"Today in the world there is so much discord, so much division. We are all connected and yet we find ourselves disconnected from each other, anesthetized by indifference and oppressed by loneliness. So many wars, let us think of wars, so many conflicts: the evil that man can do seems incredible!" The Pope said this in his homily at the Mass of Pentecost, celebrated in the Vatican basilica.
And Francis returns to speak of the devil and of the fact that it is he "in reality, who feeds our hostilities". It is "the spirit of division, the devil,
whose name means precisely 'divider'. Yes, to precede and exceed our evil, our disintegration, there is the evil spirit" that "enjoys antagonisms, injustices, calumnies. It's his joy." And then - he added - "in the face of the evil of discord, our efforts to build harmony are not enough. Here then the Lord, at the summit of his Passover, at the summit of salvation, pours out on the created world his good Spirit, the Holy Spirit, who opposes the dividing spirit because he is harmony, the Spirit of unity that brings peace. Let us invoke him every day upon our world, upon our lives and before every work of division."
The Pope therefore invites us to invoke the Spirit to overcome divisions. "If the world is divided, if the Church is polarized, if the heart fragments, we do not waste time criticizing others and getting angry with ourselves, but we invoke the Spirit, He is able to solve these things," he said, before raising a prayer: "Holy Spirit, Spirit of Jesus and of the Father, inexhaustible source of harmony, we entrust the world to you, we consecrate the Church and our hearts to you. Come Creator Spirit, harmony of humanity, renew the face of the earth".
The pontiff also recalls the Synod that is underway in the Church: "it is - and must be - a journey according to the Spirit: not a parliament to claim rights and needs according to the agenda of the world, not an opportunity to go where the wind leads, but the opportunity to be docile to the breath of the Spirit". Without the Spirit, the Pope continued, "the Church is inert, faith is only a doctrine, morality only a duty, pastoral care only a job. And many times we hear so many so-called thinkers, theologians, who give us cold doctrines: they seem mathematical". With the Spirit, instead, "faith is life, the love of the Lord conquers us and hope is reborn. Let us put the Holy Spirit back at the center of the Church", is the Pope's invitation.
The division affects the world but also the Church itself and the Pope today, in the homily of the Mass, launched an invitation: "Let us build harmony in the Church!". The Holy Spirit, at the centre of today's celebration of Pentecost, was given "for a specific purpose: to forgive sins, that is, to reconcile souls, to harmonize hearts torn by evil, shattered by wounds, broken by feelings of guilt".
Harmony is not uniformity: the Spirit "does not create a language that is the same for all, he does not erase differences, cultures, but harmonizes everything without homologating, without standardizing". Francis then reiterated that he is careful of the "temptation of retreat that seeks to homologate everything." The Holy Spirit gave life to the Church not beginning "from a structured project, as we would do, which we often then disperse in our programs; no, He begins by giving free and superabundant gifts." The Christian must respond with docility. And the Pope then asked: "Is my way of living the faith docile or is it instead stubborn", responding "to the so-called doctrines that are only cold expressions?". "Do I promote reconciliation or am I always trying to poke my nose into gossip and destroy?"