Pentecost Year A

Gospel Reading: John 20: 19-23

19 In the evening of that same day, the first day of the week, the doors were closed in the room where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews. Jesus came and stood among them. He said to them, "Peace be with you,"

20 and showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were filled with joy when they saw the Lord,

21 and he said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father sent me, so am I sending you."

22 After saying this he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit.

23 For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; for those whose sins you retain, they are retained."

Meditation

The Mass of Pentecost has two accounts of the sending of the Holy Spirit, one from the Acts and one from St John's gospel. Don't combine the two accounts in your meditation. Each in its own way is true, in the sense that it helps us recognise moments when God sent his Spirit into us, as individuals or as a community. Sometimes it happens in extraordinary ways, and at other times it happens in quite ordinary ways.

I am inviting you to meditate on the gospel account. It is less spectacular than the one in the Acts, but no less true.

In verse 19 imagine well how the disciples felt as they gathered in the room on that Easter Sunday evening; you will feel then the drama of Jesus' entry. Read it as a sending of the Spirit.

In order to interpret verse 20 let your memories explain for you the meaning of Jesus' showing his hands and his side.

Verse 21 has very little for the imagination, so you must make an effort to enter into it. It speaks of two sendings:

Jesus sent by the Father, which we know from the New Testament;

we sent by Jesus, which we know from experience.

Let the two shed light on each other.

Read verse 22 by itself, entering into the symbolism of Jesus' breathing on the disciples.

Prayer 

Lord, we celebrate today our personal Pentecosts:

we were going through a difficult time:

a relationship had broken down;

a movement we had given ourselves to disintegrated because of internal conflicts;

our prayer life was totally dry.

We turned in on ourselves, afraid to meet others lest we had to relate with them.

Then quite suddenly something happened:

friends came and shared their journey with us;

we went on a retreat and had a deep sense of being loved;

we were invited to join a group who shared our values.

It was as if Jesus had come through the closed doors of the room we were in, stood with us and said, "Peace be with you."

"The moment we cease to hold each other, the moment we break faith with one another, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out." James Baldwin

Lord, humanity today is deeply divided. Groups of people have cut themselves off, afraid to mix with others lest they lose their identity.

Send us people like Jesus who will

pass through the locked doors,

stand among others, share their own humanity,

and say "Peace be with you."

"Why can't Christians see the poor wounded part inside themselves? Can they not see Jesus there?" Carl Jung

Lord, we spend so much energy denying our hurts,

hiding the marks of the nails in our hands and the deep wounds in our sides.

Give us the grace to look with compassion at the truth of ourselves, like the disciples letting Jesus show them his hands and his side, so that we may be at peace.

"It is not as if we had a high priest who was incapable of feeling our weaknesses with us; but we have one who has been tempted in every way that we are, though he is without sin." Hebrews 4:15

Lord, you sent your Son Jesus as one of us.

He shared the weaknesses of the human condition,

he knew uncertainty and anxiety about the future,

he was limited to living in one culture and in one period of history.

Help us, Lord, to accept that as you sent Jesus so he sent us.

Lord, the modern world knows many ways of influencing others:

advertising;

the power of weapons;

aggressive argumentation which forces others to agree.

Forgive us, Lord, that we followers of Jesus use these methods in preaching his message.

Teach us to trust in his power -

love, gentle as breath, the kind that leaves others free and creative,

and comes from the very depths of our selves.

One day St Catherine of Sienna had a strange experience: Jesus came to her and removed her physical heart saying: "I am giving you my heart so that you can go on living with it forever."

Lord, lead us to deep union with your Son Jesus, let him breathe into us, so that when we breathe he is breathing in us, and when we love, he is loving in us.

Lord, we remember with gratitude the times when a priest of the Church forgave our sins and we knew that they were forgiven.

Lord, we remember parts of the world that are torn by civil strife - the Middle East , Northern Ireland , Sudan.

So many sins of the past are being retained because they are retaining them.

We pray that they may forgive one another and so their sins may be truly forgiven.