Not-vena

One of the reasons I feel that the transfer of the solemnity of the Ascension from the Thursday to the following Sunday is regrettable is owing to the loss of two days of the novena of the Holy Spirit. I mean a novena of seven days just isn't a novena. Pentecost, too, has always been one of my favourite feasts and it is bad enough to have lost the octave in the post-1970 calendar without this further loss. That period between Our Lord's Ascension and the Descent of the Holy Spirit seems worth celebrating in itself as presenting, in the Upper Room, an image of the Church- gathered in prayer with Our Lady.