#churchneverstops A Rich Harvest at Pentecost!

I have been pastor of this parish for twelve years, four months and twenty-seven days. During that time we celebrated the parish’s 25th anniversary, my 25th anniversary, and many other important events. But I think that yesterday was the greatest day of all.

At this time of uncertainty and worry, eight men and women stood at this baptismal font to have their sins washed away and to join the household of God. A ninth—for one of our converts was already baptized—received the gift of the Holy Spirit in Confirmation and the Body and Blood of Christ in Holy Communion. A tenth could not be with us and will be baptized later this week.

Two of the newly-baptized brought their children with them to the font, one of them a student at St. Anthony’s School.

Eleven baptisms in the midst of a pandemic.

Most of you know me: am I going to get through this Pentecost homily without choking up?  I broke my record yesterday: I choked up at the first four words—when I addressed the catechumens as “dear brothers and sisters.”

Frankly, we should all choke up. These new Catholics represent the harvest we have worked and prayed for since the parish decided to make evangelization its priority. Until now we have mostly been sowing seeds; now we are seeing the fruit of our labours, just when we need God’s encouragement the most.

Most of the new Catholics came to us from Alpha. All of them took part in the RCIA program under the dedicated guidance of Glen Goh and Nicole Bitelli, with the help of other generous volunteers and their sponsors.

Short of a parking lot full of people hearing us preach to them in their own language, what greater experience of Pentecost could this parish have? The new members of our parish family come from at least three countries, and they are as joyful a group as you could ever want to know. The oldest is 58 and the youngest 17, if you don’t include the two children.

That’s about all I can say without getting too emotional. But please, do two things. First, pray for our new brothers and sisters in Christ. Pray they will know the peace that Jesus promised his disciples. Pray that they will stay strong during the time we cannot be together every Sunday.

And pray in thanksgiving for how God has blessed our parish. We’ve spent literally years reflecting, and planning and training to become a parish of missionary disciples; this visible fruit is a gift from God, not an accomplishment. But it gives us the strength to continue in the direction we have been taking.

That’s not all. The second reading today has a message for the new Catholics, for sure. St. Paul reminds them that it’s because of the Holy Spirit that they can profess their faith in Jesus. They didn’t learn that Jesus is Lord by watching videos at RCIA.  It’s a gift from the Holy Spirit.

But St. Paul also has a very important message for every one of us. Let me boil down what he says: we are not given the Spirit just for our own good.

The Spirit is poured into our hearts to set them on fire with energy—divine energy that moves us to serve others. And not always one-on-one, but in the Body we call the Church.

The ten new Catholics would not have joined our parish without the welcome and formation they received from dedicated parishioners—parishioners who put to work the gifts they received at baptism and confirmation. They put them to work for the common good, they used them to serve.

What a terrible mistake it would be to say “oh those are special folks. I couldn’t teach at RCIA.”

No?  What about the people who cooked and cleaned at Alpha? What about the people who delivered our invitation cards at Easter in 2019? What about the people who will make it possible for us to add more Masses attended by the public?

“There are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are varieties of services, but the same Lord.”

"To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good."

Think about how you could serve as we begin to resume parish life. Send me an email and ask what’s needed. Pray and ask God what gifts you have.

It’s too early to make post-pandemic predictions. But I wonder if things will ever be the same for our parish. Will we go back to business as usual? Somehow I don’t think so. Restoring parish life will not take a handful of volunteers but an army. Fortunately, every baptized member of this community has both a commission in that army and the equipment—the gifts of the Holy Spirit—needed for the spiritual battle.

Pentecost was the birthday of the Church—the day the great work of evangelization began in earnest. A work that continues to this very moment, guided by the same Spirit, as we see in this rich harvest that God has granted.

The months of the pandemic have taught us a new way of doing things and—at least for those of us who aren’t young anymore—a whole new set of words. Pandemic itself was a new word, as was social distancing. I had no idea what Zoom was, and didn’t know what “meme” meant.

Now I do. But I still haven’t figured out exactly what a hashtag is. I know what it looks like—it uses what we used to call the pound sign or a number sign on a typewriter.  I just don’t know what it is.

However, I do know one thing. I know that the three words on a hashtag from the Archdiocese sum up my experience of these months of isolation. These three words have helped me move from spiritual desolation to consolation.

Those words are Church Never Stops.

The Church never stops because the Holy Spirit has come down on the earth. The Church never stops because God’s Spirit is always at work.

And that’s what Christ the Redeemer Parish experienced this Pentecost, in the year of the pandemic, 2020.