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Seeing
the Invisible
May
27, 2007
Fr.
George Smiga
John
20:19-23
God
acts in visible and invisible ways. The scriptures describe
God visiting our ancestors in visible form. God walked with
Adam and Eve in the cool of the garden, visited Abraham in
the heat of the afternoon by the oaks of Mamre, spoke to Moses
face to face on Mount Sinai . Of course, we as Christians
believe that God became one of us in Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus
is for us God made visible. But God's actions are not limited
only to these visible manifestations. In fact, God acts more
frequently and more universally in ways that we cannot see.
This brings us to today's feast, the Feast of Pentecost. Because
today we celebrate the gift of the Spirit, and it is through
the Spirit of God that God works invisibly in our lives and
in our world. When we say, “I believe in the Holy Spirit,”
we say that God is present and active in all things, in all
things but sin. When we say, “I believe in the Holy Spirit”,
we say that there is no natural process, no historical development
that is independent of God. God is present invisibly in all
things, guiding the events of nature and history.
The
famous Jewish comedian, Heni Youngman, was famous for his
one-liners. On his ninetieth birthday a friend asked him,
“Heni, to what do you give credit for your long life?” Without
skipping a beat, Youngman responded, “Breathing.” There you
have it. There's no argument about that. Where there is no
breath, there is no life. It is our invisible breath which
sustains our lives from minute to minute, day to day, year
to year.
In
today's gospel Jesus breathes on the disciples and says, “Receive
the Holy Spirit.” It is the Spirit of God who is the breath
of the world, working invisibly to carry creation towards
the Kingdom. In the Holy Spirit we believe that there is no
time or circumstance, in which God is not somehow invisibly
active.
Let
me just give you one example. You are the person you are largely
because of the genetic makeup you receive from your parents.
It was the genes from your mother or father which made you
male or female, short or tall, healthy or prone to disease.
But your parents in turn received their genetic makeup from
their parents who each had two parents. So, as you move from
generation to generation, the genetic material doubles. If
we were to take a period of time, say 500 years (which amounts
to about 21 generations) and do the math, everyone sitting
here this evening has over 2 million people in your gene pool.
That is a huge amount of people. And you can be assured that
in that pool there were some geniuses and some goofballs;
there were some poets and some dunderheads; there were some
lovers and some loners; some saints and some sinners. All
of them made a contribution. All of them contributed to the
people we are today.
What
I just described was a natural process. All I did was do the
math for the last 500 years. But because we believe in the
Holy Spirit, we believe that that process was invisibly guided
by God. God was working through the lives of all our ancestors
to make us the unique daughter or son we are today.
In
the Holy Spirit we believe that in every age and in every
circumstance God is present moving us toward the Kingdom.
Such belief should give us constant cause for hope and for
courage. It should give us cause for hope. If the Spirit of
God is always active in every time and place, then there is
a force in our world that is opposed to the evil that surrounds
us. Even though there might be problems in our family, sickness
in our body, or violence and hatred in our world, if the Spirit
of God is invisibly moving among us, there is always the possibility
that evil will be vanquished and that good will be victorious.
If the invisible power of God is moving among us, there is
always reason for hope. There is also reason for courage.
If God's spirit is real and active, we can dare to do the
right thing, even when we face opposition. We will dare to
make peace even though there is no guarantee that the forces
of hatred or violence will respond. We will dare to work for
justice even though the powers of selfishness and greed seem
overwhelming. We will support the poor and the vulnerable
even though those who are unconcerned are indifferent. When
we believe that the Spirit of God is active and moving among
us, we will find the courage to work for what is right even
though it seems impossible, because we know that we are not
alone.
The
Spirit of God is the breath of the world, constantly holding
onto creation and moving it towards the Kingdom. Believing
in that Spirit gives us constant reason for hope and for courage.
We hope that God's that there will be a better future, that
God's plan for creation will be done. We find the courage
to cooperate with the Spirit to make God's plan a reality.
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