Today
we celebrate the great solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord. There
is nothing more that Jesus can do now among us, his course is complete, and now
it is all ready to shift into another gear. But what is clear is that he will not abandon us, he will remain in a
newer dimension for all ages until the end of time. This great new
dimension would be the Church, his Mystical Body, that would solidify and be
inaugurated in 10 days’ time when the
Holy Spirit would come upon the Apostles, and they and their successors and
helper priests would make sure that Jesus is really and truly, sacramentally,
present until the end of time.
As for Jesus now – he came, so
to speak, to live our lives – but as
we live them imperfectly, he came to
live them perfectly. In Jesus it is
possible for us to strive for true, real and genuine perfection. And then,
after we have cooperated with all our might, all the days of our lives, he will
share with us the fullness of his merits: newness
of life, risen life, forever in God’s heart, in God’s love.
We thank Jesus with all our
being today for showing us the most challenging pattern of all – that we must
also participate in willingly and lovingly as he did the repeated patterns of
death and resurrection, dying and rising, falling down and getting up that are
a part of the human condition. But now thanks to him death is swallowed up
ultimately, and every fall can be the opportunity for a victorious rising.
You
ascended, Jesus, to the highest heavens today, and are now the joy of the angels and saints,
you are also our hope and our goal, as well as our comforter and our friend,
but most of all you remain our Savior. And you have asked us to take this
message and your presence to the ends of
the earth and to every creature – may we be generous in our response this
day and every one hereafter: for King of
all the earth is God – and everyone needs to know this!
God mounts his throne to shouts of joy: a
blare of trumpets for the Lord.
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