Devotion for today: Lord, send down your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth

Today is the great feast of Pentecost.

Scripture for meditation: Acts 2:1-4
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 there appeared to them tongues as of fire distributing themselves, and they rested on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit was giving them utterance.

Scripture for reflection: Joel 2:28-32

And afterward, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy,  your old men will dream dreams,  your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women,
I will pour out my Spirit in those days.  I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved;
for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be deliverance, as the Lord has said, even among the survivors whom the Lord calls.

Pentecost Graces: Holy Church at this time celebrates the sending of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, who received him in a  most interior manner. It  was necessary for our sakes that they should make such a beginning of a new existence, for we are by their means to receive the same divine gift. And it was good that they should be comforted, for they had languished comfortless and forsaken within and without. And it finally came to pass, that as long as they continued in this life,  the disciples constantly grew into deeper union with the Holy Spirit. So should every true friend of God celebrate this lovely festival every day he lives, yes, every day  and every hour should he receive the Holy Spirit in his soul. The whole task  of his life is to prepare a loving welcome for him. And his coming again and again continuously fits the soul better and better for his ever-renewed entrance. As Pentecost day was the festival of the Holy Spirit’s being sent to the disciples, so is every day of the year a Pentecost day to each Christian. If he will but thoroughly prepare his soul, the divine Spirit will enter in with all his graces and gifts….(Father John Tauler, O.P. as taken from The Magnificat, May, 2010)

 Prayer: Veni, Sancte Spiritus

Come, Holy Spirit,

send forth the heavenly

radiance of your light.

Come, father of the poor,

come, giver of gifts,

come, light of the heart.

Greatest comforter,

sweet guest of the soul,

sweet consolation.

In labor, rest,

in heat, temperance,

in tears, solace.

O most blessed light,

fill the inmost heart

of your faithful.

Without your grace,

there is nothing in us,

nothing that is not harmful.

Cleanse that which is unclean,

water that which is dry,

heal that which is wounded.

Bend that which is inflexible,

fire that which is chilled,

correct what goes astray.

Give to your faithful,

those who trust in you,

the sevenfold gifts.

Grant the reward of virtue,

grant the deliverance of salvation,

grant eternal joy.

My thoughts: Happy Birthday, Catholic Church! Today is a very special, holy and happy day. Today Christ’s disciples received the Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Holy Trinity, the gift promised by Jesus himself when he told his disciples that he would not leave them orphaned. Jesus said that he must go so that the Holy Spirit could come. In the Old Testament we see God the Father as the dominant presence in the lives of his chosen people. In the New Testament we see God the Son in the flesh, teaching all men how to enter the kingdom. Now, in the modern age, we have the Holy Spirit, leading and guiding the Church. God has never abandoned us. This is the time prophesied by Joel. This is the age of the Holy Spirit. Let him into your soul to “fire that which is chilled” and “bend that which is inflexible.” Do as Father John Tauler tells us, and  thoroughly prepare your soul, so that the Divine Spirit will enter in with all his graces and gifts.