The Third Glorious Mystery: The Descent of the Holy Spirit

When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place. And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared to them tongues as of fire, distributed and resting on each one of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance (Acts 2:1-4).

On this day the Church celebrates Pentecost. This is the day when the Holy Spirit came down upon the Apostles, giving them the gifts of wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord. They were given everything necessary in order to fulfill Jesus’ commands.

Blessed John Paul II reflected upon the descent of the Holy Spirit during his 1979 Mass at Victory Square in Poland:

The liturgy of the evening of Saturday the Vigil of Pentecost takes us to the Upper Room in Jerusalem, where the Apostles, gathered around Mary the Mother of Christ, were on the following day to receive the Holy Spirit. They were to receive the Spirit obtained for them by Christ through the Cross, in order that through the power of this Spirit they might fulfil his command: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you" (Mt 28:19-20). Before Christ the Lord left the world, he transmitted to the Apostles with these words his last recommendation, his "missionary mandate".

In the face of a Communist regime which worked tirelessly to take God out of the Poland’s past, present, and future, Blessed John Paul II then fearlessly called for a “second baptism”—a baptism that would change the history of the twentieth century and eventually lead to the fall of Communism:

And I cry—I who am a Son of the land of Poland and who am also Pope John Paul II—I cry from all the depths of this Millennium, I cry on the vigil of Pentecost:

       Let your Spirit descend.
       Let your Spirit descend.
       and renew the face of the earth,
       the face of this land.

When we sincerely call upon the Holy Spirit, we are often given the graces to live like Christ and bring Him to others. We also may be given the power to change the course of history, like Blessed John Paul II. This beautiful Spirit of Love is what we reflect upon today, as we call to mind the frightened Apostles in the Upper Room who, once filled with the Spirit, were able to bring the Church to all the nations.

While meditating on the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles, say one Our Father, 10 Hail Mary’s, and a Glory Be.