Every year, 40 days after Easter Sunday, we celebration the solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord. There is perhaps some confusion about when exactly we celebrate the Ascension. This solemnity falls on a Thursday each year, but in our Diocese and in many other Dioceses in our country, it is transferred to the following Sunday in our liturgical calendar so that more of the faithful can be present at Mass for this important solemnity. As we celebrate the Ascension today, think about how every Sunday during the profession of the Nicene Creed, we profess our belief that Jesus “ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father.”
Even as the Ascension is central to our Christian beliefs, even as we profess our belief in the Ascension every Sunday during Mass, perhaps the Ascension has lost its meaning in the lived experiences of too many Catholics today. During Lent and Easter, we understand the meaning of Jesus’ 40 days in the desert, of his death and resurrection as a part of our salvation, of his sending of the Holy Spirit to accompany us on our journey. But how does the Ascension of Jesus affect our lives in the present?
I think of the words of the great 5th century theologian St Augustine of Hippo in North Africa that he preached in a homily celebrating the Ascension: “Today our Lord Jesus ascended into heaven; let our hearts ascend with him…. If you have risen with Christ, set your hearts on the things that are above where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God; seek the things that are above, not the things that are on earth (below).” Augustine explains that just as a part of Jesus remains with us here on earth even after his Ascension into heaven, so already a part of us is in heaven with him, even though our promise of eternal life has not yet been fulfilled. In baptism, we became members of the Body of Christ. Since Jesus is the head and we are the body, we are one in Christ, a reality that goes back to the teachings of the Early Church. So, if Jesus ascended in heaven, we as a part of his body, reflect that reality as well. We cannot be separated from him completely.
As we celebrate the Ascension of the Lord today and as we celebrate the ordination to the transitional diaconate today of parishioner Andrew Bowden, let our hearts be filled with Easter joy.
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