The Feast commemorating the Descent of the Holy Spirit was established by the Apostles themselves, who celebrated the day of Pentecost annually and commanded all Christians to remember the descent of the Holy Spirit (cf. 1 Cor. 16:8; Acts 2:1–4, 20:16). In the Apostolic Constitutions, there is a direct command to observe Pentecost: “Ten days after the Ascension is the fiftieth day from the first day of the Lord (Pascha); let this day be a great feast, for at the third hour of this day, the Lord Jesus sent the gift of the Holy Spirit.”
This feast is called Pentecost because the event being celebrated occurred on the Old Testament Feast of Pentecost, and also because it is observed on the fiftieth day after the Feast of Feasts—the Resurrection of Christ. It is also referred to as the Day of the Descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles (according to the liturgical commemoration of the event) and as the Day of the Holy Trinity. This latter name is explained by the fact that the Descent of the Holy Spirit revealed the full activity of the Third Person of the Holy Trinity and manifested the participation of all three Divine Persons in the economy of salvation. Therefore, on this feast, the Church especially calls the faithful to worship the Triune God: “The Son in the Father with the Holy Spirit.”
On the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit appeared to the world in a visible form and became sensibly present to the human soul through the gifts of salvific grace—as expressed in the festal hymn:
“You ascended in glory to the Mount of Olives, O Christ God, before Your disciples, and sat at the right hand of the Father, filling all things with divinity. You sent them the Holy Spirit, enlightening, strengthening, and sanctifying our souls.”
The Holy Spirit, always united and indivisible in action with the Father and the Son, renews humanity and fills us with the life-giving power of Christ. The Holy Spirit is the Source of holiness and life. He enlightens and sanctifies every person who abides in Christ. He is Life, and the Giver of life.
On the day of Pentecost, the mystery of the Holy Trinity was revealed. God—one in essence and three in persons—is Love. Divine love has been poured into the hearts of the faithful by the Holy Spirit through the Son. Prayers to the Holy Trinity accompany a person from birth to death. The first words spoken by the Church to a newborn are: “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The infant is baptised “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” In the sacrament of Chrismation, the Church seals the newly baptised with “the gift of the Holy Spirit.” For those who genuinely repent, sins are forgiven in the sacrament of Confession—“in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.” The sacrament of Marriage is celebrated in the name of the Holy Trinity. The priest’s final prayer at the funeral ends with the glorification of the Holy Trinity.
The liturgical service for Pentecost, through its troparia, stichera, canons, readings from the Old and New Testaments, reveals the essence of the Church’s teaching on the Holy Trinity and the Holy Spirit. According to ecclesiastical hymns, Pentecost is the “feast both final and great.” It concludes the cycle of major feasts, from the Annunciation of the Most Holy Theotokos to Pascha and the Ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. Pentecost marks the culmination of the path of the Cross undertaken by the God-Man Jesus Christ for the salvation of the world; it is the day of the founding of the Church of Christ, within which our salvation is accomplished by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
The mystery of this wondrous feast is best understood through participation in the liturgical services. Preserved testimonies exist regarding how Pentecost was celebrated in the earliest centuries of Christianity. The pilgrim Egeria visited the Holy Land in the fourth century…
In her travel diary, Egeria recorded that the service for Pentecost in Jerusalem began at night in the Church of the Resurrection. At dawn, the faithful would proceed to Mount Zion, where, according to tradition, stood the house in which the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles. There, the prayer continued. After a brief rest, the faithful would gather again for a liturgical service at the site of the Lord’s Ascension on the Mount of Olives. At dusk, the procession would return to the Church of the Resurrection. The celebration lasted nearly the entire day.
One of the liturgical features unique to this feast is the Vespers of Holy Pentecost. During this service, three kneeling prayers—composed by Saint Basil the Great—are offered. In these prayers, we confess our sins before our Heavenly Father, asking for forgiveness and for the gracious aid that comes from above. We pray to the Lord Jesus Christ to grant us the grace of the Holy Spirit, that we may be instructed and strengthened in keeping the commandments of God. In the third kneeling prayer, the Church offers intercession for the repose of the souls of all the departed.
The celebration of Pentecost continues in the days that follow. During the week between the Feast of Pentecost and the Sunday of All Saints, there is no fasting. We glorify the Holy Spirit in the same way as we exalted the Resurrection of the Son of God in hymn and chant. In a testimony from the early thirteenth century, we find the following interpretation: “There is no fasting in the week after Pentecost in honour of our Saviour Jesus Christ, for the Holy Spirit is equally honourable with the Father and the Son, and by Their goodwill the mystery of our rebirth has been fulfilled, and we have been illumined with the knowledge of God.”
After Pentecost, the Resurrection of Christ becomes a present reality, and not merely an event of the past. This truth is powerfully articulated by Bishop Kallistos Ware of Diokleia, who states:
“We must not merely say: ‘Christ has risen,’ but rather ‘Christ is risen,’ for He now lives—for me and in me.”
This immediacy and personal direction in our relationship with Christ is the work of the Holy Spirit. Every transformation in human life is a testimony to the Resurrection of Christ and the descent of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost.
The Resurrection of Christ is the first and decisive moment in the life of the Church—a moment which, in his Gospel, the Apostle John refers to as “the last day” (hē eschatē hēmera, cf. Jn. 6:39–40, 44). The Holy Spirit was given on the day of Pentecost for the universal proclamation of the Gospel in the world. With Pentecost, the Church begins its path of service and witness. The fruit of the Resurrection, the Ascension, and Pentecost is the Church itself—in which these culminating events in the life of Christ are continually experienced and affirmed. The Church unceasingly bears witness to the truth of the Incarnation, Death, and Resurrection of Christ, and the Spirit within the Church carves out a new path and sets it in motion “to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).
This text was published on the Kinonia portal, in the column “From the Editor’s Pen,” on 8 June 2025.
WRITTEN BY: Catechist Branislav Ilić, Editor of the portal Kinonia
