How many of us have rejoiced or lamented being identified simply as the brother, sister, mother, cousin or friend of another? Have said to ourselves, "I want to be known for who I am, not defined by my family or friends"? That seems typical of U.S. people, whose way of thinking is formed by our myths of independence and pulling ourselves up.

But the attitude is not new, nor born in the U.S.A. The French philosopher René Descartes promulgated an idea that has influenced us for nearly 300 years. The phrase? "I think, therefore I am." 

The idea that he needed nothing more than his own mind to prove his existence is one of the legs on which today's individualism stands. Yet, his statement has a fatal flaw.

Descartes' grandmother raised him. His grandmother ushered him into the world of words and personal awareness. The error in Descartes' thinking comes from missing the fact that he would not have had any self-awareness had not his grandmother held him and said, "I'm Mémé, you are René!" He began to understand who he was because she called him by name and he, her. Their relationship, and all his others, deepened his humanity. We become who we are through relationships.

In many areas of Africa, the word ubuntu is a key to each person's identity. It's translated, "I am because we are." This describes personhood as happening through our relationships, through community. Those who understand ubuntu have uncovered one of the deepest truths of Christianity and an understandable image of our Trinitarian God. 

Today, we hear Sophia, holy wisdom, tell us who she is. She describes herself as "brought forth" by God and participating as God's artisan in the work of creation. Her entire sense of self comes from her relationship with God.

We see the same thing in Jesus, especially in the Gospel of John. In today's Gospel we hear, "Everything that the Father has is mine," implying that he and the Father live in and through one another.

The most unique aspect of Christianity is our understanding of God as triune, a community of three persons, equal and different, each of whom are who they are through their relationship with the others. They continually draw one another into being as persons whose uniqueness is called forth through their ongoing relationship.

This sounds pretty heady. For a simpler explanation, we can turn to the truth behind the Genesis creation myths. In Genesis 1, we hear that God created humanity in the divine image. Genesis 2's story of Eve and Adam illustrates what that means. In short, God saw Adam's loneliness and so created all sorts of living things to accompany him. Yet even with animals and plants to name and appreciate, Adam's loneliness remained. 

God's solution? Create another like and different from Adam. Until someone could call him by name and love and challenge him, Adam wasn't really human — he was just a solo, name-giving creature who could think, who had not yet been called forth into personhood. Voilà, Eve.

Human beings are images of God, the always interrelating, ever-loving Trinity. Entering into God's joy in communal existence is the why and the goal of our lives. As Jesus said in so many ways, the more we love, the more we relate, the more we enter into his participation in the Trinity.

Paul says as much to the Romans: "We have peace with God through [our relationship with] Jesus Christ ... and we boast in hope of the glory of God." 

He goes on to say, "The love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit." That suggests that we know the glory of God through every Christ-like relationship of love. Each person we encounter can draw us more deeply into our union with God and all that God loves.

What might we do with this understanding of our potential to model and participate in the Trinity? First of all, let's celebrate! Today can be like all our family celebrations rolled into one. As we celebrate our loving relationships, let us also take prayerful time to become more aware of how these loves make us who we are.

The next step is to broaden our circle. Whether in person or via other sorts of communication, we will grow in the divine likeness to the degree that we love others, taking in their joys and feeling their plight to the point that we feel impelled to act like siblings, responding to others' needs and participating in their ways of loving. This deepens our participation in the life of the Trinity.

When we grasp this, we'll be overjoyed to be identified with the Trinity and every other person who is, was and will be.

We're celebrating one of the greatest feasts of the church year and all we have for evidence of it is a short account from the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles, also called the second volume of the Gospel of Luke. Since the story is so short, we should look very carefully at what Luke wrote, assuming that he meant this brief narrative to tell us much more than we might expect.

He begins, "When the time for Pentecost was fulfilled." That indicates that Pentecost, a word that comes from a Greek expression referring to the 50th day, is not originally a Christian feast. For the Jewish people, this feast commemorates the time when God gave Moses the Law, the greatest expression of God's deepest connection to humankind. Thus, celebrating Pentecost indicates that we are living in the fulfillment of that living relationship.

The allusions to Jesus' Jewish tradition continue in many of the details of the story.

When Moses went up the mountain, the entire people were gathered below waiting for what he could tell them of God and God's will. Luke tells us that, on the Christian Pentecost, "they were all in one place," but he doesn't tell what they were waiting for.

The sound like a great wind recalls the noise the people heard when Moses met with God on Mount Sinai (Exodus 19-20). The immensity of that moment with wind and tremendous thunder-like sounds is reinterpreted in the Christian Scripture where it is more inspiring than frightening.

Luke tells us that the Pentecost time of remembering God's law was "fulfilled." That word, sumpleroo, speaks of completion, the achievement of all that the law was meant to be. Something new is afoot. This sumpleroo "filled the house," it became the disciples' new way of dwelling together, there was a new atmosphere among them. 

The "tongues as of fire," recall John the Baptist's proclamation that the one to come would baptize them not with water, but with fire.

The essence of the experience was that they were filled with the Holy Spirit. Their relationship with God had gone beyond dialogue and commandments and became indwelling. The disciples' ability to speak in other languages, their preaching, everything that would result from their discipleship, rested on that one reality: They were filled with the Holy Spirit.

Today's other readings and the sequence comment on this event. In the psalm, we beg for the experience of God's indwelling that renews our Earth. St. Paul's message to the Corinthians explains that because the gifts of God are too much for any one person to receive, they can only be experienced in community, where the diversity of people (cultures, languages, experience, viewpoints) can begin to express who God is.

Writing to the Romans, Paul describes his mystical vision of the Spirit dwelling in us and creating us anew, not as mere mortals, but as people of the Resurrection. That is exactly what we ask for in the sequence: "Come Holy Spirit ... shed your light, fill our inmost being."

John's Gospel brings us back to the end of the day of the Resurrection. Jesus overcomes all barriers, offering peace instead of fear to his beloved disciples. That lack of fear and awareness of God in them was all they needed to carry forth Jesus' mission — until the end of time. The sign that best expresses it was the forgiveness of sins.

The message the disciples were to carry forward proclaimed that no one need be tied to their past, whether it is a past of oppression like that of the people enslaved in Egypt or being defined by their worst moments instead of their potential. Forgiveness ushers everyone into the realm of God's future, far beyond any sad or sinful past.

Pentecost completes our celebration of Easter. Today, we remember each moment in which we have felt the influence of God's Spirit. Before you say that it's beyond you, the very fact that you are reading the Scriptures and reflecting on them demonstrates that the Spirit is leading you toward something deeper than you yet know. 

Paul said that there are many kinds of gifts. We ought not disparage the Spirit's influence in our lives just because tongues of fire haven't brightened our way or we have trouble with other languages or even our own words. The marvels we read about are nothing more than that, signs and symbols of what the Spirit is constantly working in the world.

Today's feast reminds us that God not only chose to dwell among us, but to dwell in us. That mutual indwelling grows for a lifetime. It fulfills every human life.