Sunday, June 4, 2028
Liturgical Color: Red
Pentecost (alternative)
O God, who on this day taught the hearts of your faithful people by sending to them the light of your Holy Spirit: Grant us by the same Spirit to have a right judgment in all things, and evermore to rejoice in his holy comfort; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Pentecost
Through Jesus Christ our Lord; according to whose most true promise, the Holy Spirit came down from heaven, lighting upon the disciples, to teach them and to lead them into all truth, giving them boldness and fervent zeal constantly to preach the Gospel to all nations; by which we have been brought out of darkness and error into the clear light and true knowledge of you, and of your Son Jesus Christ.
Most liturgical texts are from the Book of Common Prayer (2019) of the Anglican Church in North America.
The New Coverdale Psalter, © 2019 by the Anglican Church in North America. Used by permission.
Pentecost
Red Letter Day
Bishop of Rome, Ecumenist, and Reformer of the Church
Ecumenical Commemoration
The descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles fifty days after Easter. As the Law was given at Sinai after the Exodus, so the Spirit is given after the Resurrection.
Pentecost commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles fifty days after Easter (Acts 2:1-41). The name derives from the Greek pentekostos, 'fiftieth,' referring to the Jewish festival of Shavuot (the Feast of Weeks), which falls fifty days after Passover. The typological connection is deliberate and profound: as the Law was given at Sinai fifty days after the Exodus, so the Spirit was given fifty days after the Resurrection, writing the law on human hearts rather than tablets of stone (cf. Jeremiah 31:33, 2 Corinthians 3:3). The Christian observance of Pentecost is among the oldest feasts after Easter itself. Tertullian (De Baptismo 19, c. 200 AD) mentions Pentecost as a season particularly appropriate for baptism, suggesting it was already a significant liturgical occasion by the early third century. The Council of Elvira (c. 305) references the Pentecost season. Eusebius (Vita Constantini 4.64) records that Constantine was baptized at Pentecost. By the fourth century, the feast was universally observed across both East and West. The BCP 2019 lists Pentecost among the seven Principal Feasts — the highest liturgical rank — and the Day of Pentecost is one of the four traditional Ember Day anchors, when prayers are offered for those called to Holy Orders.
Pentecost carries a distinctive liturgical character shaped by its dual identity as both the culmination of Easter and its own feast. The color is red — for the tongues of fire (Acts 2:3) and for the Spirit's presence in the Church. In the medieval West, the custom of releasing doves or dropping rose petals from church ceilings dramatized the Spirit's descent; the French name for Pentecost, Pâques des Roses, recalls this practice. The sequence hymn Veni Sancte Spiritus ('Come, Holy Spirit'), attributed to Stephen Langton (c. 1200), became one of the most beloved Pentecost texts in Western Christianity. In the East, Pentecost is closely linked with the feast of the Holy Trinity, which the Byzantine tradition celebrates on the same day (the West assigns Trinity to the following Sunday). The Kneeling Prayers of Pentecost Vespers in the Byzantine rite mark the formal end of the Paschal season: the congregation kneels for the first time since Easter. The BCP 2019 provides two collects — the first emphasizing the Spirit's revelation of 'the way of eternal life to every race and nation,' the second (from the 1549 BCP) asking for 'a right judgment in all things.' The Old Covenant overlay is significant: Shavuot celebrates both the wheat harvest and the giving of Torah, and the Pentecost narrative in Acts deliberately echoes Sinai imagery — the sound of wind, the appearance of fire, the gathering of nations.
Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, John XXIII, was Bishop of Rome from 1958 to 1963 and the pope who summoned the Second Vatican Council. A diplomat's son of the Bergamo peasantry in Italy, elected at seventy-six as a caretaker, he instead opened the Roman church toward the other Christian communions and toward the world. The affection in which he was held has long outlived him, and his impact on simplifying and unifying the Roman church still resonates today. The maxim he commended in his first encyclical was an old one: in essentials, unity; in doubtful matters, liberty; in all things, charity.
Pope John XXIII (Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli, 1881–1963) was an unexpected revolutionary pope. Born to a peasant family in Bergamo, Italy, he rose through diplomatic service as papal nuncio (ambassador) to Bulgaria, Turkey, France, and Venice before his election as pope at age 77 in 1958. As pope, he inaugurated the Second Vatican Council in 1962—a watershed moment for global Christianity. Vatican II (1962–1965) fundamentally reformed Catholic liturgy, theology, and ecumenical engagement, transitioning the church from institutional defensiveness to evangelical openness. His encyclicals Mater et Magistra (1961) and Pacem in Terris (1963) addressed social justice, human dignity, and peace during the Cold War. Pacem in Terris, issued just months before his death, called for disarmament, international cooperation, and respect for human rights in language that transcended confessional boundaries and influenced global statecraft. His pastoral gentleness and accessibility—evident in his Journal of a Soul (spiritual diary)—revealed a man of deep prayer and humble conviction. He reached out to Orthodox and Protestant churches, demonstrating concrete ecumenical friendship. Though he did not live to see Vatican II's conclusion, its trajectory was set by his vision. The Roman Catholic Church canonized him in 2014.
Pope John XXIII represents the possibility of institutional renewal grounded in pastoral gentleness and evangelical vision. He demonstrates that hierarchy and reform are not incompatible, and that ecclesial tradition can be reinterpreted for new times without being abandoned. His ecumenical openness presaged the modern trajectory toward Christian unity. His social encyclicals established the pope as a prophetic voice for justice and peace. For Anglicanism and other traditions, he embodies unexpected kinship across historic divisions.