasts, three of which were considered “major feasts” and were commanded as times when the males were to “appear before the Lord God” in Jerusalem (c.f. Exodus 23:14-17).  These three major feasts were the feast of Unleavened Bread, the feast of the Ingathering at the end of the year, and the harvest festival.  The Harvest festival, or the Feast of Weeks was to occur on the fiftieth day after Passover (there was some disagreement among the Pharisees and Sadducees as to when the actual feast was to be celebrated).  In later antiquity, it would come to be as Pentecost (Greek for “fiftieth”) by the Greek-speaking Jews.  It was for the celebration of this feast that many Jews from throughout the world (Parthians, Medes, Mesopotamian, Egyptians, etc. as listed in Acts 2:9-10) had gathered when the Holy Spirit was finally manifest on that day.

This helps to explain why so many were gathered on that day in Jerusalem to witness the power from on high, but it does not necessarily explain why it had to be that feast day.  In other words, why was it that the Jewish Feast of Weeks found its fulfillment on Pentecost?

A word first about the concept of “fulfillment.”  When we hear this term used, there is a tendency to think “it had to happen that day in order to fulfill the meaning of Pentecost.”  In short, we can think that the purpose of Pentecost was to fulfill the Feast of Weeks.  Thinking in these terms there is a danger of thinking that the Feast of Weeks is obsolete and now only Pentecost matters.  Properly understood though we should attempt to see things the other way around.  The purpose of the Feast of Weeks was to make Pentecost understandable.  It may no longer be efficacious, but it is not devoid of meaning.  God was so demanding in the rubrics surrounding the Jewish liturgy because He wanted them to act as clear signs of the thing they were pointing to.  The Jews gathered in Jerusalem on Pentecost would have recognized what was happening and were instantly moved upon hearing Peter’s explanation.  But Pentecost was not just for them.  By deepening our own understanding of the Feast of Weeks, we can enter more fully into the celebration and join those first Christians in being “cut to the heart.”

This challenge of deepening our understanding of the Jewish celebrations is echoed in the Catechism:

A better knowledge of the Jewish people’s faith and religious life as professed and lived even now can help our better understanding of certain aspects of Christian liturgy…The relationship between Jewish liturgy and Christian liturgy, but also their differences in content, are particularly evident in the great feasts of the liturgical year, such as Passover. Christians and Jews both celebrate the Passover. For Jews, it is the Passover of history, tending toward the future; for Christians, it is the Passover fulfilled in the death and Resurrection of Christ, though always in expectation of its definitive consummation. (CCC 1096, emphasis added)

In ancient Israel, the Feast of Weeks was a harvest festival in which loaves of bread were offered to the Lord as a gift of the first fruits (a minor Jewish festival celebrated just after the Feast of Unleavened Bread).  It was accompanied by sacred rest and sacrifices (see Num 28:26-31).  It was by the death of the grains of wheat, the first fruits of the wheat that the bread was to be baked.   This grain then takes on the value of a sign of the One Whom “God raised up” (Acts 2:32).  As the definitive sacrifice, He ascended to heaven where God received Him and showed His approval by pouring out His Spirit by a strongly felt sign (Acts 2:33).  Rising on the day after Passover, that is the feast of first fruits, Christ is “the first fruits of those who have died” (1Cor 15:20).

The Feast of Weeks

By this powerful sign, the Apostles now become the harvesters.  And on this day, the harvest is great, drawing 3000 souls to the Lord.  This number is far from arbitrary and it would immediately bring to mind the other aspect of the Feast of Weeks, namely that it was to be marked as a time to remember the giving of the Law on Mt. Sinai.

While God was giving the Law to Moses, the Israelites fashioned the Golden Calf.  In response, the Levites were commanded “’Each of you put your sword on your hip! Go back and forth through the camp, from gate to gate, and kill your brothers, your friends, your neighbors!’ The Levites did as Moses had commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people fell” (Ex 32:27-28).  Spiritually inebriated, the Apostles, that is the priestly successors to the Levites, will put to death the flesh of those 3000 souls, each of which will follow the law because it is written not in stone, but on their hearts (Jer 31:33).

The giving of the Law was the initiation of the Old Covenant.  This indwelling of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of the Faithful that will become the sign of the new Covenant, that is Baptism.  Those who are claimed for Christ, the 3000, do as Peter told them— “repent and be baptized” so that they “will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38).

The giving of the Law as part of the Old Covenant also formed Israel as the People of God—that is the visible Kingdom of God on earth.  At Pentecost, the Church becomes the Kingdom of God that is open to all people.  This understanding helps bring clarity to the somewhat random question and ambiguous response Our Lord gives to the Apostles when, just prior to His Ascension, they ask “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” to which He replies that they will “receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you” (Acts 1:6,8).

The Spirit of Pentecost

All of this remains mere proof-texting unless we allow the effects of Pentecost to be felt in our day.  So many within the Church speak of waiting for a “New Pentecost” in which the power of the Holy Spirit will be made manifest once again.  But there will be no “New Pentecost” because Pentecost was not a single event, but one that was to last perpetually.  The Jews celebrated the different festivals not merely to remind them of the past, but to make the past somehow present to them so that they could participate in it.  The Feast of Weeks was a time for recalling and renewing the Old Covenant and Pentecost ought to be a time that we consciously renew our participation in the New Covenant.

The first way that this should be done is through a renewed focus on our baptismal commitment to offer spiritual sacrifices unceasingly to Christ.  Likewise, we should renew our commitment to the graces of Confirmation, that is when we received the fullness of the Holy Spirit, and march to the Front in the battle to win souls.  Offering Mass for the grace to live those two Pentecostal Sacraments to their fullest would be a worthy intention.

Pentecost is often referred to as the birthday of the Church.  With this in mind, a second way to live Pentecost is to do what we all do at all birthday celebrations—show gratitude for the gift of the person and offer a gift to pay our debt of gratitude.  We can often take for granted the gift of the Church and how much easier it makes our lives.  Yes, we have to deal with the human elements, that is the weeds among the wheat, but the guidance that her teaching office gives us can save us from making a lot of mistakes.  She speaks to nearly every aspect of our lives and offers us a sure port amidst the storms of life.  Amidst a culture in which we are “tossed to and fro by every wave of false doctrine,” there is great comfort knowing we have a place to go for the Truth.  By renewing our efforts to form ourselves in her teachings, to be docile to the truth and proclaim it loudly, we can pay the debt of our gratitude.  We are the new harvesters in the long line of harvesters known as the Communion of Saints.  Pray then, this Pentecost, that the Master of the Harvest will send more out into the fields, priests, and laity alike.