Messages

We all have strong opinions and beliefs we’d like others to share.

We all have our own messages.

It’s fair to say we’re natural evangelists

When it comes to spreading our own messages.

Those messages are sometimes surprising.

I’m often amazed at what people will post on social media.

What they’ll endorse or promote.

On Facebook or a blog, or in a tweet.

For the whole world to see, virtually forever.

Sometimes friends and family will say things that make you cringe.

In a sort of sympathetic or proxy embarrassment for them.

For their lack of discretion.

Often you think, I know she’s better than that.

I know he doesn’t really believe that.

Maybe they did it as an attempt at humor.

Some of the outrageous statements you see actually are clever or funny.

But you still worry, What if they really believe that?

What if they really feel that way?

And we’ve probably all had occasion to cringe in retrospect

At something we ourselves sent out.

We don’t need to become humorless pillars of political correctness.

But we do have to consider impacts and perceptions.

The risk of sending out bad messages isn’t new or limited to the Internet.

We still have traditional opportunities to make our unworthy statements.

At the office or school, at a party, in the checkout line, at the dinner table.

Pretty much anywhere people meet and speak.

But the Internet makes them more public 
And widespread and permanent.

Our unworthy statement might be a quick, thoughtless unkindness.
Or it might be a more formal statement.
Promoting the worship of money;

Or a sense of total entitlement to all the good things we’ve been given;

Or belief we should keep a tight grip on those things 
And share with no one;

Or prejudice or lack of sympathy toward a particular group of people.

Like welfare recipients, immigrants, refugees, or even the wealthy 1%.

Evangelizing our own message comes naturally.

Whether we do it consciously and thoughtfully or not.

And our own message is probably a mix of good and bad.

But we’re also called to be evangelists for Jesus’ message.

In today’s Gospel he says:

As the Father has sent me, so I send you.

And he doesn’t send us out unprepared.

Last week, at the Ascension, we heard him tell his disciples to wait.

To stay in Jerusalem, to not go out.

Until they were made ready.

Until they’d received the power of the Spirit.

Well, today, at Pentecost, that power of the Spirit arrives.

They speak fearlessly, they speak knowledgeably, they speak in tongues.

For us, that’s good news and bad news.

The good news is that the Sprit has already come to all of us.

That the Spirit dwells within us.

He came to us individually in Baptism and Confirmation.

The bad news is that the Spirit has already come to us.

We have already been prepared.

We have no excuse to wait any longer.

It’s time to go out—as we were sent.

To spread Jesus’ message.

The message that God is a Father who loves us.

A God of Mercy.

A God who gave His only Son for our salvation.

The message that, in return, we are to love God.

And to love our neighbor.

We heard that the Spirit came to rest on the disciples as tongues of fire.

Today, on this final day of the Easter Season,

We see this Pascal Candle standing here on display.

Tomorrow we retire it to its resting place by the baptismal font.

It too is like a tongue of fire.

But it most directly represents not the Holy Spirit, but Jesus himself.

The light of the world.

This candle, standing unlit at our church entrance, 
Can be a reminder to us.

It’s now up to us to spread the light.

Indeed, we already are evangelists—

And people really are watching and listening.

We have greater influence than we probably realize.
As we preach with our words, spoken and written.

Preach even more loudly with our actions, and in-actions.

We're all spreading the message.

But whose message are we spreading?

Pentecost

Jn 20:19-23   Read this Scripture @usccb.org