Today is that special feast day, it is Pentecost Sunday. Yet, that word means nothing to us if we do not know what that means. Have you ever heard someone say that they are spiritual but not religious. Another version is that they believe in God, but not in his Church. In reality, these words don’t make any sense and it is no other day than Pentecost that illustrates this.

First what is the difference between faith and religion. It is simple: “Faith is the act of believing in that which is beyond our perception.” The scientific basis of faith is that “Our ability to perceive reality is limited by our biology.” Many Atheists acknowledge this fact, but then say there is nothing we can do about it. There are just things that are beyond our ability to know period and we will never know them. Our Faith allows us to see beyond the limitation and understand those revealed truths that are beyond our biological ability to see, comprehend and understand. That however is faith.

Religion, on the other hand, is the expression of that faith in a believing community that transcends place and time. Therefore, we share our experience of that faith with those world wide and throughout time. This is religion. Our experience of faith and our definition of how to live that faith is built upon the history of living that faith from the time of Moses until the present and from Israel and back by way of both the prime meridian and the international dateline.

You can believe, but belief is nothing if it is not expressed within the context of community. The Devil, after all, believes better than any of us, but he likewise rejects the believing community that is part of expressing that belief.

Now understanding that, let’s look at how this applies to Pentecost.

It is no secret that Pentecost is the reversal of the Tower of Babel. This is the moment described in Genesis when men in exalting themselves tried to build a tower to Heaven. God in disciplining them not to do this, gave them all a different language so they could not unite and exalt the human again. That is because when the humans exalt themselves, disaster happens. We are not capable of taking God’s place. When we exalt ourselves we try to do exactly that.

Today in Pentecost we see that despite different languages, the whole room is united in their worship of God through Jesus Christ. This is a key element here. If we miss it, then we miss the point. One of the easiest ways to miss it is to focus on the special effects and miss the result of those special effects. We can focus on the tongues of fire over the Apostles and the ability of everyone to understand the language of the Apostles, but we miss the point when do not see the final result. What is the final result? Unity. This is the central element of the what Pentecost is all about, a community united in Christ.

Notice too, what happens. Peter stands up and preaches the word. He convicts those people there for putting Jesus to death and then moves on and calls them to conversion and baptism. There is an end to the separation between them because of the death of Jesus. Now they unite over the resurrection, ascension and the descent of the Holy Spirit. Again we see unity.

This becomes the hallmark of Christianity, that Christians are united in faith and that they share their faith with one another in community. This is the reason why we consider today the birthday of the Church, it is today that the community united in Christ began. This is what it means to be a believer, to first believe and then share your faith with others in community.

This may be hard for North Americans to fully understand because we live in an individualistic culture. A great illustration of this is the book Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam on how he shows that typical elements of the North American Community have changed and enforced our individualistic culture. But rugged individualism which is as American as George Washington is not simultaneously Catholic or for that matter Christian. That is because we become united in our faith and our expression of faith.

St. Paul addresses this in many places when he talks about how we are no longer slave or free, Jew or Greek, but we are really people of faith united in Christ. Therefore, we no longer can let national or cultural issues cloud the reality that we believe the same thing. Indeed, today, we may express our faith through different language or cultural issues but our celebrations of Pentecost are predominantly Catholic because we do this as Catholics.

I think further one of the most dramatic experiences I have had in light of what I call the special effects we see in Pentecost can be seen in light of this effect. I speak Spanish as you all know. Brazilians speak Portuguese which is similar to Spanish but not identical. Maybe it would be like an English Speaker trying to understand German. The languages are similar, but you are not going to understand German just because you happen to speak English. So, with really no Portuguese education, I visited Canção Nova, thanks to Adriano and Flavia Moraes. They brought me to Eucharistic adoration where everyone was praying in tongues. If you are not familiar with this Charismatic gift, you can find it described in the twelfth chapter of first letter to the Corinthians. Many people of our faith have this gift.

Now, again, I didn’t speak Portuguese well, however, praying in tongues, we were all united in our adoration of Christ across language lines despite the fact that none of were speaking the same language. Again in if you focus on tongues you miss the point, the key is that see the unity in adoration of Christ. This is the very meaning of Pentecost.

So what does Pentecost mean for us? It is a time to recognize how our faith brings us together in Christ and to eliminate those things in our faith that separate us from Christ and each other, even though it may appear we are being devout.

There is another aspect of this. Ultimately those who are united in Christ will see their community grow, those who reject each other even if they believe will see their community fall.

Why because it is God’s will that we are in union with each other and God.

This is expressed well in Psalm 133.

Because unity in faith is

How good and pleasant it is
when brothers live together in unity!

It is like precious oil poured on the head,
running down on the beard,
running down on Aaron’s beard,
down upon the collar of his robes.

It is as if the dew of Hermon
were falling on Mount Zion.
For there the LORD bestows his blessing,
even life forevermore.

–Psalm 133

What are the signs of this. It is something I watch for all the time and it is quite simple: People smiling when they come out of mass. When I see that, I know that our community is filled with the Holy Spirit because after all Joy is the sign of the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is this presence we recognize for the first time on Pentecost.

Photocredits: top: BlueCherryGraphics via bigstockphoto.com 

Bottom: Andres via bigstockphoto.com