We heard from St. Paul that it is in this
one Spirit that we were all baptized into one body. “Now you are the body of
Christ,” Paul says, “and individually members of it.” This turns out to be a
place of risk, unpredictability, and beyond our control. Wholeness is a matter of
many different parts all being themselves and doing their jobs. Only
gradually we come to discover that unity and diversity are not contradictory
terms: our survival as bodies depends not on the sameness of our members but on
their variety, their differences. When it
comes to the Body of Christ that we are, it is only the Spirit of Pentecost
that creates and renews the intricate cooperation required to keep the Body
alive and well.
But, truth be told, this is a place of risk, unpredictability, and where we are not in
control. The problem begins with the concrete reality that we find ourselves in
a community with a bunch of other people who look, think, talk, and act
differently than we do. In a monastic
community, for example, a microcosm of the Church as a whole, we join a
community looking for—what?—closeness, support, some measure of safety—and nine
times out of ten what we get instead is this holy struggle to live and work
with people who are just as angular as we are. There are moments that would persuade us that community is
“that place where the person you least want to live with always lives!” (Ironically,
we may suddenly realize that usually turns out to be ourselves!)
May this feast of Pentecost inspire us this
morning to give ourselves over to the working of the Holy Spirit in the “open
spaces” in our lives, especially in spaces of risk, unpredictability and where
we are not in control. That gives the Holy Spirit plenty of room in which to
work! On a very practical level, what better way is there to open ourselves up
to the God beyond our knowing than to begin with the brother (or sister) beyond
our knowing, who is a fellow-member of the Body of Christ? What finer way to
learn about the reconciling power of Christ that we’ve been celebrating this
Eastertide than to test it in a body of infinite variety? The Holy Spirit, the
Consoler, the Advocate, is also the one who desires to set us on fire with
love, to transform our lives in Truth, and turn our world upside down with the
Good News of Jesus Christ risen, glorified and abiding with us always.
Excerpts from Father Dominic's homily for Pentecost Sunday.