« Jesus The Friend | Home | Quotes About Heroes »
Pentecost Day
By peace | May 12, 2008
St Anthony Church of Padua: Christ The Revelation and Sacrament of God
By his preaching, and by his death and Resurrection, Jesus is both the revealer and the revelation of God. Who the Father is, is shown in his Son, Jesus. As the revelation of God, Jesus is both God’s approach to humankind and our path to God.
Jesus is the ultimate sign of God’s salvation in the world — the center and means of God’s encounter with you. Thus, we call him the original sacrament. The grace he communicates to you is himself. And through this communication of himself, you receive the total self-communication of God. Jesus is the saving presence of God in the world.
Jesus told his Apostles on several occasions that he was leaving them in order to send to them a mysterious Person to help and teach them. He called him the ‘Spirit of Truth’ and the ‘Counsellor’.
On the day he ascended into heaven, he told them to wait in Jerusalem for the fulfillment of this promise. The great even took place ten days later, on the Jewish festival called Pentecost.
The word “Pentecost” is from the Greek word for “50”, and Pentecost takes place 50 days after the end of Passover. According to Church tradition Pentecost is always seven weeks after Easter Sunday. On Pentecost, Christians celebrate the presence of the Holy Spirit. It is in mid- to late spring in the Northern Hemisphere and mid- to late Autumn in the Southern Hemisphere.
2007: May 27
2008: May 11
2009: 31 May
2010: 23 May
2011: 12 June
2012: 27 May
2013: 19 May
2014: 8 June
2015: 24 May
2016: 15 May
2017: 4 June
2018: 20 May
2019: 9 June
2020: 31 May
The earliest possible date is May 10 as in 1818 and 2285. The latest possible date is June 13 as in 1943 and 2038.
Pentecost started out as an ancient Hebrew harvest festival. By the time of Christ, Pentecost was a celebration of God’s covenant with Israel. One commentator noted it was 50 days between historical Passover in Egypt and the giving of the Law on Mt. Sinai. So Pentecost celebrated not only the harvest, but also God’s covenant with God’s people. It was thus an obvious time for Christians to celebrate God’s new covenant with those who chose to be Christians.
More Interesting Facts about Pentecost
A religious observance that has roots in the Old Testament and continues to be observed in both Judaism and Christianity. In the Old Testament the customary name for the observance is
the Feast of Weeks, or the first fruits of the harvest. It was originally an agricultural festival, an occasion on which the community was expected to show gratitude to God for the first fruits.
Somewhere between 300 BC and 300 AD, Pentecost lost its association with agriculture and became associated with the religious history of the Jewish people identified with the covenant
between God and Noah. Today Pentecost falls on the seventh Sunday of Easter and is known
as the birthday of the Christian church.
Topics: Faith, Spiritual Articles, View All Post |
May 12th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
[…] of The Sparrow On 10th May 2008, the day where the church celebrate Pentecost, Richard, the children and me cycled to church as usual. At the traffic light of Esso Petrol Kiosk, […]
May 12th, 2008 at 4:14 pm
[…] this day, Pentecost, Father Vincent cut his hair, wore red - Red is the color of blood, and therefore also of […]