Though not one of the original Twelve, Barnabas was called an apostle by the early Church. His given name was Joseph, but the apostles gave him a new name, Barnabas, meaning “son of encouragement” (Acts 4:36), a name which seems to capture his mission in life, because he was someone who built others up, who opened doors, who believed in people when others doubted them.

He first appears in Acts as a generous disciple of our Lord, selling a field and laying the proceeds at the apostles’ feet. But his deeper significance emerges when he welcomes a newly converted Saul — later Paul — into the Christian community. Others were understandably suspicious of Paul, given his past as a persecutor, but Barnabas believed in the change grace had wrought. He stood beside Paul and introduced him to the apostles. In doing so, he opened the door to one of the greatest missionary vocations in history, because without Paul’s energy and enthusiasm, the Church would have found the work of evangelisation far more difficult.

Later, when the Church in Antioch began to grow, it was Barnabas who was sent from Jerusalem to guide and encourage this fledgling Gentile community. He rejoiced in what he saw and again reached out to Paul, inviting him to join in the work. Together they became the first great missionary pair of the Church.

What stands out is Barnabas’ quiet, steady presence: not dominating, not desperately seeking attention, but enabling others to shine, especially Paul. And even when Paul and Barnabas had a disagreement over whether to bring along the young John Mark, Barnabas again chose to believe in the one who had previously failed. He took Mark with him and gave him another chance. Later, Paul himself would commend Mark as “useful to me in ministry” (2 Tim. 4:11) and all perhaps because Barnabas had chosen not to give up on him.

Barnabas teaches us something vital about the Christian life: that encouragement is not a lesser gift. It is a grace that often works behind the scenes, lifting the discouraged, believing in those whom others distrust, and enabling vocations to flourish. The Church needs not only great preachers and saints, but also people like Barnabas, who see potential, who forgive, who strengthen, who believe.

His life invites us to ask: Whom might I encourage today? Is there someone whose gifts need drawing out? Is there someone who failed once but deserves another chance?

Barnabas was a bridge-builder, a man of generosity, humility, and peace. He reminds us that to be an apostle is not just to proclaim the Word, but to make space for others to proclaim it too.

St Barnabas, Son of encouragement, pray for us.

At the Ascension we heard how Jesus, before he returned to the Father, told the Apostles not to leave Jerusalem, but to wait for the “promise of the Father… in a few days you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit” (Acts 1:5). The Apostles and other disciples, together with Our Lady, waited in the Upper Room, where the Lord had celebrated the Last Supper, where they had hidden in fear after his death, and where he had appeared to them on Easter Sunday. They waited, and waited. A day and a night passed, and then another, and then another. Only ten days later, on the Jewish feast of Pentecost, did the promised Spirit arrive, in wind and flame.

We might ask why the Lord made them wait so long. Pentecost, the Jewish harvest festival and celebration of the giving of the Law, was an appropriate day for descent of the Holy Spirit, who is the law of the New Covenant placed in the heart of believers and the power to harvest men and women for Christ’s kingdom. A long wait gave them plenty of time to learn from Our Lady about the Lord’s early life, as a lovely tradition tells us, and to be formed by her to cooperate with the Holy Spirit whom she had known since her Conception.

Perhaps the most fitting explanation for the long wait was that God wanted the early Church to grow in desire for the Holy Spirit promised by Christ, to long for the Spirit’s presence, to see and know all the reasons why they needed his guidance and help, so that they would be totally receptive and responsive, like Our Lady, to his power coming down upon them.

This experience of desiring the Spirit is a lesson the Church wants each of us to learn — not just as we wait for the yearly celebration of Pentecost, but every day of our lives. We pray “Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful, and kindle in them the fire of your love”. The Holy Spirit has already come into our hearts, at our baptism, at Confirmation, every time we receive Holy Communion and the other sacraments. The Holy Spirit comes with every absolution of our sins, and speaks in our hearts in every prayer and good work. And yet we keep praying, “Come!” Our need for the power of the Spirit is always the same, and yet always new, as we encounter new challenges, meet new obstacles, have new needs.

In the Veni Creator Spiritus hymn for Pentecost we beg the Holy Spirit to take up his rest in our hearts, to come with his grace and heavenly aid, to fill the hearts he has made, to give us his sevenfold gift of grace, to illumine our minds, inflame our hearts, strengthen our bodies, repel our enemies, give us peace, and help us to know God the Father and the Son. The Sequence for the Mass of Pentecost asks the Spirit to comfort us, give us rest in labour, refreshment in heat, solace in tribulation, cleansing what is impure, irrigating what is desiccated, healing what is wounded, bending whatever is stubborn, warming whatever is frozen, putting back on the narrow way whatever leads us astray, granting us the reward of virtue, the end of salvation and eternal joy. That is quite a list!

The more we realise our need for the Holy Spirit and the more we ask of him, the more he is able to do for us. And so we wait, and pray, and implore: “Come, Holy Spirit.”

“The feast hath been too much for him;
His heart is full, his eye is dim,”

Those words of Fr Faber’s hymn The Death of Saint Philip are no doubt still ringing in the ears of many of St Philip’s sons and friends after the great feast of Our Holy Father, which we celebrated on Monday. This year we do not have much time to hold on to the memory of that day before the Church directs us, not elsewhere, still to Heaven, but seen through different lenses. On Tuesday we continued our May devotions to Our Lady, and then on Wednesday night we sing First Vespers of the Ascension and celebrate that feast all through Thursday. St Philip, Our Lady, and Our Lord — all in the space of a few days — what more could we ask for? St Philip himself reminds us: “He who wishes for anything but Christ, does not know what he wishes; he who asks for anything but Christ, does not know what he is asking; he who works, and not for Christ, does not know what he is doing.”

Our Holy Father himself preferred nothing to the love of God. His entire life was spent “going from Christ to Christ”, be it in prayer or in his apostolic labours. He was, as has been written, “naturally supernatural”. The account of St Philip’s death could really be an account of any day of his life. He rose early, welcomed those who came seeking confession, he prayed, he celebrated Mass, he received his spiritual children and conversed with them familiarly on the things of God. But he knew it would be his last day upon this earth and so every action of his that day was done in the knowledge that it would be his last.

Ascension Thursday then directs our gaze heavenwards too. It reminds us of the hope we have for those who have gone before us in death and urges us on in our prayers for them. Above all it reminds us that like Christ, like St Philip, we too shall pass through death, and please God, one day join them in Heaven. It is there that Our Redeemer awaits us, having prepared there a place for us. It is the reminder of Heaven that allows us to live and breath in that sure and certain hope which is so indispensable in our Christian life, and which is the source of our Christian joy. It was his loving familiarity with the things of Heaven that gave Saint Philip his natural supernaturality.

Please God each of us will allow St Philip to be that loving, gentle, and kind Father who will lead us to Heaven too.