Fr. Louis Brioni sx
Only of the Son of Man, after His death and resurrection, we can say that He ascended into the heaven, from which He had descended on March 25th of the year zero in the womb of Mary, the virgin of Nazareth. Yes, this mystery of descension and ascension can only be applicable of the Son of God existing without beginning or end. For us human beings, when we die, we ascend to a place from where we never descended. Unlike for Jesus, our ascension will be a totally new experience, for we never descended from there into the womb of our mothers. Before our conception we just did not exist: we were a nothing that God turned into His creature.
That’s why we can correctly say that, after descending from heaven, Jesus ascended back where He had lived already for all eternity.
However, at His ascension, Jesus’ identity was very different from the day of His descension, for He returned to His only Father not only as His Son, but also as the son of a woman, with her very flesh and blood and bones, as a human being equal to all of us, in our true image and likeness! He returned home as the universal man, the first-born of the new creation, the fulfillment of humanity risen to the heights of the divine. With the Ascension the words of Jesus to Martha, I am the resurrection and the life (Jo 11:25), become evident for all times and places, for each human being.
On the Ascension Day we have lost Jesus, but only physically, for from “there” He can truly be “here”, everywhere, in a mysterious and most real way. He, “through all things were made” (Jo 1:3) has become now the King of God’s Kingdom, the universal Saviour, the Sacred Heart, to which we are all invited to enter and to be loved in full.
By celebrating Jesus Christ’s Ascension, we become ever more aware that the Son of God has entered totally in our human history, and geography, and biology, and chemistry, and physics, and all. He is now one of us, always and everywhere, with no other purpose for His descension but to remain with us as the vine needs its branches to bear fruit (Jo 15:1).
Questions to us then become unavoidable: Do I deeply, sincerely, and totally believe that the crucified and risen Lord loves me now for myself, without any merit of mine? That He loves me from where He is so that one day I can share with Him His life without end?
At times we may feel that God is exacting so many sacrifices from us that we have no chance to enjoy this life on earth. But this is not God’s will. We can only mention one example by recalling Jesus’ 30 years of loving and happy togetherness with His mother Mary in Nazareth.
And, then, does God truly need anything from us that He does not have already?
When we really decide to believe in Jesus Christ, descended and ascended, we quickly come to know that He is always total gift, total life, total love to us. By welcome Him as our Good Brother, our existence becomes holy, complete, eternal as He really is. Yes, we do not deserve Him, but our sins and stubbornness, as we sing on Easter Vigil of the Happy Fault, will make Him our true Saviour, our most reliable Friend.
The details of the Ascension, whether it happened after 40 days or not, whether it was from Jerusalem or Mount Tabor, should not detract us from the reality of Jesus present in our day as the incarnate, crucified, and risen Son of God and son of Mary. He is alive and living and life-giving. That is why in the records of the evangelists Jesus’ last words on earth are: Go out to the whole world … to the whole creation (Mk 16:1).
Believing in Jesus evidently means to take His words seriously for all of us to become GOERS of the Gospel, wherever we are and to every neighbour we have, teaching, baptizing, breaking the bread of life, being one heart and mind, always.
May our Ascension Feast be a joyful moment of thanksgiving to the Lord for having descended first among us, for having share our human destiny, and for sending us, with His “ascended” love, to the whole world!
Only of the Son of Man, after His death and resurrection, we can say that He ascended into the heaven, from which He had descended on March 25th of the year zero in the womb of Mary, the virgin of Nazareth. Yes, this mystery of descension and ascension can only be applicable of the Son of God existing without beginning or end. For us human beings, when we die, we ascend to a place from where we never descended. Unlike for Jesus, our ascension will be a totally new experience, for we never descended from there into the womb of our mothers. Before our conception we just did not exist: we were a nothing that God turned into His creature.
That’s why we can correctly say that, after descending from heaven, Jesus ascended back where He had lived already for all eternity.
However, at His ascension, Jesus’ identity was very different from the day of His descension, for He returned to His only Father not only as His Son, but also as the son of a woman, with her very flesh and blood and bones, as a human being equal to all of us, in our true image and likeness! He returned home as the universal man, the first-born of the new creation, the fulfillment of humanity risen to the heights of the divine. With the Ascension the words of Jesus to Martha, I am the resurrection and the life (Jo 11:25), become evident for all times and places, for each human being.
On the Ascension Day we have lost Jesus, but only physically, for from “there” He can truly be “here”, everywhere, in a mysterious and most real way. He, “through all things were made” (Jo 1:3) has become now the King of God’s Kingdom, the universal Saviour, the Sacred Heart, to which we are all invited to enter and to be loved in full.
By celebrating Jesus Christ’s Ascension, we become ever more aware that the Son of God has entered totally in our human history, and geography, and biology, and chemistry, and physics, and all. He is now one of us, always and everywhere, with no other purpose for His descension but to remain with us as the vine needs its branches to bear fruit (Jo 15:1).
Questions to us then become unavoidable: Do I deeply, sincerely, and totally believe that the crucified and risen Lord loves me now for myself, without any merit of mine? That He loves me from where He is so that one day I can share with Him His life without end?
At times we may feel that God is exacting so many sacrifices from us that we have no chance to enjoy this life on earth. But this is not God’s will. We can only mention one example by recalling Jesus’ 30 years of loving and happy togetherness with His mother Mary in Nazareth.
And, then, does God truly need anything from us that He does not have already?
When we really decide to believe in Jesus Christ, descended and ascended, we quickly come to know that He is always total gift, total life, total love to us. By welcome Him as our Good Brother, our existence becomes holy, complete, eternal as He really is. Yes, we do not deserve Him, but our sins and stubbornness, as we sing on Easter Vigil of the Happy Fault, will make Him our true Saviour, our most reliable Friend.
The details of the Ascension, whether it happened after 40 days or not, whether it was from Jerusalem or Mount Tabor, should not detract us from the reality of Jesus present in our day as the incarnate, crucified, and risen Son of God and son of Mary. He is alive and living and life-giving. That is why in the records of the evangelists Jesus’ last words on earth are: Go out to the whole world … to the whole creation (Mk 16:1).
Believing in Jesus evidently means to take His words seriously for all of us to become GOERS of the Gospel, wherever we are and to every neighbour we have, teaching, baptizing, breaking the bread of life, being one heart and mind, always.
May our Ascension Feast be a joyful moment of thanksgiving to the Lord for having descended first among us, for having share our human destiny, and for sending us, with His “ascended” love, to the whole world!