Pentecost – The Birthday of the Church

Pentecost – Te Birthday of the Church

As we celebrate the beginning of the mission of the Church in the world with the Gift of the. Holy Spirit, I invite you to prayerfully reflect on one of my favorite prayers in the whole treasury of the Church, prayer, the Sequencefor Pentecost. A translation of the original Latin Veni Creator

Spiritus, written by the French Benedictine monk Rabanus Maurus, the Church has prayed these words for almost twelve centuries through all manner of joys, sorrows, tragedies, and

renewals:

Come, Holy Spirit, come

and from Your celestial home

shed a ray of light divine.

Come, Father of the poor,

come, source of all our store,

come, within our bosoms shine.

You, of comforters the best,

You, the soul’s most welcome Guest,

sweet refreshment here below.

In our labor, rest most sweet,

grateful coolness in the heat,

solace in the midst of woe.

O most blessed Light divine,

shine within these hearts of Yours,

and our inmost being fill.

Where You are not, we have naught,

nothing good in deed or thought,

nothing free from taint of ill.

Heal our wounds, our strength renew,

on our dryness pour Your dew,

wash the stains of guilt away.

Bend the stubborn heart and will,

Melt the frozen, warm the chill,

guide the steps that go astray.

On the faithful, who adore

and confess You, evermore

in Your seven-fold gifts descend.

Give them virtue’s sure reward,

give them Your salvation, Lord,

give them joys that never end.

Amen. Alleluia.