Faith
The violence, extremism, and social division in our society reflect a fractured community. It's no surprise that Pentecost Sunday, once the second-most important Christian feast, has largely faded. Today’s culture prioritizes individualism over community, undermining the core meaning of Pentecost.
Originally a Jewish harvest celebration, Pentecost evolved to commemorate the covenant between God and the faithful. For Christians, it marks the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, uniting believers as the body of Christ — a community.
Modern culture, with its emphasis on materialism, individual fulfillment, and fragmented churches, works against this ideal. Churches often confuse institutional survival with communal well-being.
To reclaim Pentecost’s meaning, we must focus on four themes:
- Responsibility and responsiveness: True community considers everyone’s needs, not just subgroup interests.
- Culture: The message of salvation must be expressed within diverse cultural contexts, all of which should be respected.
- Individual and community: We must value personal gifts while placing them in service of the common good.
- Empowerment: Pentecost empowers individuals not just for expression, but for mission and service.
Pentecost calls us to rebuild community. By living as a Pentecostal people, we can renew our lives, serve one another, and transform the world.
Women, the Stars of Sacred Stories
When Abraham took his son Isaac to be sacrificed on a mount on God's command, his wife Sarah, according to one Jewish tradition, had a vision of the event, and "her loud scream was the voice of the angel that stopped Abraham from killing his son."
"Can women scream loud enough to stop the senseless sacrifice of violence and war?" Sister Martha Ann Kirk asks in her recent book, Women of Bible Lands: A Pilgrimage to Compassion and Wisdom (Liturgical Press, 2004).
Kirk, professor of religious studies at the University of the Incarnate Word, recently studied in Israel and toured the sacred places in the Holy Land with her sights on women's stories.
The “pilgrimage” included Rachel’s Tomb. Rachel was Jacob’s wife, and the Scripture labels her as one who has a pillar at her grave, near where she died as she gave birth to Benjamin. "Rachel," Kirk points out, "can be translated as ‘mother love’ ‘womb’ or ‘compassion.’"
In the fourth century, men and women gathered (near today’s Church of the Nativity) to pray and study, as did Jerome, who translated the Bible from Greek to Latin, a major accomplishment that brought the Word of God to the people of the Roman Empire.
Jerome speaks of Paula, a wealthy woman who supported his work financially and used her money to help the poor and preserve the site of Christ’s birth for inspiration.
Jerome writes of Paula not only as someone who financially supported him but also as someone who, with her daughter, studied the Scriptures.
She studied Hebrew and succeeded so well she could chant the psalms in Hebrew and could speak the language without a trace of the pronunciation peculiar to Latin.
At the El-Aksa mosque, an early eighth-century structure, author Kirk evokes Rabi’a, a Muslim "saint" respected for her wisdom and mysticism. Rabi’a defied the social norm that the only role for women was that of being a wife.
Her mystical prayer: "My peace ... is in solitude ... Thou was the source of my life ... My hope is for union with Thee, for that is the goal of my desire."
Most of the stories of women in the Middle East, as elsewhere, are written by men, but Kirk manages to peer past this — and past denominational lines and political boundaries — to discern a feminine perspective and provide stories that are instructive and inspiring.
Avoiding "big questions" of might and power that daily whirl in this region, Kirk’s reflections upon visiting the shrines and holy places in Israel and the surrounding areas are on the things that matter in God’s eyes, inviting readers — men as well as women — to explore sacred stories in new ways.
ExpressNews, 05/24/2005
Abridged Version:
César Chávez, whose birthday is today (March 31), was able to dedicate his life to the rights of farm workers and justice for the poor because he had a profound spirituality.
“A fast is first and foremost personal,” said Chávez, according to the official Web page of the United Farm Workers of America (www.ufw.org). “It is for the purification of my own body, mind and soul. (But) the fast is also a heartfelt prayer for purification and strengthening for all those who work beside me in the farm workers movement.”
This prayer was also for the oppressor, he said, calling it “an act of penance for those who are in positions of moral authority and for all men and women activists who know what is right and just, who know that they could and should do more.”
Fasting was symbolic of a transformation of suffering. Chávez summarized this when he observed that “it is a question of suffering with some kind of hope.”
Chávez received this profoundly strong faith from his mother, according to Sister Martha Ann Kirk, a professor of religious studies at the University of the Incarnate Word. His mother’s faith was directed at helping the poor and included the courage and strength to turn the other cheek.
Later, Chávez learned that his mother’s philosophy had been articulated by Pope Leo XIII, who wrote, “If a man falls, he should be helped by another man.”
Chávez lived this out. “God knows that we are not beasts of burden, agricultural implements or rented slaves, we are men (and women) locked in a death struggle against man's inhumanity to man…and this struggle itself gives meaning to our life and ennobles our dying,” Chávez declared to a writer.
Prayer, fasting, and suffering – so central to Chávez’s life and work – produced not emotional “me-and-God” good feelings but deep convictions of how we are related to those around us and how that relationship obligates us to act on their behalf.
In his words and his actions, Chávez lived for something
greater than himself.
La Fe de Césr Chávez Alimentó Su Labor
César Chávez,
cuyo cumpleaños es hoy (31 de marzo), pudo dedicar su vida a los derechos de
los trabajadores del campo y a la justicia para los pobres porque tenía una
profunda espiritualidad.
“El ayuno es,
ante todo, algo personal”, dijo Chávez, según la página oficial de los United
Farm Workers of America (www.ufw.org). “Es para la purificación de mi propio
cuerpo, mi mente y mi alma. (Pero) el ayuno es también una oración sincera por
la purificación y el fortalecimiento de todos aquellos que trabajan a mi lado
en el movimiento de los trabajadores del campo”.
Esta oración
también era por el opresor, dijo Chávez, llamándolo “un acto de penitencia por
aquellos que están en posiciones de autoridad moral y por todos los hombres y
mujeres activistas que saben lo que es correcto y justo, que saben que podrían
y deberían hacer más”.
El ayuno era un
símbolo de la transformación del sufrimiento. Chávez lo resumió cuando observó
que “se trata de sufrir con algún tipo de esperanza”.
Según Sr. Martha
Ann Kirk, profesora de estudios religiosos en University of the Incarnate Word,
Chávez recibió esta profunda fe de su madre. La fe de su madre se manifestaba
en ayudar a los pobres e incluía la valentía y la fortaleza de poner la otra
mejilla.
Más tarde, Chávez
descubrió que la filosofía de su madre había sido articulada por el Papa León
XIII, quien escribió: “Si un hombre cae, debe ser ayudado por otro hombre”.
Chávez vivió
conforme a esta creencia. “Dios sabe que no somos bestias de carga,
instrumentos agrícolas o esclavos alquilados. Somos hombres (y mujeres)
atrapados en una lucha a muerte contra la inhumanidad del hombre hacia el
hombre… y esta lucha en sí misma da sentido a nuestra vida y ennoblece nuestra
muerte,” declaró Chávez a un escritor.
La oración, el
ayuno y el sufrimiento, elementos centrales en la vida y el trabajo de Chávez,
no producían simplemente sentimientos emocionales de “Dios y yo”, sino
profundas convicciones sobre cómo estamos relacionados con quienes nos rodean y
cómo esa relación nos obliga a actuar en su favor.
Con sus palabras
y sus acciones, Chávez vivió por algo más grande que él mismo.
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