Ordinary Time is just around the corner. Let’s consider it a mandate to acknowledge and reflect on World Communications Day this year (1).

Paul was addressing a community experiencing conflicts and differing loyalties. Every community of faith—including yours—has such divisions.

It may seem a faint expression if we compare the Feast of Pentecost to an old country song made popular by Olivia Newton-John. But what gives country music its immense and enthusiastic audience is its capacity to speak plain truths in plain ways.

A surgical team quizzed me recently about my history of “difficult intubation,” a result of childhood arthritis.

As a seminarian, I spent four years helping out in a small parish that was not blessed with more than a handful of Sunday Mass lectors.

Brothers and sisters, let us acknowledge our sins, and so prepare ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries.

Breathe in me, O Holy Spirit, that my thoughts may all be holy. Act in me, O Holy Spirit, that my work, too, may be holy. … Strengthen me, O Holy Spirit, to defend all that is holy.

Browse our library for additional Solemnity of Pentecost, Cycle C material.