The Holy Spirit, Life-Breath of the Church
Pentecost, continued
The outpouring of the Spirit, however, is not an event in the past that is over
and done with: Pentecost, as a transformative experience brought about by the
Holy Spirit, is still going on in the Church.
The acts of the Apostles already highlights other experiences of the Spirit
breaking through and bringing about conversions, cures, new pastoral
orientations.
Pentecost remains pertinent
In the recent past, when he was announcing the Second Vatican Council, John
XXIII did not hesitate to claim a special inspiration of the Holy Spirit and to
ask the bishops to join in prayer with Mary, begging the Holy Spirit “to work
marvels once more in our day, as on a new Pentecost”.
After John XXIII, Paul VI asserted that “The primary need of the Church is to
live out Pentecost at all times”. And in our time, John Paul II has repeated on
many occasions that the New Evangelization must derive its momentum from the
grace of Pentecost.
The experience of the Holy Spirit, lived in response to prayer – an experience
of conversion, of recognizing the living Christ, of openness to the Holy Spirit
with his gifts, his charisma, his power – is to be found taking place before our
very eyes, through that current of grace which is called the Charismatic
Renewal. In order to do justice to its scope and avoid any suggestion of
exclusivity, it might be better named the Renewal in the Holy Spirit. On the
next page, of Orthodox origin, is an excellent illustration of how it is the
Holy Spirit who gives life to the Church.