Illustration: The Pentecost depicted in a 14th-century Missal
Pope Francis’ Previous Homilies for Pentecost Sunday
First Reading:
Acts of the Apostles (cf. 2:1-11)
When Pentecost day came round, they had all met in one room, when suddenly they heard what sounded like a powerful wind from heaven, the noise of which filled the entire house in which they were sitting; and something appeared to them that seemed like tongues of fire; these separated and came to rest on the head of each of them. They were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and began to speak foreign languages as the Spirit gave them the gift of speech.
Now there were devout men living in Jerusalem from every nation under heaven, and at this sound they all assembled, each one bewildered to hear these men speaking his own language. They were amazed and astonished. ‘Surely’ they said ‘all these men speaking are Galileans? How does it happen that each of us hears them in his own native language? Parthians, Medes and Elamites; people from Mesopotamia, Judaea and Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya round Cyrene; as well as visitors from Rome – Jews and proselytes alike – Cretans and Arabs; we hear them preaching in our own language about the marvels of God.’
Choice of Gospel Texts:
John 20:10-23
In the evening of 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’, and showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were filled with joy when they saw the Lord, and he said to them again, ‘Peace be with you. ‘As the Father sent me, so am I sending you.’
After saying this he breathed on them and said ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. For those whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven; for those whose sins you retain, they are retained.’
John 15:26 – 27, John 16:12-15
Jesus said to his disciples: ‘When the Advocate comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who issues from the Father, he will be my witness. And you too will be witnesses, because you have been with me from the outset.
‘I still have many things to say to you but they would be too much for you now. But when the Spirit of truth comes he will lead you to the complete truth, since he will not be speaking as from himself but will say only what he has learnt; and he will tell you of the things to come. He will glorify me, since all he tells you will be taken from what is mine. Everything the Father has is mine; that is why I said: All he tells you will be taken from what is mine.’
Pope Francis Homily 2021
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The Acts of the Apostles (Acts 2:1-11 above) tells us what happened in Jerusalem 50 days after the Passover of Jesus. The disciples were gathered in the Upper Room, and the Virgin Mary was with them. The Risen Lord had told them to remain in the city until they received the gift of the Spirit from on high. And this was manifested by a “sound” which they suddenly heard coming from heaven, like the “rushing of a mighty wind” which filled the house where they were (cf. v. 2). It is therefore a real but also symbolic experience. Something that happened but also gives us a symbolic message for all of life.
This experience shows that the Holy Spirit is like a strong and free wind, that is He gives us strength and brings us freedom: a strong and free-flowing wind. It cannot be controlled, stopped, nor measured; nor can its direction be predicted. It cannot be framed in our human demands – we always try to frame things – it does not allow itself to be framed in our schemes and our prejudices.
The Spirit proceeds from God the Father and from his Son Jesus Christ and bursts upon the Church.
He bursts upon each one of us and gives life to our minds and hearts. He is, as the Creed says, “the Lord who gives life”. He is Lord because he is God and he gives life..
On the day of Pentecost, Jesus’ disciples were still confused and afraid. They did not yet have the courage to come out. We too sometimes prefer to remain within the protective walls of our environment. But the Lord knows how to reach us and open the doors of our hearts.
He sends us the Holy Spirit who envelops us and overwhelms all our hesitations, tears down our defences, dismantles our false security. The Spirit makes us new creatures, just as he did that day with the Apostles: he renews us, new creatures.
After they have received the Holy Spirit they were no longer as they were before – he changed them – but they went out and began to preach Jesus, to preach that Jesus is risen, that the Lord is with us, in such a way that everyone understood them in their own language. Because the Spirit is universal; he does not take away cultural differences, differences in thinking, no. He is for everyone, but everyone understands Him in his or her own culture, in his or her own language. The Spirit changes the heart, widens the eyes of the disciples. He makes them capable of communicating to all the great works of God, without limits, going beyond the cultural and religious boundaries within which they were accustomed to think and live. He enables the apostles to reach out to others, respecting their ability to listen and understand,, in the culture and language of each one (vv. 5-11). In other words, the Holy Spirit brings different people into communication, thus realizing the unity and universality of the Church.
And today this truth tells us so much, this reality of the Holy Spirit, where in the Church there are small groups who always seek to divide, to separate from others. This is not the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God is harmony, it is unity, it unites differences. A good Cardinal, who was the Archbishop of Genoa, said that the Church is like a river: the important thing is to be in it; if you are a little on this side and a little on the other side is not important; the Holy Spirit creates unity. He used the image of a river. The important thing is to be inside, in the unity of the Spirit, and not to look at the small things that you are a little on this side and a little on that side, that you pray in this way or that way…. That is not of god. The Church is for everyone, for everyone, as the Holy Spirit showed on the day of Pentecost.
Today we ask the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, to intercede so that the Holy Spirit may descend in abundance, fill the hearts of the faithful and kindle the fire of his love in everyone.
Pope Francis Homily 2018
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The seaspm of Easter culminates in today’s celebration of Pentecost, centred on the death and resurrection of Jesus. This solemnity inspires us to remember and relive the outpouring of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and the other disciples gathered in prayer with the Virgin Mary in the Upper Room . On that day the history of holy Christianity began, because the Holy Spirit is the source of holiness, which is not the privilege of the few, but the vocation of all.
Indeed, through Baptism, we are all called to share in the same divine life of Christ and, through Confirmation, to become his witnesses in the world. “. “The Holy Spirit pours out holiness everywhere in the holy faithful people of God”(Gaudete et exultate, 6). “God did not wish to sanctify and save men individually and without any bond between them, but he wished to gather them together as one people, who would acknowledge him in truth and serve him in holiness” (Lumen Gentium, 9).
Through the prophets of old, the Lord had announced his plan to the people. “I will put my Spirit within you and make you live according to my laws, and I will make you observe and practice my standards. […] You shall be my people, and I will be your God” (36:27-28).
The prophet Joel: “I will pour out my spirit on every man, and your sons and daughters will become prophets. … I will also pour out my spirit on the slaves and on the slave girls in those days. […] Whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Ezekiel: 3:1-2,5). And all these prophecies are fulfilled in Jesus Christ, “mediator and guarantor of the perennial outpouring of the Spirit” (Roman Missal, Preface after Ascension). And today is the feast of the outpouring of the Spirit.
Since that day of Pentecost, and until the end of time, this holiness, the fullness of which is Christ, is given to all those who open themselves to the action of the Holy Spirit and strive to be docile to him. It is the Spirit who makes us feel complete joy. The Holy Spirit, when he comes into us, conquers dryness, opens hearts to hope, stimulates, encourages and promotes inner maturity in our relationship with God and with our neighbour. This is what Saint Paul tells us: “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (Gal 5:22-23). The Spirit creates all these in us. That is why today we celebrate this richness that the Father gives us.
Let us ask the Virgin Mary to obtain for the Church even today a renewed Pentecost, a renewed youthfulness that will give us the joy of living and witnessing to the Gospel and “awaken in us an intense desire to be holy for the greater glory of God” (Gaudete et exultate, 177).
Pope Francis Homily 2015
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The Feast of Pentecost brings us back to the beginnings of the Church. The Book of the Acts of the Apostles recounts that fifty days after Easter, in the house where Jesus’ disciples were staying, “suddenly there came a noise from heaven, like a rushing wind…and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:2-4). From this outpouring, the disciples are completely transformed: fear is replaced by courage, closure gives way to proclamation, and every doubt is driven away by faith full of love. It is the “baptism” of the Church, which thus began its journey through history, guided by the power of the Holy Spirit.
That event, which changed the hearts and lives of the apostles and the other disciples, immediately had repercussions outside the Upper Room.
In fact, the door that had been kept closed for fifty days was finally thrown wide open and the first Christian community, no longer withdrawn into itself, began to speak to crowds of people of different origins about the great things that God had done (Acts 2:.11), that is, about the resurrection of the crucified Jesus. Everyone present hears his own language being spoken by the disciples. The gift of the Spirit restores the harmony of tongues that had been lost in Babel and foreshadows the universal dimension of the apostles’ mission. The Church is not born isolated, she is born universal, one, and Catholic, with a precise identity, open to all, not closed, an identity that embraces the whole world and excludes no one. Mother Church closes her door in the face of no one, no one! Not even to the greatest sinner, not to anyone! This is through the power, through the grace of the Holy Spirit. Mother Church opens, opens wide her doors to everyone because she is mother.
The Holy Spirit, poured out in the hearts of the disciples at Pentecost, is the beginning of a new season: the season of witness and fraternity. It is a season that comes from above, from God, like the tongues of fire that rest on the head of each disciple. It was the flame of love that burns all hardness; it was the tongue of the Gospel that transcends man-made boundaries and reaches the hearts of the multitudes, without distinction of language, race or nationality.
As on that day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit is continually poured out on the Church and on each one of us, so that we may come out of our mediocrity and our closeness and communicate the Lord’s merciful love to the whole world. To communicate the Lord’s merciful love: that is our mission!
We too have been given the gift of the “tongue” of the Gospel and the “fire” of the Holy Spirit, so that by proclaiming the Risen Jesus, who is alive and present among us, we may warm our hearts and the hearts of peoples, bringing them closer to him, the Way, the Truth and the Life.
We entrust ourselves to the maternal intercession of Mary Most Holy, who was present as a mother among the disciples in the Upper Room: she is the Mother of the Church, the Mother of Jesus who became the Mother of the Church. We entrust ourselves to her so that the Holy Spirit may descend in abundance upon the Church of our time, fill the hearts of all the faithful and kindle in them the fire of his love.