Pentecost - The Coming of the Holy Spirit

Secular presentation

The third glorious mystery

Spiritual contact!

We started the series with the Spirit of God being represented by a dove.  The artist uses the same symbolism here, to show the Spirit of God, who Christians call the 'Holy Spirit' coming as if in tongues of fire.

The Holy Spirit comes from the head of the picture, the same place as Jesus' head in the previous picture.  This illustrates that it is Jesus who sends the Holy Spirit to His Church.

These 'tongues of fire' are actually mentioned in a very graphic account in the Bible, in a part called the 'Acts of the Apostles'.  It describes their arrival as being accompanied by a mighty sound, like that of a violent wind.  It's so loud that all the towns-people come out to see what's going on.

The followers of Jesus are gathered here in prayer, as a single body - the Church, waiting for this momentous event.  As the Spirit of God comes, the Church is put into action.  The artist shows them praying just before they respond to the people's curiosity.  Then, having been filled with the Spirit, they will praise God and explain to the people what has taken place - that is the story of Jesus' death and resurrection.  They preach with the encouragement of the Spirit, and they do very well: the account goes on to say that 3,000 people were persuaded to join the Church that day!  Historians might quibble with the accuracy of the numbers but either way, a lot of people clearly opted to follow Jesus in response to this momentous event.