The interval between the Ascension and Pentecost was archetypal for a particular kind of prayer: the novena. Before the end of His final post-Resurrection bodily appearances to His disciples, Christ instructed them on the fortieth day to remain in Jerusalem, wait, and pray for the coming of the Holy Spirit. He did not specify how long. They were to wait on God’s time, not their schedule. (For more, see here.)

Taking seriously the historical nature of Christianity, which is an expression of the truth of the Incarnation — God and man in time and space — means that the interval between Ascension and Pentecost has spiritual significance. Catholic spiritual theology traditionally recognized that interim as the Church’s first “novena,” i.e., nine days of focused prayer for a particular intention, in this case the coming of the Paraclete.

I have criticized the “pastoral” tampering with the day of the Ascension — its transfer from Thursday to Sunday — because the events in question ought not to be deemed mere historical happenstance. “40 days” is not an arbitrary Biblical number, five weeks and five days. Jesus spends a Biblically significant time period preparing His disciples, then leaves them to contribute their human prayer and waiting for another ten, until fulness is achieved (7 x 7, i.e., perfection times perfection = 49 + superlative addition of 1 = 50 days).

All that is lost in the name of “pastoral accommodation” that dissociates Ascension and Pentecost.

The Novena to the Holy Spirit (its text is here) is not just a nice pious idea. There is no denying that, post-Vatican II, no small circle of liturgists and “pastoral” implementers decided that novenas were old women’s pious devotions that did not fit their notions of “liturgical renewal.” I recall parishes that had active communities where people attended novenas regularly (including novenas within Mass) which were decimated in the 1960s and 1970s by “renewing” clergy who decided they did not want to officiate at what helped assemble those smelly sheep.

The Novena to the Holy Spirit reminds us to focus on some concrete ideas about the truths of the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity and His role in our sanctification. That is far more important than gaseous talk about “conversations in the Spirit” and “the Spirit’s working in modern times” that are generally short on prayer or deeper discernment within the continuity of Church tradition. This annual interval should be an opportunity for Catholics to consider what Vincent Gourdon and Michaël Gasperoni called “the forgotten sacrament”: Confirmation. The sacrament that should animate how an adult Catholic lives and functions in the Church is rarely, if ever mentioned. The role of the “seven gifts of the Holy Spirit” in terms of personal sanctification and communal responsibility likewise gets short shrift.

And we have lost all this focus, and the time to do it, in the name of “pastoral” care? That is risible.

In the meantime, I suggest serious Catholics recover what liturgical vandalism has distorted and use these days between Ascension and Pentecost to recover an awareness of the significance of the Paraclete’s coming, for the Church and for me, through waiting and prayer. Like the Novena to the Holy Spirit.