On Saturdays, we pre-send the Sunday reflection for families - the same one Hearth & Altar subscribers receive at the table together.

Have a blessed Sunday - we'll be back Monday morning.

Sunday's Reflection — Pentecost Sunday

Acts 2:1-11; Ps 104:1, 24, 29-30, 31, 34; 1 Cor 12:3b-7, 12-13; Jn 20:19-23

They were all in one place together. That is where the Spirit finds them - gathered, waiting, in one place. The strong driving wind fills the house. Tongues of fire rest on each one individually. They are all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they begin to speak in the languages of every nation represented in Jerusalem. Devout Jews from across the known world hear the mighty acts of God proclaimed in their own tongue.

The Spirit does not come to a scattered people. The gathering is the condition for the fullness. Your family, in one place, in prayer, is the gathered community that the Spirit fills.

Jesus breathes on the disciples in the Gospel and says: receive the Holy Spirit. The same breath that moved over the waters in the beginning, the same breath that animated Adam, breathed now into the disciples gathered behind locked doors after the resurrection. The peace he gives them opens locked doors - not the physical doors, but the fear that keeps them inside. Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.

The Easter season ends today. The Spirit given at Pentecost is the power for the ordinary time that begins this week. Whatever your family carries into the weeks ahead - the summer schedule, the decisions pending, the relationships in process - it goes with the Spirit who has been sent.

Universal Prayer

• For our family, that we would gather in one place in prayer this week, so the Spirit has the condition he is looking for, we pray to the Lord.
• For those still behind locked doors - held by fear, grief, or shame - that the peace of the Risen Lord would stand in the middle of their room, we pray to the Lord.
• For each member of this family, that the gift of the Spirit given at baptism and confirmation would be received again in its fullness today, we pray to the Lord.
• For all that this household carries into Ordinary Time, that the Spirit who renews the face of the earth would renew what needs renewing in us, we pray to the Lord.

Faith in Action

As the Father has sent me, so I send you. Your family is sent - into your street, your school, your workplace, your neighborhood. This week, name where you are sent. One specific place, one specific person, one specific act of witness. The Pentecost sending is not general. It is into the particular world where your family actually lives.

A Note for Parents

Each person received the Spirit - tongues of fire resting on each one individually. The Spirit's gift is personal, not inherited. Your children will receive it in their own way, in their own time, in their own particular encounter with the risen Christ. Your job is to gather, to stay in the room, to be the community of one place where the Spirit finds them.