Pentecost

As I child, I often heard the story of the tower of Babel, and took it as a nice story that explained the origins of different languages in our world. However, there is a much deeper meaning to this story which reveals itself if we pay attention to the stated goal of the tower of Babel which was to have its top piercing the clouds and reaching heaven. Focusing on this aspect of the story points to the story as a metaphor for the Promethean hubris of humans who believe that it is possible to transgress the human/divine separation. They aspired to be gods and, drunk with an exaggerated sense of their power, thought that divinity was within their grasp. God punished them and reminded them that divinity does not simply comes through human power. In order to teach them some humility, God dispersed them all across the nations and gave them different languages so that they could not understand one another and therefore would not succumb to the human hubris of thinking that by their own power they could become like God.

Most times humans have sought to create unity on a global or at least continental scale, they have been doomed to failure because they have sought to create this unity through imposition of uniformity. The experience of communism tried to wipe out individual difference – everyone was ideally supposed to be treated the same (though of course, the Orwellian parody of communism revealed that in practice some animals were more equal than others). Particularity was discouraged, leading to a stifling of individual creativity and initiative, ultimately resulting in the demise of the communist regime. China at the moment seems to be pursuing a similar line of politics, most evident in the brazen attempt to stamp out the religious and cultural particularity of the Muslim Uighur minority through massive re-education camps that force them to adopt the Chinese culture and language of the majority.

Human beings have always been blighted by the scourge of the problem of the particular and the universal, the problem of the one and the many. This problem might be summed up in the following way: how do we establish a sense of unity that does not obliterate our autonomy and individuality? Put the other way, how do we protect individual autonomy and uniqueness in a manner that does not ultimately lead to selfishness and egocentricity? In other words, it is possible to create communities that bring the warmth and security of total belonging, where closeness does not threaten independence but enhances it. How can we belong, without being possessed? This is frequently called the porcupine problem – like porcupines we want the warmth and closeness that come with being together – but when we snuggle up we end up pricking ourselves. The question is how do we render difference non-divisive?

Christianity is perhaps the only world religion that has taken seriously the particularity of the cultures in which it has implanted itself. Granted, the Christian missionary drive comprises a patchwork of pastoral strategies that at times showed incredible sensitivity to local cultures while at other times endorsing the systematic eradication and demonization of local cultures. However, on the whole, Christianity has placed an important emphasis on inculturation, the process by which the gospel takes on the flavor of the local culture, a process that is not exhausted simply by translating the bible and the catechism and the hymns at mass into the vernacular. There is a real effort now to seek to express the gospel both theologically and ritually in the culture of the local people. This is in stark contrast to a religion like Islam, for example, where the Word of God in the Koran can only be heard as such in its original language of Arabic. Where translations are provided, they are merely for the convenience of a better understanding, but are not in themselves to be considered the Word of God. Muslims, whether in Kuwait or in Timbuktu must pray in Arabic, and not in their local vernacular. Catholicism on the other hand has allowed a wonderful diversity of liturgical practice to blossom in the myriads of local cultures it has implanted itself, while still claiming to be one Church. It is this effort that really embraces the diversity of a world culture.

Church Fathers very quickly recognized that Pentecost, where all people could suddenly understand Peter in their own foreign languages was the final reversal of the punishment from God meted out after the tower of Babel incident and heralded a new era. The miracle of the Pentecost experience, that Peter spoke in his own language, and he was heard in the other languages. In other words, a unity was achieved without having to erase the particularity of the individuals who constituted that unity. The Pentecost experience heralds God’s desire to gather the whole of humanity under one roof, in one community. Unlike in the story of the tower of Babel, the initiative to become like God is not coming from human beings, but from God. through the gift of God’s spirit, we are enabled to become children of God. This is perhaps the simplest definition of salvation. Salvation is gift of divine sonship and daughtership, given through the Spirit of Jesus Christ, who has become a brother to us all. But God is not a monad, God is a community, God is a Trinity. So in order to become like God, we must become a community, and not simply a community of sameness, not simply a community with those who look and talk like us, but a community of diversity with all the richness of the diversity and newness of the Trinity itself.

The experience of Pentecost was miraculous, in that Peter speaking in Aramaic was heard in the vernacular by Greeks, Arabs, Cretans, Elamites, Parthedians and Medes. It all happened so smoothly, without any effort on any body’s part, neither Peter, nor his listeners. On the birthday of the Church, its first day of existence – God was giving this community God had assembled a foretaste of heaven. However, going forward, things did not remain so easy, and the book of Acts recounts how the Christian community had to do the hard work of welcoming the difference and diversity of the peoples that it would come to welcome into its fold – most notably the difference of the pagan peoples. It was significant that the Holy Spirit led the community as the first council of the Church – the council of Jerusalem – not to impose the laws of Moses on the pagans who entered the Church. In other words, the council did not seek to make everyone the same. It is important to remember that the word “Catholic” means universal, but this universality is not to be bought at the expense of wiping out particularity. We are called to achieve a unity in diversity, and the only way we can do this is through the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Questions for reflection:

1. How much diversity is there in my local parish?
2. How welcoming is my parish of socio-economic, racial and cultural diversity?
3. Do our liturgies at times give expression to this diversity?