We are at the end of the Easter season. The final acts of the divine drama unfold today as we witness the return of the Son to the Father at the Ascension. Where he has gone, we hope to follow. The apostles and Our Lady now had to stay together and at prayer, to await the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, that we commemorate next week at Pentecost. After that, fisherman Peter will preach conversion to a few thousand, heal the sick and raise the dead. The world would never be the same again. The Church would start its incredible journey through history charged by our Founder with the words we hear in today’s Gospel :“Go make disciples of all nations.”
This week a successor of those very same apostles, Archbishop George Stack comes to confirm many of our young people. “Be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit”, he will say to each as he anoints them. Yes, the gift of the very same Holy Spirit will be available to each and every one of them, as it was to all of us at our Confirmation.
What have we done with that gift? Is it still in its “confirmation wrapping”? As we join our young people in celebrating, let’s make sure that we have grasped our confirmation, allowed the Spirit to melt us and mould us, fill us and use us. No holding back! Our current Sunday evening gatherings are one way of making sure that we are opening to the Spirit as much as we can.
The Church journeys on. From those gatherings after the Resurrection, at the Ascension and at Pentecost, the People of God have spread out across the globe, God’s world. May the young people of this part of Cardiff fully take up and play their part in the next chapter of the Church’s history. And may we all be truly awake in the Lord!
Fr Matthew
