You Belong Here

Pentecost Sunday

Reading: 1 Corinthians 12:3-13

Pentecost is one of those feast days that resists easy interpretation. Sure, you might say it’s the birthday of the Church, but that’s a bit like calling the Transfiguration a “mountaintop picnic” or Stonewall a “bar fight.” It’s not wrong, but it misses the dynamism, the movement, the complexity and the significance of it all.

Today’s readings themselves offer a much more compelling picture. Tongues of fire, rushing wind, and a cacophony of languages... No wonder some of the bystanders accused the Apostles of day-drinking! It sounds more like a Pride block party than a demure Catholic liturgy.

Pentecost is certainly not a quiet feast, but it is a tremendously important one. I think the easiest on-ramp to understanding the meaning of it all is not the dramatic first reading from Acts, but the second reading. St. Paul, writing to a squabbling little church in Corinth, gives us the interpretive key:

“There are different kinds of gifts… but the same Spirit.”

“Different forms of service… but the same Lord.”

“Different workings… but the same God.”

Many and one. One and many. The relationship between these two concepts has been a preoccupation of philosophers since Plato. It also happens to be the tension at the center of this feast.

From the beginning, our human impulse has been to scatter. We like to split into factions, draw lines, decide who’s in and who’s out, and then wage war against our rival tribes. Although God made us to be one (cf. Gen 1:27; 2:18), we’ve been fracturing into the many ever since.

God, however, has also been at work. You might say the entire narrative arc of the Old Testament is the story of God gathering His people, calling them back again and again into relationship with Himself and communion with one another, as much as they resist Him and continue to scatter. From Abraham to Moses, from Exodus to the exile and return, from the Psalms to the prophets, God is at work, forming one people for Himself (cf. Deut 7:6–8; Isaiah 56:3–8).

And the goal of God’s work was never just to establish a sacred “inner circle.” It was always that all the nations would be blessed, that all of humanity would become His people, that the whole world would be drawn in to that communion. Jesus prays for exactly this in John 17: “That they may all be one… so that the world may believe.”

That prayer is answered at Pentecost. But notice: it’s not answered in the Temple, or any other “holy place.” The holiness of God’s Spirit doesn’t descend into a sanctuary set apart from the world. It comes roaring into a secular place, an upstairs room, like any ordinary flat above a common inn. The Spirit of God is poured out into the world. And the apostles, filled with that Spirit, are immediately sent out to the ends of the earth—not to build a new Temple, but to carry the fire to every tribe and people and tongue, to proclaim the Good News in every language under heaven, and to baptize everyone “with water and the Spirit” (John 3:5, Acts 1:8). That’s the mandate: not to make more divisions, but to gather all of humanity into the holy people of God.

The word ekklesia, which we translate as “Church,” literally means “those who are called out.” But we should not imagine that we have been called out of the world and into the Church, as if these two were diametrically opposed, like St. Augustine’s “City of God” and “city of man.” No, we are called out of our divisions, our rivalries, our fear-based identities, and called into a Spirit-filled communion that embraces every nation, every difference, every person made new in Christ.

Let’s be clear: Jesus was not praying for the kind of oneness that erases differences or enforces conformity. The miracle of Pentecost is not that everyone was suddenly able to speak the same language. In fact, it’s exactly the opposite. The miracle is that each person hears the Good News in their own language. Nobody has to give up who they are to belong to the People of God.

This feast should hit a little differently, then, for anyone who’s ever been told they don’t belong or that they need to change in order to stay within the fold. If the cacophony of tongues this morning tells us anything, it’s that our differences are not a threat to unity. In fact, they’re what make that unity living and glorious.

We hear phrases like “the Body of Christ” so often, they start to lose their meaning. They become dead, inert symbols, no longer capable of communicating anything real. But if we try to hear Paul’s words with fresh ears, we might recognize that a body is an incredibly complex, interdependent system in which every part has value. There’s no such thing as a disposable body part. Sure, you can survive without an arm or a kidney, but that doesn’t mean they’re worthless. Every part matters to the whole.

Of course, plenty of Christians have tried to co-opt Paul’s metaphor. “You belong,” they might say, but the tone implies: Barely. Maybe you’re the appendix. You might be technically part of the body, but you’re mostly just a nuisance. Some even say the quiet part out loud: LGBTQ+ people are like a cancer in the Body of Christ. We need to be removed.

Such people would do well to reread St. Paul’s words and take them to heart. “If one part suffers, all suffer with it; if one part is honored, all share in its joy” (1 Cor 12:26). No part of the Body is optional. No part is expendable. Every part has dignity. Every part belongs.

That’s why I like to think of Pentecost, not just as the Church’s birthday, but as the feast of divine integration: the day when all the scattered languages and tribes and gifts and wounds of humanity are, not erased, but gathered in to the living Body of Christ.

As I’m coming to recognize, for many queer folks, Pride Month is its own kind of Pentecost. It’s a time when people of all different backgrounds come together to celebrate our differences and unique identities within a shared community. It’s a space of vibrant diversity that refuses to collapse into sameness, yet reveals a glorious, vibrant, living communion.

Here, too, I believe the Spirit of God is at work. The same Spirit who hovered over the waters at the creation of the world, who overshadowed Mary at the Annunciation, who set the apostles on fire in the upper room… That Spirit is still gathering people in. Especially the ones who’ve been told they don’t belong.

So when we hear voices, whether in the Church or within ourselves, saying somebody doesn’t belong, it’s worth pausing to ask: What spirit is speaking here?

Is it the Spirit of God, who gathers, heals, and builds communion?

Or is it the spirit of fear, shame, and division, which builds walls and drives people away?

One spirit brings death. The other brings life.

One scatters. The other gathers.

One excludes. The other makes room.

Today, on this wild, windy feast of divine integration, let’s listen to the Holy Spirit. He is here. He is with us. And if you’ve been waiting for someone to tell you that you belong, hear this now:

You don’t need to become anyone you’re not.

You don’t need to erase who you are to be made one in Christ.

You don’t need to earn your place in the Body.

The Spirit of God already knows your name.

He speaks your language.

And He says: “You belong here.”

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Reflection Questions:

• Where do I feel the Spirit is drawing me in?

• What “languages” do I speak (gifts, identities, perspectives) that the Church might need to hear more fully?

• How might I help create a space where others know they belong, especially those who’ve been told they don’t?