Penecost homily

James Caldwell: This is the Manly Catholic, the podcast that calls you out of the shadows and into the fight. Here we forge men into warriors for Christ, husbands, fathers, and leaders who refuse to kneel to the modern world's lies. No more passivity, no more excuses, no more lukewarm faith. This is your battle crowd, your call to arms. The time for weakness is over. It's time to fight. Welcome to the Manly Catholic. Let's get to work. The name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. As we celebrate this great solemnity of Pentecost, we enter into the end of the fifty day celebration, for that's what Pentecost means in Greek, fifty. So we kicked off the Easter season with the Easter celebration of the resurrection, and so we celebrate as Christians for fifty days. So longest celebration in the Catholic Church. 50 days of celebrating Easter. And then we end today on Pentecost. Have you seen that ending the power of the resurrection? We know that. For celebrating 50 days of Easter, we call to mind the power of the resurrection every day when we wake up from sleep. It's a resurrection day. And then we ask the Holy Spirit to be with us. And so that's what we celebrate today. Today we celebrate remembering that we have. A great gift of God, for the Holy Spirit is God. It is the Spirit of God. And we have the Spirit of God in us. And so today we're reminded of that. And then we're also reminded of a prayer that we need to offer up to our Heavenly Father. Fill me with your Holy Spirit every day. Every day. And we'll get to why that's important and what that looks like in just a minute. I remember listening to a philosopher, Catholic philosopher, and he said, What we need in today's day and age are not necessarily more educated philosophers in theology, though we do need them. He says, in today's day and age, what we need is we need to lay people of the church to be on fire. We need witnesses. We need you. We need you. Witnesses are very powerful. Someone's actions that display The power of Christ, someone who is full of peace and joy and happiness and justice, someone knows someone who knows how to act rightly with virtue, filled with the gifts and the spirit of the Holy Spirit. Someone who is a witness is very powerful. In Greek, witnesses is martyr. And we have a lot in that communion of saints, don't we? We have a lot of witnesses filled with the Holy Spirit who did not back down but proclaim the love of Christ, even if it c even if it cost the spilling of his or her blood. And we have all kinds of martyrs, don't we? Young, old, married, priests, bishops, nuns. All kinds. of martyrs that give witness to the power of of Christ, power of the Holy Spirit, power of the most holy Trinity. So when someone asks you, you're a Catholic, right? Tell me about this Holy Spirit thing. What would you say? What would you say? What are some words that come to mind? I think words might be a good place to start if someone asks, hey, tell me about the Holy Spirit. What words come to mind when you think of the Holy Spirit? Fire? Symbols maybe, dove, water. We have all kinds of symbols of the Holy Spirit. Words. One that comes to my mind is action. Why? Why does that come to mind? Well, maybe some of you had a deep experience of Christ in your life that transforms you, and and that's all you want to talk about. I mean, that's a witness. So when someone asks me about my faith, the only thing that I can talk about really or start with is when I encounter the Lord, He changed my life. And I've I've talked to you about that a little bit to be a witness about that at 28. God came crashing into my life and changed me completely. Another good image of the Holy Spirit is quenching one's thirst. When I think of that, I think of the great prophet Ezekiel. One of my favorite chapters in the Bible, chapter 37. We all know it. It's the valley of the dry bones. When I lived my life without God, thinking that I was God, making my own rules, doing what I wanted to do when I wanted to do it, ignoring God, that's what I was. All I was was just a bag of dry bones. When God came crashing into my life and I gave my life to Him, just like in that great reading, God in front of Ezekiel and these dry bones did what? He put on sinew, muscle, flesh, blood, ⁓ organs, and then what? They weren't alive until the breath of God fell upon them. The breath of God. I was filled with the breath of God and he gave me life. I was no longer. Dried bones, but someone who is eager to bring the Holy Spirit to everyone I met, and so it is with us too. And that's the meaning of our lives, isn't it? And so when we think about the breath of God, when we think about the Holy Spirit, we can turn to scripture. Our readings today are full of that. Our first reading talks about unity. Holy Spirit fell upon the apostles and disciples, our first bishops and priests. Mary was there amongst them. And then what did they do? They proclaimed the mighty acts of God. Action. Every time we hear about the Holy Spirit, we experience the Holy Spirit, there's always an action associated with that, isn't there? Think about baptism. The sacraments are full of the Holy Spirit. The sacraments are like engines, and the Holy Spirit is like gas. A dumb analogy, maybe, but I work like working on engines, so that's the first thing that came to my mind. Well, think about baptism. Jesus works through the priests, and then the priest says, I baptize you in the name of the Father and the Son and the, and then there's an action that happens right after that. Only when the Holy Spirit is mentioned, then there's the act. Original sin is wiped away. Amazing. There's an action behind that. Well, think about confession, the priest absolving you of your sins, Jesus working through the through the priest, he says, I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father and the Son and the And then there's the action of your sins being wiped away. The Holy Spirit is pure act, it's pure potential. It is the breath of God. And that Holy Spirit brings us into a life of God. If we didn't have the Holy Spirit, we wouldn't have the life of God. That's amazing. When you were confirmed in the bishop, the bishop with his thumb and holy chrism made the sign of the cross on your forehead that he said, Be sealed with the Holy Spirit. And then you're sent as a soldier of Christ into the world. There's an action behind that. When the priest says the words of consecration over the bread and the wine, the bread and the wine are changed into what? The body, blood, soul, and divinity of God. By the power of the Holy Spirit, there's an action. And then you receive. The Eucharist. Then after Mass, the priest says, The Lord be with you and with your spirit. May Almighty God bless you, the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Mass is ended. Go in peace. There's the action. You receive the power of the Holy Spirit fully in the Eucharist, and then there's an act calling you to go out into the world. Sometimes I think we forget that as Christians is we have this potential of the Holy Spirit, not beside us, but in us, and it lies untapped. And we need to bring that back with such vigor that it'll be like in our Gospel that driving wind. Was it our gospel? I don't know. Actually, apostles, there's a driving wind. You know what I mean? The power of the spirit that you bring into the world. People are hungering for you. I didn't know if you knew that. They're hungering for what you have, and we're called to bring it. Well, how do we know if we have the spirit? How do we know if we have the breath of God? Let's look at Genesis and then we're gonna go through the whole Bible to Revelation. In the beginning, God created heaven and earth. And the earth was void and empty. A darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God moved over the waters. And God said, Be light, and light was made. The Spirit of God moved over the waters. God breathed the words, be light, and he created light. God said, Let there be the earth, and there was earth. When God speaks, his breath is completely and utterly creative. Where do we see the breath of God every time we're at the Mass? It's the part of the Mass that the priest where he says the words of consecration. If you notice during Mass, when I have the host, I breathe the words of consecration because Christ, who is God, works through the Spirit, and that works through the priest, and that same spirit, the breath of God, falls upon the host and consecrate it. There's an act. The breath of God changes it. And the same with the chalice. He breathes into the chalice the words of consecration, the breath of God change it. To his very self. Then God created man in his own image, to the image of God he created him, male and female, he created them. And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the earth and breathed into his face the breath of life. Man became a living soul. Reflecting on this reminds us we are created in God's image and likeness, and we have his breath within us. We have his spirit. He's so close to us. We have the breath of God. When we have the spirit, when we receive the sacraments, the Holy Spirit gives us the strength to act rightly and properly. How do we know we have the Spirit? The gifts and the fruits. Having the Spirit means that you have wisdom, understanding. Right judgment, fortitude, knowledge, piety, fear of the Lord, or wonder and awe of our Heavenly Father. We also have the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Ask yourself: do I have charity? Do I have joy and peace and patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, faithfulness, modesty, self-control, chastity? These are the things of the Holy Spirit. St. Paul goes on to say in a very deep way the things of the world or the things of the spirit of this world that come from the evil one, those are the things are bouts of anger, drunkenness, orgies, and everything of the like. Those who embrace these things do not have the spirit. And you cannot enter the kingdom of God. So important it is to have the Spirit. He goes on to say, He says, Be careful of the things of the world. There are three things of the world that Christ talks about that we're supposed to be wary of: lust of the eyes, lust of flesh, and the pride of life. And the Holy Spirit gives us the strength to stay in a state of grace, to know to stay away from these things. And I'd like to end with this, another name. The Holy Spirit, as we know, is the advocate or the paraclete, these are this is courtroom language. That means that the Holy Spirit will speak on your behalf. Where do we see an example of this? Well, Jesus Himself even says this. He knows that we as Christians, when we go out into the world that does not want Christ, sometimes we will be persecuted. Often we will be persecuted. But Jesus says, Do not worry, have strength. For when you are put before princes and governors and kings and given a charge of account to profess your faith, he says, Don't even prepare anything. For the Holy Spirit will speak for you. Praying. Jesus says to us: if you do not know how to pray, the Holy Spirit will pray for you with deep groanings and sighs, inexpressible groanings. The Holy Spirit is here to take care of us. And all we have to do is just let it in and it will change our life. So as we celebrate this great day, we're reminded of the Holy Spirit that we have within us. And so let us ask the Lord. Through this Eucharist of receiving his body, blood, soul, and divinity, to give us the strength to accept the power of the Holy Spirit so that we with Christ can change the world. In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Brothers, thank you so much for listening to this episode. If the shows add value to your life, I'm going to ask you to do three things: share with the brother who needs it, leave us a review, and finally support the show so we can keep fighting. Links are in the show notes. We'll see you next week.