Yet there is a different kind of Pentecost, the one that we can all experience in our own lives. I'm not going to go all Charismatic and say that the only way we can be "saved" is to go the Pentecostal route of receiving the laying on of hands and then start praying in tongues to be formally declared "baptized in the Holy Spirit" according to the way it is understood by many modern day Christians. That is something quite wonderful for the people who are led in that direction. I don't criticize them or their journey in the Lord. I only disagree with their belief that it is the only way.
There is a different and I believe more powerful kind of relationship that we can have with the Third Person of the Trinity. One that is quiet, and deep like the still waters of Shiloh. I could do my best to describe it, however, there is someone who voiced it more eloquently than I ever could. She is St. Mary Magdalene de Pazzi. She was born in Florence in 1566. She became a Carmelite nun and led of solitary life of prayer and self-denial. She never heard of the laying on of hands or of praying in tongues as we know it today. Yet, her prayer to the Holy Spirit is so powerful that it moves me to tears every time I read it:
You, the Word, are most wonderful, working through the Holy Spirit to fill the soul with yourself, so that it is joined to God, grasps God, tastes God and absorbs nothing but God.
The Holy Spirit comes into the soul signed with the precious seal of the blood of the Word and of the slain lamb; or rather that very blood urges it to come, although the Spirit moves itself and desires to come.
This Spirit which moves in itself is the substance of the Father and of the Word, and it proceeds from the essence of the Father and the good will of the Word; it comes into the soul like a fountain, and the soul is immersed in it. Just as two rushing rivers intermingle in such a way that the smaller loses its name and is absorbed into the larger, so the divine Spirit acts upon the soul and absorbs it. It is proper that the soul, which is lesser, should lose its name and surrender to the Spirit, as it will if it turns entirely toward the Spirit and is united.
This Spirit, dispenser of the treasures which lay in the lap of the Father, and the guardian of the deliberations which pass between the Father and the Son, flows into the soul so sweetly and imperceptibly that few esteem its greatness.
It moves itself by its own weight and lightness into all places that are fitting and disposed to receive it. Its word is heard by all in the most attentive silence; through the impetus of love, the unmoved yet most perfect mover infuses itself into all.
You do not, O Holy Spirit, stand still in the unmoved Father or in the Word, and yet you are always in the Father and in the Word and in yourself and in all blessed spirits and creatures. You are friend of the created because of the blood shed by the only-begotten Word, who in the greatness of his love made himself the friend of the created. You find rest in creatures who are prepared to receive you, so that in the transmission of your gifts they take on, through purity, their own particular likeness to you. You find rest in those creatures who absorb the effects of the blood of the Word and make themselves a worthy dwelling pace for you.
Come, Holy Spirit. Let the precious pearl of the Father and the Word's delight come. Spirit of truth, you are the reward of the saints, the comforter of souls, light in the darkness, riches to the poor, treasure to lovers, food for the hungry, comfort to those who are wandering; to sum up, you are the one in whom all treasures are contained.
Come! As you descended upon Mary, that the Word might become flesh, work in us through grace as you worked in her through nature and grace.
Come! Food of every chaste thought, fountain of all mercy, sum of all purity.
Come! Consume in us whatever prevents us from being consumed in you.
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| Holy Spirit Rosary at Laude Arts and Gifts |
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