HOMILY PRONOUNCED BY MONS. DIEGO MONROY PONCE; GENERAL AND EPISCOPAL VICAR OF GUADALUPE, RECTOR OF THE SANCTUARY.
CELEBRATION OF PENTECOST

Sunday, May 27 th of 2006

THE HOLY SPIRIT, THE CONSTRUCTOR OF THE CHURCH

Brothers, today we culminate the great celebration of Easter. God grant that this time, that today ends, had been of great spiritual fruits and the great optimism so that, with the gift of His Spirit, we continue announcing with joy and perceverance the joy of knowing ourselves, by the life, death and resurrection of the lord Jesus Christ.

My brothers, with this celebration, we see fulfilled the promise that Jesus had made of giving us His spirit. In the Old Testament it was promised constantly to the poeple of Israel as supreme gift of the God´s mercy. In the New Testament, it is like the logical consequence of the paschal mystery, in the way that If Jesus brought the new life for us, it means, a new way to relate ourselves with God, with the brothers and with the world, this day it is revealed to us that the new life is work of His Spirit that God has reached for us in a supreme, unexpected and great act of His mercy.

In this week that just finished, brothers, we listened in the reading of the Gospel of Saint John, like Jesus, in the farewell, he took some minutes to pray not only for his apostles and disciples that were present in that supper, but also for us, the ones that have believed in his preaching and his testimony. In that prayer he asked the unity between us and with Him, and in Him, with the father.

Today, the readings of the Scripture speak about the unity in the diversity of all the towns of earth. Unity is communion in the plurality and diversity, my brothers, it would be uniformity and what the Holy Spirit gives us is UNANIMITY. Let us approach every reading to benefit ourselves by his richness.

In the first reading which has been taken from the book of the Acts of the Apostles, we have listened, in the first part, the narration of the miracles of Pentecost, and with the richness of symbols that were taken from the Old Testament, it is presented to us as the fulfillment of the promise of Jesus (Lk 24, 49; Jh 15, 26; 16, 7.13). The second reading talks about how the nations unlike Babel, they are in the understanding in spite of the different languages. The Spirit manifests himself in that day in tongue of flame, over the apostles, it means on the rising Church. We can see, my brothers, according to the line of the tradition, in that sign, a manifestation of its universal character, it is catholic. So, we see the church like an integrated community, from its origins, by men and women of all the towns, with its diverse languages, customs and cultures. A new community that surpasses the barriers of the exclusivity of a town and of a tradition like the jew one was, which was integrated in it.

Saint Paul, in the second reading, shows that the cause of the new situation of this new town is connected with that thing that all of us have been baptized in only one Spirit to form only one body, Jews and Greeks, it means, Jews and all the other towns of earth; all the men that are enslaved or free. Everybody is called to the salvation by the merits of Christ, Lord of the church.

My brothers, in this way, it is very clear that the unity is work of the Spirit of Jesus that with His death and resurrection reconciled us, all the human beings, with his Father, to make only one town with all of us. It means that if we save ourselves, it is through the Church, this new town to which belong, in a misterious way, those who let themselves lead by the Holy Spirit, because the same spirit has been given us to drink from it.

According to Saint John, from the first night after his resurrection, the paschal night by excellence, and thanks to this Spirit that the Lord Jesus gives us, through his blowing of his breath –sign of his own life -, it is the way in which we can be sure about we live, we move ourselves and we are in a new town, species of a new creation, with a different and more superior than the old law: the law of love that is over the law of fear.

In this new community of love, the diversity of charismas is what constitutes its own richness. When it includes in its interior to all the towns of Earth, the church is sent to show, from its own being, the richness of sharing all the goods that it owns by the great variety of gifts that are given by every town that integrates it. In this, Saint Paul is very clear when he assures that everybody receives from the unique God what we are and have to put ourselves at the service of ones for others.

But it will be difficult to understand properly, my brothers, if we do not understand that the unity is not equal to the uniformity. This one depersonalizes and amasses, for example like the consumption does. The uniformity enslaves giving false security, whereas the unity or rather the unanimity, when it is understood completely, is liberating and it makes us responsible and glad when it takes us to give from which everyone has to receive in humility and the gratitude of which everyone needs. In this way the Spirit constructs the Church and he makes it a sign and instrument of his sanctifying presence. In this way the new humanity is constructed.

It is the way in which we have to understand the things that the catholic tradition says: “outside of the Church there is no salvation”, because Jesus Christ was who wanted that it existed like historic and alive presence of His mystery of love, as an instrument of Him in favor of the humanity, because he wants that the all men are saved. This is the reason, my brothers, of our mission that is derived from the mission of the Church, and really of the mission of Christ, the emissary of the Father.
With our little girl and sweet mother of the Church, we are happy because God, our merciful Father, has chosen us to be instruments of His love. Let us ask her intercession to be, like her, docile and humble to fulfill His will.

Let us ask her that she transmits her attitude to serve and poverty to us, because without the recognition of our emptiness the spirit does not come, He is Father of the poor people not of the vain and satisfied ones. Let us receive, like Her, to the Holy Spirit because the Spirit comes as a guest, and we have to open unconditionally our heart. With our loved little girl, let us supplicate intensely and with faith that she comec, because without her divine inspiration the men can not do anything and the sin dominates us, may she comes and defeats our pride, may she warms our coldness and straightens our steps.

Amen.