One of the ritual actions that we perform on the feast of Pentecost is to kneel for the first time in 50 days. Kneeling takes on a new meaning on this feast. It signifies that we understand with deep humility the gifts of the Spirit which God has bestowed upon us. These gifts are permanent dispositions that move us to respond to the guidance of the Spirit. The traditional list of these gifts is derived from, Isaiah (11:1-3) and include:

wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, fortitude, reverence or piety and wonder and awe in God’s presence (fear of the Lord).

These are all powers that we say God possesses. He shares them with us if only we open ourselves to the Spirit within us.

The practice of kneeling especially during portions of the Divine Liturgy then continues through the remainder of the Church Year. In many Eastern Churches kneeling is not necessarily one of the ordinary ritual practices.

A second unique ritual practice that is observed with the Feast of Pentecost is that beginning with this feast, Sundays return to being the end of the week and not the beginning of the week as they are during the days after Easter.

Pentecost is frequently misunderstood to be a feast focused on the worship of the Holy Spirit. Actually Pentecost commemorates the event itself of the descent of the Holy Spirit while             Pentecost Monday is dedicated to paying special worship to the Holy Spirit as the Third Person of the Trinity. So Pentecost truly celebrates the impact of the gift of God’s Spirit. It is the Divine Force which forms us into the Church. The prayers of Pentecost Monday actually say this:

On this day we honor that all-holy and life-giving and all-powerful Spirit, one God in the Holy Trinity, one in dignity, one in nature and one in glory with the Father and the Son.

The Synods of Zamost and Lviv call Monday the feast of the Holy Trinity. An Ukrainian Typicon (i.e., a book which indicates how services should be taken), indicates that the feast can be considered a feast of the Holy Trinity. It would seem that it is more properly considered the feast of the Holy Trinity since it is by the work of the Holy Trinity that humankind has been granted the gifts of the Spirit.

The special kneeling prayers that we use on our celebration of Pentecost are, in reality, a part of the Vespers service and St. Basil the Great is the person who directed that these prayers be said while kneeling as a sign of respect. We now say them during the Divine Liturgy