After Easter, Pentecost is one of the most important festivals of the church. A recent children’s book about Pentecost, published by Paraclete Press, is appropriately titled, “The Day that God Made Church.” On Pentecost, meaning fifty days after Easter, the Holy Spirit descended in power, filling and overflowing the apostles and other witnesses to the Resurrection. A tradition in the East joins this experience to the story of the Tower of Babel, as told in this ancient hymn:
When the Most High confounded the tongues,
he dispersed the nations:
but when he distributed the tongues of life,
he called all men to unity