Pentecost and the Eucharist

     After the Resurrection of Jesus, his apostles frequently recognized Him in “the breaking of the bread,” that is, in the Holy Eucharist. And indeed on Pentecost, as they gathered together to pray in the very place, “the upper room,” where the Last Supper took place, Jesus fulfilled his promise to send from Him and the Father their Holy Spirit to help, guide, and empower them.
     Jesus in the Holy Eucharist opens for us the avenue of having a relationship with the Holy Spirit. He shows us the Father, as he told his disciples, and He gives us the Holy Spirit. And when He comes to dwell in our hearts, He can never be alone, for being One God, the Father and the Holy Spirit are inseparably with Him - therefore inside of us in a special way when we are in a state of grace and receive the Holy Eucharist!
​     When we receive the Holy Eucharist, then, how wonderful and beautiful it is to address the Third Person of the Holy Trinity, the Holy Spirit who is so powerfully inside of us in that moment! It is a moment when we can ask Him to help us be aware of how he is empowering us to have the very wisdom and fortitude of God. We can thank Him for the ways he has already led us, even today to the point of receiving Him into ourselves, body and soul! We can ask him for strength and to speak His life-giving words in our soul so that we might be transformed to be more like Jesus.
     As today we remember and celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit in power at the birth of the Church on Pentecost, let us offer words and actions of thanksgiving and praise that He comes to you and I today through the Holy Sacraments, particularly in the abiding effects of Baptism and Confirmation - but in a most powerful way with Jesus in the Holy Eucharist!

May God inflame you with a great love of Jesus in the Eucharist!
  +FrDT