An Identity Renewed: Homily for the Solemnity of Pentecost

Some time ago, while interacting with a group of seminarians I heard the following anecdote from their life in the seminary. The question was of identities, and they were taught that we are first human, then Indian (assuming the seminary is in India), and only then, in the third place, Christian.

My dear brothers and sisters, if what was reported to me is true, then it is not only a great shame, but a matter of great concern, that such unchristian knowledge is being propagated via seminaries.

It is not that this teaching is entirely untrue. Naturally, and chronologically, speaking, it is a fact that one is first born, and is hence human; that we are then registered in the State records, and receive our nationality and/or citizenship; and it is only then, after a period that in the old days was about 45 days, that one is baptized, and hence becomes Christian. 

But the life of Christians is not about the natural alone, but also about the supernatural! The feast of the Pentecost that we celebrate today, is indeed, all about the cooperation of the natural and the supernatural, and the priority of the supernatural over the natural. Through Our Lord Jesus Christ, and the gift of His Holy Spirit, the supernatural has not only triumphed over the world and the natural, but indeed, remade it! As in the case we just heard from the Acts of the Apostles:

there were devout Jews from every nation under heaven
staying in Jerusalem.

but they were confused
because each one heard them speaking in his own language.
They were astounded, and in amazement they asked,
"Are not all these people who are speaking Galileans?
Then how does each of us hear them in his native language?

How else, but because of the work of the Holy Spirit, that remakes the world?

I would like to return to the anecdote from the seminary; the formator who filled the seminarians with this nonsense seems to have misunderstood the very nature of baptism. When we are baptized, we are – through the power of the Holy Spirit – claimed for Christ, the stain of original sin is removed, and we are made worthy of entering heaven.

Listen to the words of St. Peter in his first epistle (1: 18-19):

You know that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your ancestors, not with perishable things like silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without defect or blemish.

The ways of our ancestors, those who belonged to the world, were – and remain – useless, and it was only with the gift of the Precious Blood of Christ and His Holy Spirit, that we are renewed, or made anew. As the response to the psalm says:

Lord, send out your Spirit, and renew the face of the earth.

After Pentecost, and the sacraments of baptism and confirmation that flow from it, we are no longer anything first, other than Christian. If we are not Christian first, and we stress our natural identities rather than the supernatural then we have missed the point, and we are nothing. For, as St. Paul teaches, "the wisdom of the flesh is death" (Romans 8: 6).

This Christian identity, is not some mere social identity, that is, not a natural identity, but in fact, a supernatural identity. The Christian identity via baptism is something that changes the core of our being, an ontological change - to use a technical word - and is about acknowledging Christ as Lord. As Saint Paul says in the portion from his first letter to the Corinthians that we just read:

No one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit, which was poured on the world on Pentecost, continues to claim souls for Christ, and to guide these souls towards union with Him and the Father. More than this, as St. Paul continues to teach, it makes us one body. This is the body that we belong to, the mystical body of Christ, which is His Church. We are, through baptism, therefore, not Jews, or Greeks, or slaves or free persons, or Indians, or Pakistanis, or Portuguese, or anything else but Christians; which is to say, one body in Christ, who is our first identity.

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful
and kindle in them the fire of your love.

Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created,
and you shall renew the face of the earth.

(This homily was first preached to the faithful at the Cathedral parish of St. Catherine of Alexandria, Old Goa on the 7 of June 2025, following the first vespers of the solemnity of Pentecost.)

(Image reference: Constantine the Great, accompanied by the bishops of the First Council of Nicaea (325), holding the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed of 381, anonymous icon writer, via Wikipedia.)